Editor’s Note
This article explores the shifting aesthetics in watchmaking, where a recent trend toward gender-neutral, smaller-case designs is now being challenged by a resurgence of the bold, rigid bracelet watch. It examines how consumer desires and industry responses continue to redefine notions of style and statement on the wrist.
Not so long ago, watchmakers wholeheartedly embraced a genderless aesthetic. In boutiques, it was not uncommon to hear managers whisper that “women are increasingly buying extra-flat watches, 38 mm sizes.” A new manifesto, an expression of their freedom and power in a world that had been highly codified until then. Faced with this new approach, manufacturers naturally abandoned XXL diameters in favor of more discreet cases (38, sometimes even 36 mm) on models now described as “unisex.” Like perfume, the line between feminine and masculine seemed to be blurring.
But like any trend, this one eventually ran out of steam. One desire chases another. Women – and brands with them – have shifted the narrative, reconnecting with a more expressive form of watchmaking. With their rigid gold bracelets, watches like Cartier’s Baignoire and Chanel’s Première Galon, launched with great fanfare at the end of 2025, testify to this return of jewelry-watches. Pieces more constraining than a second-skin leather strap, but which precisely embrace this presence, this density on the wrist.
Behind this return of the rigid bracelet watch lies a certain desire to reconnect with an extreme femininity.
At Bvlgari, Jonathan Brinbaum, Director of the Watch Division, also confirms this with the launch of the new Serpenti Aeterna:
Through these models, the intention is also to combine the useful (telling time) with the pleasant (the precious accessory). A convergence championed by Chanel, for whom the choice of a rigid bracelet is first and foremost a matter of style and passion. Indeed, Arnaud Chastaingt, Director of the Chanel Horlogerie Creation Studio, has long been fond of this exercise.
The same sentiment is echoed at Bvlgari:
A fine mesh that also seduces Gucci, launching this year two new rigid bracelet watches within the Model 2000 collection, born in 1972.
Finally, this trend says a lot about the very contemporary evolution of female desire: no longer having to choose. To unite a watch and a piece of jewelry in a single object. Because a watch often also means difficulty in pairing it with jewelry. Timepieces do not tolerate proximity well: repeated shocks from bracelets piled on the same wrist, visual competition, friction of materials. The rigid bracelet model, however, solves this equation. It stands alone, self-sufficient, designed to be worn as a bracelet – and not as a “tool” to be dressed up.
