Quiet luxury fashion is on the rise, helped by the unbranded “stealth wealth” styles favoured by the Roys in HBO’s hit TV show Succession and the louche-yet-elegant looks donned by Gwyneth Paltrow during her now infamous ski trip trial. There is, however, always a rule breaker where you least expect one, and this spring, it’s the ultimate “stealth” brand, Rolex, that’s bending the rules and bringing a sense of playfulness to the rarefied milieu of haute luxury.
Historically, Rolex hasn’t been seen as a rebellious brand, preferring to tweak existing models with one or two carefully considered updates at a time. However, all this changed in 2020, when the watchmaker released a series of Oyster Perpetuals with colourful lacquered dials. An instant hit, these “candy coloured” steel iterations are so elusive, they are now on resale sites for more than double their original price, with the bright orange version being the most sought-after with valuations ranging from £13,000 to £16,000.
At this year’s Watches & Wonders exhibition in Geneva, the Swiss marque upped the ante with two new designs that set social media alight: a “Bubbles” version of the Oyster Perpetual in 31, 36 and 41mm, and a “Puzzle” version of the Day-Date 36, both as exuberant as they were unexpected.
The Week
Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.
Before the description, it’s important to consider the history, because truth be told, Rolex invariably uses the past to action new unconventional designs, of which there have been many, including the Daytona Cosmograph, which wasn’t well received upon its release in 1963. Indeed, it took a certain Paul Newman to transform this horological motor racing tool into the icon it is today.
Simple steel versions may be like hen’s teeth, but Rolex isn’t all about monochromatic classics. In fact, the company has a long history of brightly coloured dials, some even appearing on chronographs – a 1990s Daytona with a blood red dial sold at Sotheby’s Hong Kong in 2019 for more than £400,000. It is, however, the Day-Date that has consistently chased rainbows: the brand first popularised coloured enamel dials, known as Stella dials, on this model in the late 1970s and early 1980s when fashion was embracing daring silhouettes and bold colours. Since then, colour at “The Crown” has been a constant feature, although never before has it been so celebrated.
The Bubbles Oyster Perpetual is a fun and joyful model that has a serious side: its spotted pattern reunites the five hues – candy pink, turquoise blue, yellow, coral red, and green – introduced to the range in 2020, compounding the importance of this sell-out series and turning this particular edition into a sneaky tribute piece.
“Who would have thought that Rolex was this fun?”, said Jason Pitsch on Professional Watches. The Bubbles could become the “next ultra-collectible OP model”.
Sign up for Today's Best Articles in your inbox
A free daily email with the biggest news stories of the day – and the best features from TheWeek.com
The Rolex 2023 Day-Date Jigsaw edition with turquoise dial
More obviously playful and whimsical is the Oyster Perpetual “Puzzle” edition of the Day-Date 36 in yellow gold with a dial decorated with tiny jigsaw puzzle pieces in similar multicoloured hues. Instead of displaying the 12 o’clock, this Day-Date has the unusual cachet of revealing one of seven inspirational words – Happy, Eternity, Gratitude, Peace, Faith, Love and Hope – while the window at three o’clock reveals daily one of 31 exclusive emojis in place of the date.
If this launch seems unusually idiosyncratic for Rolex, consider perhaps the brand’s verve for “reactionary” designs and marketing. For example, in 1967, the Sea Dweller became the first dive watch to be fitted with a helium gas escape valve and commercial models of this ultra-accurate and robust timepiece followed in the early 1970s. These weren’t so much intended for use as to immerse the wearer in a world full of adventure including the great advances in ocean exploration that were happening at the time. Comparing undersea achievements to an emoji language isn’t the point, what matters is Rolex’s unabashed ability to seize the zeitgeist and boldly claim its share of it.
The Rolex 2023 Day-Date Jigsaw edition with orange dial
The ‘Emoji Rolex’
Today, there are more than 3,000 emojis available to use and we all do use them. A number of universities and institutes have also used emojis to study changes in contemporary language, which adds weight to the argument that this new Rolex watch has already established itself as a emblem of modern communication. Because as simplistic as it may sound, emojis connect communities globally, even more so than time.
The Day-Date is “associated with buttoned-up elegance and prestige” that it earned the moniker of the “Rolex President”, said Bilal Khan on WatchTime. So taking this watch and repurposing it as the “Emoji Rolex”, sends a “loud and clear message” from the brand: “don’t take them so seriously and don’t try to box in their creative vision.”
Plus, the fact that the watch is explicitly designed to create an emotional response from a (more or less) tradition dial is pretty clever. Why? Because unless you are wearing a smartwatch or fitness device, using your wristwatch to ground you in the present, make you smile, and perhaps even save your life as tool watches once did, is less of a concern these days for makers and wearers – if anything, most of us use a phone to tell the time.
So, love it or hate it, the Day-Date “Puzzle” is unquestionably a strong design piece that perfectly encapsulates emoji culture as a uniting global phenomenon. Yes, it’s a luxury item, but it wants to be understood by everyone, much like the first commercially available Sea Dwellers. That, in itself, deserves a tiny heart at three o’clock for ingeniously using popular taste to create something niche, fun and exclusive.
Alexandra Zagalsky is a London-based journalist specialising in luxury, art and travel. She began her career working on a cultural guide for English-speaking expats in Paris, where her first major break was an interview with Lionel Poilâne, the late baker of Saint-Germain-des-Prés famed for his signature sourdough loaves. Returning to London in her early 20s, she went on to write for not only The Week but also The Art Newspaper’s Art of Luxury supplement, The Telegraph and The Times, as well as art and design platforms including 1stDibs’ Introspective Magazine and the magazines of the V&A, Sotheby’s and Christie’s. She studied fine art and art history at Goldsmiths, University of London and continues to explore travel journalism through the lens of art, craftsmanship and culture.
