It doesn’t quite work to apply the old adage ‘necessity is the mother of invention’ to the world of luxury watches – but it’s certainly true to say that straitened circumstances can ‘fuel’ imagination.
From Necessity to Design
As was the case with Bvlgari’s original (and brillianty named ) Tubogas wrist watch of 1948.
The guns of World War Two may have fallen silent three years earlier, but Europe still had a long way to go before life could be described as being anything like ‘back to normal’ with Italy, in particular, struggling to recover.
Restoring and upgrading the country’s energy supply was key, and it was the use of modern, articulated pipework for the movement of fuel gas that led the Roman jeweller’s designers to explore the possibility of creating the coiled, flexible bracelet with the name that describes exactly what inspired it – those industrial ‘tubes of gas’.
But there’s nothing industrial about the latest Tubogas Manchette unveiled at LVMH Watch Week.
As luxurious a woman’s watch as you’re ever likely to see, the new Manchette (or ‘cuff’) is subtly set with a hefty 12 carats of diamonds in a sunray motif, offset by a healthy smattering of citrines, rubellites, peridots, amethysts and topaz to create a pyrotechnic display of colour all around the wide, single coil of the bracelet.
At the head, there’s a square link housing a round watch head that harks back to the design of the very earliest Tubogas models, which contained movements by makers such as Vacheron Constantin, Piaget and Jaeger-LeCoultre.
A High-Jewellery Icon for Today
Today’s Tubogas and Serpenti watches are, of course, powered by Bvlgari’s own movements, with the Manchette getting the suitably minuscule Lady Solotempo BVS 100 self-winding calibre measuring 3.9mm thick.
This, and the even slimmer (2.5mm) BVP 100 used in the Maglia Milanese Monete secret watch also revealed at LVMH Watch Week, owe their development to technology perfected during the dozen or more years that Bvlgari has relentlessly pursued ‘thinness’ since the reveal of the record-breaking Octo Finissimo Tourbillon in 2014.
There’s more modern tech in the coiled bracelet, too – these days, the precious metal outer casing is layered over a titanium blade, rather than one made from spring steel.
Jonathan Brinbaum, managing director of Bvlgari’s watch division since 2024, says the new Manchette won’t be a limited edition but, due to the complexity of gem setting involved in creating each one, only around five are likely to be made this year – each with a price tag of Euros 160,000.
“By introducing watches such as the Manchette and the Maglia Milanese during this edition of LVMH Watch Week we are taking Bvlgari back to who we are – which, in watch terms, is a maker of women’s pieces and a brand for which 80 per cent of its clients are female,” explained Brinbaum while unveiling the new pieces on a fragrant upper floor of the brand’s expansive Milan boutique.
Which is a place, incidentally, that seems far removed from the twists and turns of a commercial gas pipe…..
