Hermès Gets Whimsical at Watches & Wonders 2022

A brand that started in leather goods, Hermès is synonymous with quality and class. A shining star in the accessories world, for the past few years, Hermès has taken an elevated approach to its timepieces with high complications and designs that rival any other watchmaker’s.

So, with a decades-long love for watches from the Heure H and Cape Cod lines, the novelties released at Watches & Wonders 2022 only build on the years past, proving Hermès is a serious contender in the watch world and that this is only the beginning of the brand’s journey into haute horlogerie.

Inspired by Loïc Dubigeon’s 1984 scarf print, the Arceau Les Folies du Ciel watch is a piece that combines the brand’s history with modern horology. Designed as a tribute to those early visionaries who thought humans would one day fly, the beloved “Les Folies du Ciel” scarf is still available today.
 

I saw this playful piece during the show, and it brought me back to a childlike innocence; before I even loved watches. No watch has ever evoked that emotion in me.
 

Housed in a 38mm gold case featuring a mother-of-pearl dial, the hand-painted neoralite balloon and bird motifs summon the desire to travel and soar to new heights. Limited to twenty-four pieces, the Les Folies du Ciel watch is as whimsical as the scarves that inspired it.

With an underlying theme of travel in many of its novelties, the Arceau Le Temps Voyageur was no exception.
 

A must-have, frequently-talked-about favorite of many show attendees, the Arceau Le Temps Voyageur features a “Traveling Time” mechanism made exclusively for Hermès. This mechanism uses a disc-type display to show the time anywhere from Sydney to Los Angeles, totaling 24 time zones. Also inspired by a scarf design, the satellite rotates on a map that first appeared on the “Planisphère d’un monde équestre” scarf in 1978 by Jérome Colliard.
 

With one variation sized at 41mm in platinum and the other at 38mm in steel, the Le Temps Voyageur’s 122 components dedicated to displaying only the home time emphasize just how committed Hermès is to compete in the watch game.