Haute Horlogerie builds on a solid foundation.
Before the year 2002, the name Louis Vuitton had hardly any association with watches. The company had released a small quantity of travel clocks in the 1920s and 1930s. In 1988, Louis Vuitton presented Monterey I: a watch conceived by the architect and designer Gae Aulenti. The facility used to create the watch at the time was the IWC manufacture.
However, those at LVMH know how to start with nothing and go on to deliver significant results. Louis Vuitton's trump card was ultimately the Tambour model created within the walls of La Fabrique du Temps Louis Vuitton in 2002.
This was also the birthplace of the LV 525 Caliber: the beating heart of the Tambour Carpe Diem watch that won the Audacity Prize at the Grand Prix d’Horlogerie de Genève (GPHG) in 2021.
The hand-wound movement which activates the automata on the dial may have seemed to be a one-off experiment, but the idea was repeated for a new model in 2023. LV 525 has also been put to good use in the Tambour Opera Automata watch.
Louis Vuitton has transitioned from the 2021 Carpe Diem watch's European Vanitas skull to the Chinese art of Bian Lian from the Sichuan Opera: a spectacular show where masks are changed almost instantaneously in a flick of a fan.
The Western snake has been swapped for the Eastern dragon, yet this watch's fundamental principles remain unchanged. Pressing the push-piece at 2 o'clock makes the dragon raise its head to reveal the window for the jumping hour. At the same time, its tail serves as a retrograde minute hand on the fan.
The same fan can be seen on the winding crown at 4 o'clock. Last but not least, an indication in the shape of a calabash gourd to the left of the mask keeps track of the movement's 100-hour power reserve.
Louis Vuitton Tambour Opera Automata
The artistic contribution was made by masters invited to create the watch: the enamelist Anita Porchet and engraver Dick Steenman. An open view of the movement is revealed with the tourbillon in the mouth of a second caseback mask at 6 o'clock.