Dragon Mystérieux Watch

CARTIER FINE WATCHMAKING BREAKS NEW FRONTIERS

Fine Watchmaking and High Jewellery: the confluence of Cartier’s two founding fields will be the highlight of the 2016 edition of the Salon International de la Haute Horlogerie. A unique creative partnership has thus been initiated between High Jewellery, with all the flamboyance of its gemstones, the power of its style and the expertise of its craft, and Fine Watchmaking, with its attention to detail and its emblematic watches and complications.

Master watchmakers and master jewellers, facing the same constraints and driven by the same ambitions, merge their skills to create five extraordinary jewellery watches on the boundaries of both worlds. The panther tries its hand at the complication game, with two watches that transpose Cartier’s supreme expertise into a narrative register. Enamel granulation, the latest addition to the collection of Cartier artistic crafts, introduces a rich diversity of chromatic range to the Maison’s iconic feline. Five Fine Watchmaking signature watches illustrate the creative dynamism of the 2016 Salon, hoisting the twin banners of technical prowess and aesthetic progress to new heights. Finally, since experimenting with shape has always been at the heart of Cartier watchmaking, the Maison has decided to unveil the new Hypnose and Drive de Cartier watches at the Salon.

With a focus on thirteen distinctive creations and two new collections, traditional definitions have been shaken up in the celebration of a new multi-faceted expertise that combines High Jewellery and Fine Watchmaking. The mysterious has extended its magic beyond the limits of imagination, blurring previously finite boundaries in an exploration of new creative territories. The force of Cartier’s watchmaking expertise can be measured by the depth of the emotion it inspires.

High Jewellery and Fine Watchmaking in an extraordinary, unprecedented collaboration

For over 160 years, Fine Watchmaking and High Jewellery have written the history of Cartier side by side. Today, these two worlds come together.

With the audacity to break the rules of separating genres, this collaboration is driven by a vision of creative territory in which diverse skills complement one another to their mutual advantage. The movement has been ushered into existence by Cartier, whose unique and decisive view assures the value of such exchanges.

Thus, amid the secrecy of its workshops, Cartier creates rare and precious objects that contribute to the beauty of our world. Here, the dialogue established between complementary skills yields extraordinary results.

By working together, craftsmen surpass their own limitations to blaze a new path. Through their hands and under their skilled eyes, miracles take on shape and colour, volume and brilliance. The ultimate achievement is the creation of emotion, through pioneering curiosity and unlimited boldness – the authentic Cartier signatures.

A DRAGON OF MYSTERY AND FIRE

Passionately curious about distant civilisations, Cartier has often brought back dragons from the East for its High Jewellery workshops. These creatures of fantasy, once duly installed at Rue de la Paix, serve as an invitation to dream, contemplate, and share this unique beauty. They have even become the motifs for watches fitted with fascinating mechanisms, combining the power of their heritage with the exceptional expertise of the Maison.

A fierce and protective animal of fantasy wraps itself around a mysterious dial in a never-seen-before swirl of diamond-set scales. This enigmatic creature is endowed with emerald eyes and a bewitching presence. A line of onyx brings tension and dynamism to the composition, housing the movement within its undulating forms. On either side, coral provides structure and rhythm to the design, even marking out the animal’s profile. Between its horns lies a faceted cushion-shaped 23.77-carat fire opal, the stone which symbolizes life, strength and energy all combined. Between sculpting, mounting the stones, gem-cutting and cutting to measure, some 1,100 hours of work were required to bring this creation to life. The colours create a vibrant chromatic harmony, a veritable Cartier signature.

A worthy successor to the mystery movements that began appearing at Cartier in 1912, this sheer spectacle of time perpetuates the enigma of their complexity. This powerful work merges magic and mystery, poetry and fantasy... confident and generous in its dimensions, and dazzling in its presence.