As with recent years Van Cleef et Arpels flagship Poetic Complications for the year is a double retrograde created by Jean-Marc Wiederrecht. The Five Weeks in a Balloon depicts a hot air balloon in enamel lifting off from Zanzibar, inspired by Jules Verne’s novel of the same name. The novel also provides the leitmotif for much of the rest of the 2011 collection.
The hours are indicated on the left by a bird while the minutes are shown on the right by the anchor of the balloon.
The dial is champlevé enamel with mother-of-pearl forming the clouds.
Unlike the earlier Poetic Complications retrograde watches this is in a 42 mm case making it suitable for both men and women.
Unlike enamelled watches from other watchmakers and jewellers, the work from VC&A tends to be more whimsical. This light spirit continues in the rest of the collection.
Each stage of the balloon’s voyage from Africa is further explored in the Extraordinary Dials collection. As the name suggests these are jewellery watches with lavishly decorated dials in gold, enamel and mother-of-pearl.
The first series of four watches depicts animals from the African plains: the elephant, giraffe, antelope and hippopotamus. All the animals are in relief and hand-engraved, with beautiful shades of enamel.
The second series of four watches depicts creatures of the Antarctic. Here you see the polar bear, seal, penguin and whale. Unlike the vibrant shades of the Africa series watches these timepieces are almost entirely comprised of various tones of blue.
Especially stunning is the mother-of-pearl Aurora Borealis sky on the piece with the seals. It is subtle; you don’t notice it until you really.
Finally the balloon ends up in the jungle somewhere and for that VC&A has created a unique high jewellery timepiece set with diamonds and blue and pink sapphires. The main flower flips open to reveal the time on a mother-of-pearl dial.
Jules Verne also gives inspiration for the last of the 2011 collection. Les Voyages Extraordinaires, a set of four enamelled watches in an enormous wood box that resembles a chest, depicts motifs from four of his novels: Five Weeks in a Ballon, Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea, A Journey to the Centre of the Earth and From the Earth to the Moon.
Each of these has a stunning, vividly coloured paillonne enamel dial with gold and silver for the relief portions. And despite the serious artistry in the dials, the designs are bright and amusing.
- SJX
This message has been edited by SJX on 2011-01-30 09:43:05 This message has been edited by AnthonyTsai on 2011-01-30 16:22:12