Prestige Singapore – July 2019

#prestigediversions | JULY 2019 PRESTIGE 51

FLIGHT

SHOW

Heads up, fans of pilot watches:

IWC is holding a Pilot’s Watches

Exhibition from Jul 1 to 9 at

Pavilion Kuala Lumpur’s Centre

Court. Apart from the current

collection, the brand is showcasing

12 historic references from its

archives, including the legendary

Mark XI pictured here.

Track a nd Trac e
The hype over blockchain may have died down, but the technology’s
potential still remains, and Vacheron Constantin has begun to
harness it. The brand has announced its partnership with the
Arianee consortium to deploy the latter’s blockchain-based
digital certification system for its watches. According to Vacheron
Constantin, the new digital certification system’s open-source
design makes a record permanent and secure, yet allows ownership
to be both anonymous and transferable. This system was first
implemented in the Les Collectionneurs collection earlier in May,
and remains a pilot project for now. Expect further rollouts of this
technology for the rest of the brand’s collections over time though.

The Year in Preview

Earlier in April, the LVMH group confirmed its participation

in Baselworld 2020, thus confirming the presence of Hublot,

Bvlgari, Zenith and TAG Heuer at what is still the world’s largest

watch and jewellery trade show. The group has just announced

that it will host the LVMH Swiss Watch Manufactures Exhibition

— its first such event — in the Dubai Bvlgari Hotel in January

next year. This effectively replaces the group’s activities in

Geneva every January during SIHH, and is clearly a response

to SIHH’s shift to April from 2020. The new event will ostensibly

allow retailers and the media to have a clearer view of the

LVMH brands’ plans and novelties for the year ahead. This

should come as welcome news for those who are worried

about the dearth of new timepieces in the first quarter of 2020.

Baselworld remains a

fixture for LVMH, but

the group’s activities

in Geneva every

January will be moved

to Dubai instead

NEW MOON

Hermès has updated the Arceau Petite Lune this year, beginning

with a cleaner dial that gives the watch a sleeker look. Meanwhile,

the moon at 10:30 is now a smiling face in lieu of a simple polished

disc, as inspired by the Acte III, Scene I, La Clairiere Hermès scarf

designed by French-German artist Edouard Baribeaud. The tweaks

are minor; the timepiece’s quirky, asymmetric design remains.