The prosecution argues that your entire watch collection leans heavily on the same off-centred display principle, executed in different ways each time.
Not guilty! Many prestigious watch brands, for whom I have the greatest respect, have continued to refine the three-hands watch design for centuries. I don’t claim to be better than them! So yes, we will continue to iterate the off-centre display. It’s a unique concept that can manifest itself in countless different forms. We’ve showcased this repeatedly, and we won’t be stopping anytime soon. The off-centre, handless display doesn’t stifle creativity – quite the opposite. I feel that central hands enforce a restrictive mould, a straitjacket, which we can break free from to express our own brand of creativity. Trilobe doesn’t do central displays or hands. And that’s how it’s going to stay.
You stand accused of resting on your laurels. Your Calibre X-Centric dates back to 2020, and we’re nearly in 2024!
Guilty as charged! Sooner or later, we’ll obviously be introducing a different mechanism. But I’ve always strived for Trilobe to break away from the constraints of the present moment, the here and now. You can’t engineer a new movement on Instagram. We’re growing one step at a time. Our R&D department is a hive of activity, and we’ll soon present something fresh based on the X-Centric. A new calibre? Absolutely, it’s in the pipeline, although it’s unlikely to be ready before 2025. But rest assured, there will be plenty of other novelties along the way.
You stand accused of prevaricating between men’s and women’s timepieces, choosing to settle somewhere in between.
Guilty! But we stand by this decision wholeheartedly. When it comes to creativity, discrimination is not about men or women, it’s about beauty. I see watchmaking as an art. Would you ask a painter if their art is for men or women? No.
The same applies to watchmaking. So, yes, I plead guilty to trusting our customers to decide whether a watch is beautiful, and whether it suits them. We’ll never box them into a binary choice between men’s or women’s watches. That’s not our place. In fact, even our retailers don’t demand this.
Trilobe, a French brand, has been Swiss Made since its inception. Is the defendant reluctant to celebrate his roots?
Not guilty. In fact, we’re planning to gradually promote our Parisian flair, but it’s not about tooting our own horn for the sake of it. I want to highlight what we have the skills to create in-house. And our house happens to be based in Paris.
We recently relocated near the Opera Garnier, where we now occupy a sprawling 300-square-metre workspace. With five full-time watchmakers, our assembly happens right here in Paris. This momentum will continue to pick up, as our goal is to tell the story of a prestigious Parisian watchmaking house. If you think about it, there hasn’t really been one of those since Breguet.
Co-branding, collaboration: Trilobe is finding its feet. Does the defendant not possess a strong enough brand to stand alone without third-party endorsements?
Not guilty! If you’ve been keeping tabs, we’ve entered into three collaborations in two and a half years. Here’s a little secret: in the last year alone, we received 37 partnership proposals – about three per month. We declined nearly all of them because we felt that they served the collaborators’ ego more than they served Trilobe.
Overdoing collaborations can negatively impact the coherence of a collection. We need to tread carefully. Our partnership with the Dubai Watch Club, for instance, was of high quality and expanded our creative scope into areas we hadn’t fully explored [i.e. guilloché]. It was a win-win. That’s how it should always be. You need a strong idea. That’s what bolsters a brand, not collaborations for the sake of it, even if they’re with big names.
A 100% handless brand that goes the distance: many are called but few are chosen. Trilobe stands accused of arrogance, for daring to succeed where 250 years of watchmakers have failed!
Not guilty. For the record, I’m not a Marxist; I don’t believe history is bound to repeat itself! The past doesn’t dictate the future. Moreover, the paradigm was very different two centuries ago from what it is today.
These days, people want to be different. They’re after unique, personal items that reflect their individuality. I’d point out that many brands in recent years have relied on gimmicks or one-hit wonders, offering a fun and original complication but nothing more.
This isn’t Trilobe’s way. We’re playing the long game: we’re committed to establishing a distinguished Parisian watchmaking house. That’s why the brand doesn’t bear my name. If I were to exit stage left prematurely, Trilobe would carry on without a hitch. We have 20 years’ worth of ideas and designs in the pipeline. A skilled Artistic Director could easily take the reins and continue to grow the Trilobe brand.
