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Andrew McUtchen
The Cartier Collectors’ Rendezvous is a comparatively new improvement, the place Cartier makes use of the event of Watches and Wonders as a chance to not solely contain their most loyal and discovered collectors, but in addition to allow them to in on the expertise of the world’s largest watch truthful in a extremely intimate, unique, and privileged manner.
It isn’t simply “right here’s the brand new watches on a pink velvet tray.” It’s an opportunity to get contained in the design course of, to index opinions off different collectors, and to get a way of the historic context across the items. This yr, I used to be privileged to reasonable the dialogue. As a newly minted, Cartier-curious customer-turned-budding collector (you will have adopted my journey to my first Tank Louis Cartier from About Effing Time, to a latest panel chat with Tim Inexperienced, Justin Hast, and our very personal Russell Sheldrake) – the honour was not misplaced on me!
Becoming a member of me as a co-host was Cartier’s Picture, Type and Heritage Director Pierre Rainero. To my left for the dialog was a senior Cartier designer who labored on the 2025 assortment. So, you set these two unimaginable folks along with the brand new timepieces, and you’ve got this fairly surreal expertise of being not solely led into the Cartier area, however then right into a boardroom throughout the stomach of the sales space that’s not for public entry to congregate with among the world’s greatest recognized Cartier collectors. Pairing the historic context set by Pierre with design insights from the collections’ precise designers set the scene for some very vibrant storytelling.
Add all these issues up, and it’s just about a Cartier collector’s dream; an opportunity for friends to be with “their folks”, and to essentially have some illumination across the new assortment from a number of sources of sunshine. I simply can’t think about something being as efficient as these two hosts, one whose fingerprints are actually on the designs earlier than us on the desk.
I suppose my function in that blend was simply to reasonable and facilitate, and to ensure that everybody within the room had a voice. I used to be there to create area for friends to have the ability to ask questions and share their tales. In actual fact, the very first thing that occurred after we all sat down was that Pierre produced an image of a monument on the entrance to the 1925 Exhibition of Fashionable Industrial and Ornamental Arts in Paris. It had the exact form of a Tank watch, with the brancards extending down both sides of rectangle, barely exceeding its extent at each ends. “This seems like a Tank, and it seems like a door”, Pierre opened, “so let’s start by sharing which ‘door’ we every got here in by to finish up right here, at a Cartier Collectors’ Rendezvous!”
What a query to interrupt the ice with this room of legendary collectors! Names included Italian legend Auro Montanari, American tremendous collector Eric Ku, in addition to a fresh-faced younger Spanish collector by the identify of Carlos Ortiz. Regardless of the shadow solid by most of the names, their anecdotes have been touching, private, and relatable. As I discussed, I’m outwardly a brand new Cartier convert, within the sense that I’ve all the time recognized and been curious concerning the model, however solely lately have I began to grasp the slipperiness of the slope. Solely lately have I felt its distinctive draw as a model. However I can inform you that draw is powerful, and even stronger after an expertise like this.
The visitor that I dropped at the desk was Head of Industrial of secondary market Subdial, Tim Inexperienced. Tim talks concerning the Tank and about Cartier with such conviction, and with a diametric contempt for different manufacturers as compared, that I simply needed to have him there. Within the latest video we did with Russell and Justin, speaking a couple of two watch assortment, he was fairly declarative about Cartier’s important place in his pair, and he was totally filled with contempt for every other selection, together with mine. I discovered that actually fascinating. Folks which are into Cartier are simply so dedicated and nearly cult-like of their ardour.
Naturally, the calibre of Cartier watches worn by friends was past elite. You have been nearly on the outer if you weren’t sporting a Cartier NSO, which stands for “new particular order”, a now rumoured-to-be-retired program that concerned folks ordering bespoke items. Trying round, I’d say the commonest watch within the room was the Crash, however tremendous uncommon fashions equivalent to a classic (non CPCP) Tank à Guichets (of which barely 400 fashions have been ever produced) and Tank Normale examples have been current.
The only unifying concept of the Tank that may by no means go away me is that it has this duality. There are two sides to the Tank coin. It has this exclusivity aspect, grounded in the truth that roughly (and solely) 100 Tank watches have been produced per yr from 1917 to the launch of the Should de Cartier in 1977. There are stated to be lower than 5,000 classic Tanks solely from this primary chapter. After which, after the Should de Cartier, there’s this ubiquity – a veritable explosion of manufacturing and of notoriety.
However someway, regardless of the rise in entry, there isn’t any dilution of its model energy. The Tank stays a towering icon in watchmaking and, unusually, it fully crosses the gender divide. It’s as a lot an icon for males as it’s for ladies. I contend that there’s no different watch like that, actually, within the sense that whereas it’s, on the one hand, ubiquitous, unavoidable, it has additionally been, and stays, really tremendous, tremendous uncommon and collectable for almost 70% of its life.
We have been capable of peruse extraordinary examples from the museum for example this level, and the assorted themes of the Tank – its change in proportions over time, its playfulness, and its varied collectable shapes too. We concluded the session with some actually detailed questions across the new items: Why have been the brancards eliminated on the Tank à Guichets? Why was the bevel framing the aperture for the hours and minutes hand-polished as an alternative of machine-polished? Why have been the numbers colour-matched to the strap?
Co-hosting this particular occasion for Cartier collectors granted me an perception into the way in which collectors’ minds work. It appears to me that they’re without end reconciling the brand new with the outdated. The traditional with the up to date. I discovered that, for a collector, there’s a lot respect and nearly reverence for the unique article, and there merely can’t be an excessive amount of adjustment away from regardless of the important aspect of that classic instance is.
And the factor that the majority excited me concerning the 2025 Cartier collections’ response from this very discovered cohort is that they have been tremendous, tremendous comfortable. They have been simply actually, visibly excited by the classic constancy in addition to the up to date twists. Just like the indirect angle of the hour aperture on the platinum Tank à Guichets, and the blood pink numerals that reference the ruby cabochon that’s lacking as a result of crown place at 12.
One other large perception was that the collectors have been simply tremendous impressed, and, sure, I’m going to say it; they have been turned on by one factor specifically. They have been massively turned on by the slimness of the gathering total.
It actually drew consideration to the truth that the CPCP Tank à Guichets fashions of their final instance have been on the thick aspect and had some components that have been a bit gauche, a bit clunky, like screws within the case sides for instance. So, know-how has come to the fore, together with constancy to unique designs. It led to those fashions being acquired so joyously, nearly ecstatically. And that’s not overstating it. Folks have been simply elated by what they noticed and what they held, and so they had effusive reward for the designers. It was a vibe. All of that’s simply to say that when you’re questioning what the temper was within the Cartier collector camp, it was past a heat reception. It was scorching in there. It was so good.
In closing, it must be stated that this – current firm who was co-hosting excluded – was a wonderfully designed collector expertise. Regardless of my official capability on the day, I joined the fray with the collector group and clamoured to order the pink gold Tank LC Computerized within the warmth of the second. In the identical manner that Rolex holds the crown for creating the cover-all watchmaking bundle, I feel Cartier is undeniably the highest of the mountain relating to magnificence because it pertains to watchmaking and watches.
And that magnificence was simply inexorably wrapped up with this complete expertise, the way in which that all of it transpired. The way in which everybody was dressed, and the cordiality of the way in which everybody interacted, it was simply superb. A tremendous expertise. I really feel very privileged to have been chosen to facilitate that group and to do some filming with the model that week as nicely. It was one of many highlights of my profession within the watch trade.
