When you attempt to strap a newly unveiled watch around your ankle in front of the brand’s CEO – the gem-set bezel kinda matched my shoe – and the response is “If Rihanna can, why not”, you know that brand is in good hands.
Gerald Charles’ main man Federico Ziviani was likening my playful antics to the time the queen of poppy R’n’B chose to wear a watch around her neck at Pharrell’s debut LV show. Similar to Rihanna’s neck watch, the latest Gerald Charles Maestro pieces are dripping in gems. But unlike Rihanna’s neck watch, they probably look best on wrists – and are far more accessible too.
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This year, Gerald Charles was making its debut at Watches and Wonders so I hooked up with Ziviani in the brand’s booth to cop a look and feel of all its new novelties. Given Gerald Charles was only founded in 2000, the brand’s upward trajectory to now being talked about in the same breath as horology’s key players is impressive. Ziviani, who has been at the brand for six years but only became CEO in 2023, greets me in Gucci sneakers with a high five and a Gerald Charles cap, which he immediately implores I put on. He’s excited, buoyed by the experience of being here, in the mix at the world’s biggest watch fair.
“Fairs are the biggest moments for us because people can finally see the product in the flesh,” he says. “We've done fairs in Mexico, in New York, Dubai, and here. And every time people see our watches, they say they are 10 times better than in pictures.” While Ziviani is happy to have journalists’ eyes on his watches IRL, he’s particularly happy with how Watches and Wonders is being opened up to the public too.
“Before the Swiss industry was more in love with the Ivory tower, [and catered to] a more closed circle, but now it's opening up more,” he adds. “This is the right thing to do, and that's also what we're doing at Gerald Charles.”
Anyone who doesn’t know, Gerald Charles owes its name, its designs and its stature to Gerald Charles Genta, who was one of, if not the, greatest watchmaker of all time.
“I have a phrase that’s printed [up on the wall] in my office which is from Gerald himself. It says: I created Gerald Charles to be playful and to use colour like an artist uses paints in a canvas,” Ziviani tells me, “so we never forget where we come from and the fact we can be fun."
Right on cue, Gerald Charles’ latest pieces reflect exactly this vibe shift. As well as unveiling four new Maestro pieces (the model it's been building a loyal following through in recent years), an entirely new collection has also been added to its repertoire; the Masterlink.
The first series of the Maestros were much more traditional and lauded for having a unique baroque-like design, thus laying the foundations to embrace more fun in the future. Each one is lined with sapphires around the bezels – orange, yellow, light blue and purple ones respectively. Though extraordinarily difficult to source, Ziviani says it was well worth it. “We wanted something new, something different, something that was more colourful, even more playful, like candies,” he adds.
As far as the new Masterlink is concerned, it’s thinner than the Maestro, has a brand new crown and generally displays more of Genta’s DNA – primarily because it takes inspiration from the last integrated bracelet that the icon ever designed in 2007. “The pressure [of creating a new watch] was diluted across the three years of research and development,” says Ziviani. “We got comfortable with the pressure and we learnt how to handle it.”
Considering Genta is behind several of the most loved integrated bracelet watches – hello Audemars Piguet Royal Oak, IWC Ingenieur, Patek Philippe Nautilus – Ziviani says it feels like “the natural evolution [for Gerald Charles] is to develop” Genta’s last integrated bracelet design across its collections. “Step-by-step we’ll be completing the collections, keeping the Maestro and the Masterlink alive in the future," he says. “But we only have a few artisans and a few watchmakers so we're not in a rush."
