Trends from Watches and Wonders 2025

With a footprint equivalent to that of eight rugby fields, Watches & Wonders Geneva hosted 60 maisons this year, each presenting their novelties in luxurious, engaging spaces alongside fine dining experiences, Champagne and coffee bars.

With these numbers in mind, it is near impossible to see every brand or novelty, yet with a minimum of 12 half-hour meetings a day over the first four press and retailer days, I managed to make good use of my time, though that excluded the extensive “In the City” programme and adjacent side events around Geneva.

What sometimes felt like the watchworld equivalent of speed dating, I clocked at least 7km daily between meetings, which consisted mainly of “touch and try” sessions.  With 1,600 journalists in attendance from around the world, I was pleased to have started early in the year to secure one-on-one time with company leads and design teams — all highlights of my week, which I’ll share over the coming months.    

After my encounters with more than 175 timepieces in hand and on my wrist, here are a few examples and initial reflections on the mood and trends that stood out at the fair. 

Colour

Whether an outcome of leaner budgets in these challenging times or a response to the much-needed playfulness we require in our lives right now, Watches & Wonders was a veritable Pantone party of colourful dials from haute horlogerie to accessibly priced luxe everyday wearers. There were bright hues, tints and tones in sunbursts and matt finishes, colourful gemstones, intricate artistic crafts, and popping complementaries inspired by nature to create stunning visual effects.

New neutral (burgundy)

Golden brown

Burgundy, a favourite “new neutral” brings an added touch of sophistication to even the sportiest of tool watches, while salmon and sand dials are joined by richer golden browns.

Reassuring blues

If colour theory is anything to go by, a full spectrum of calming blue dials and case materials sent emotive visual messages that bring a touch of tranquillity in a chaotic world and perhaps also allude to important aspects of brand provenance around trust and reliability.

Haute Horlogerie

It's the 100th anniversary of the Art Deco movement, which finds expression through revisited heritage pieces, window watches, and shapely timepieces. Haute Horlogerie, especially those with watch and jewellery offerings, flexed more muscle through mesmerising complications and record-breaking timepieces, many in celebration of anniversaries, movement milestones and the “golden age” of watchmaking, which reminds us of their incredible prowess but also that there is no time for complacency.

Independents

The smaller independents continue to bring the “wonder” to the fair with their truly avant-garde approach to high-end watchmaking. While presented with price increases and a decline in sales, the more accessibly-priced luxury brands certainly rose to the occasion with some seriously good-lookers and complications to boot — most notably calendars — to suit even the smallest of pockets and certainly worthy of inclusion in any collection.   

Affordable luxe