Louis Vuitton Unveils Fresh Tambour Observe, Cuts 80 % of Lineup – WWD

PARIS — Ban the clocks for Louis Vuitton’s watches.

As of Wednesday, 80 % of the luxurious French space’s timepieces will likely be retired, as a part of an upscaling walk that will likely be finished in September with the forming of a brandnew Tambour design.

The brandnew taste will likely be a three-hand streamlined rush at the French space’s flagship fashion, with an built-in bracelet. However the greatest novelty would be the worth level, which can jump via a fivefold issue.

“It’s not a revolution for the market, but it’s a revolution for us because of everything we are retiring and a new price point. On the scale of the brand it’s a small gamble, but for Louis Vuitton watches, it’s truly a radical change,” Louis Vuitton director of watches Jean Arnault instructed WWD.

“Going from a 4,000 euro price average to the 20,000-and-up range in one go is a daring gamble. It’s true that we have a lot of unknowns in doing this,” he mentioned.

“We don’t have a sales target, or a goal of growing by such-and-such percent annually. We are going to build growth little by little to be sure to have an irreproachable quality for the client and legitimacy.”

The logo’s lineup will move from greater than 100 energetic references to round 20, together with a handful of ladies’s watches, the attached Tambour Horizon Sunny Up oversee, the Tambour Boulevard Diver introduced in 2021, and the 5 brandnew Tambour fashions, with top watchmaking on supremacy of that. All of those will likely be lined via a five-year guaranty, up from 3.

Consistent with the manager, as of late’s Louis Vuitton oversee clientele is break between those that purchase watches as type equipment and oversee lovers and creditors.

However the point of view of shedding the primary division doesn’t faze him, although he imagines them attaining for the attached oversee and its customizable virtual oversee faces to compare their outfits.  

“Whatever the performance we have today — and it’s rather good — I’m not looking at it to pilot this change,” Arnault mentioned, deeming the Tambour iteration the logo’s greatest oversee forming of the hour two decades.

“Our goal is not to put a watch on everyone’s wrist. It’s to ensure that our historical collectors, our brand aficionados can recognize themselves in a more entry-level high-end watchmaking piece,” he persisted. “There’s also this idea of respecting long-standing clients and bringing value to what they’ve already collected.”

In a nutshell, the site is set appearing how severe the French luxurious space is set its watchmaking chops.

He’s “not interested in tripling the business by maximizing, lowering prices and doing more volume.” Rather, this step is set “leveraging the know-how of our craftspeople and ensure that a client entering a Louis Vuitton store — for the watches or by chance — will see that [these pieces] have a level of execution on par” with watchmaking natural gamers.

Arnault mentioned the walk was once a part of a long-game technique that stretches to 2030, “whatever the result of this collection.”

“We aren’t going to change strategy midway because it didn’t work,” he persisted. “We’re not going for an exceptional success or launching with a bang. It would be arrogant to think that way. But we are installing ourselves step by step, building a stable business.”

That is the “good fortune of being part of a big house that’s historically believed in watchmaking,” initiated with the 2002 forming of the primary Tambour design and furthered via making an investment in L. a. Fabrique du Temps to “create high watchmaking in a more spontaneous way, without having to think about an immediate return on investment,” he mentioned.

In preparation for the cutover, manufacturing of the outgoing oversee fashions was once halted 18 months in the past and the brandnew fashions received’t roll into shops till September, which Arnault described as a idleness that will permit the logo to give an explanation for the brandnew path to would-be consumers.

Regarded as a unisex fashion, the brandnew 40-mm Tambour oversee will are available two metallic choices with both a silver-gray or a deep blue dial, each priced at 19,500 euros; a steel-and-gold fashion; one in cast 18-karat yellow gold, and a rose gold model.

A number of the right away optic design adjustments are the a lack of lugs and the built-in bracelet but in addition a slimline profile of simply over 8 millimeters — towards 13 for the tide Tambour designs — that has been designed to look even thinner.

Inside of is the LFT023 proprietary motion designed via Louis Vuitton and codeveloped via Swiss actions experts Le Cercle des Horlogers, a call Arnault mentioned was once related to calling on a racing engine producer when launching a brandnew automobile.

“It would have taken us four or five years before arriving to a satisfactory level of robustness, by the time they had something tested and ready,” he defined. “I didn’t want to launch an unreliable product on the market just for the sake of saying we do everything [in-house].”

Don’t be expecting brandnew dials or a flurry of headaches coming i’m sick the sequence at a speedy week, both. If truth be told, he’s atmosphere alternative priorities for the 20 to 30 watchmakers of L. a. Fabrique du Temps, reminiscent of absolutely bespoke items, running on a selected fashion from begin to end, or growing top complication items.

“Today, we are organized to make small series, unique pieces. It’s not natural to us to do large runs of 1,000, 2,000, 4,000 pieces,” he mentioned, prior to including that not up to manufacturing capability itself, it might cruel concessions round design or finishings.

Past the logo’s industry, he additionally felt the strategic walk suits with sweeping adjustments in nation, the place “there is a growing appreciation of craft and less consumption, where instead of having 10 watches, you’ll only have one — but it’s magnificent.”