Geneva Watch Days: Where watchmaking excellence meets innovation

Every year Geneva Watch Days brings together tens of thousands of watch collectors and enthusiasts around 52 brands for an experience which is becoming a major fixture on the watchmaking diary.

Champagne, tanned complexions and some of the finest watches on the planet marked the start of the fifth edition of Geneva Watch Days, a show launched in the midst of a pandemic by a group of 6 brands, Breitling, Bvlgari, De Bethune, Girard-Perregaux, H. Moser & Cie. and MB&F.
“We wanted to ensure our visibility in the face of the cancellation of watch fairs. We decided that it would be decentralised to reduce costs and avoid an overcrowded pavilion, and that’s how the principles of Geneva Watch Days were born,” Jean-Christophe Babin, CEO of Bulgari, who is now president of GWD, recalls for Euronews Culture.
Unlike more conservative watchmaking events, the atmosphere is informal and relaxed. Around the main pavilion in the heart of the Swiss city, participating brands have set up their headquarters in grand hotels to welcome customers, journalists and haute-horlogerie enthusiasts from all over the world. 
“We’ve always said that everybody should do what they want. We’ve started very small with a few brands, I never thought it would continue over after COVID, and now we’re here with 52 and 650 journalists, thousands of clients. It is now a big event,” boasts Breitling CEO Georges Kern, who has scored one of the biggest commercial successes in watchmaking in recent years since taking over the helm of the brand in 2017.   
Breitling took advantage of the event to launch the publication of a book celebrating the 140th anniversary of the Maison founded in 1884 in the canton of Bern, as well as three limited editions of legendary models: the Premier, the Navitimer and the Chronomat. Each is equipped with the revolutionary Calibre B19, which guarantees precision for a century and a 96-hour power reserve. 
Geneva Watch Days has carved out a special place for itself in the watchmaking calendar, alongside Watches and Wonders, the major international trade show held in the spring at Palexpo Geneva.    
“It’s the back to school spirit, everybody comes from their summer holiday with their heads free. You meet up and things start again. It doesn’t have that transactional vibe, it’s one of my favourite events in the watchmaking calendar”, says Rolf Studer, CEO of Oris, one of the show’s 12 associate brands.    
“There is now a huge diversity, with brands that made this History of watchmaking such as Breguet, medium size brands like Breitling or Bvlgari and also new growing brands. It’s the best diversity you can dream of when you come to discovering watchmaking”, added the CEO of Bvlgari, who says the show was thought “in a collegial and self-managed approach. We don’t like the ego spirit that is still present in this industry”, he added. 
Bvlgari, accustomed to being rewarded for its technological exploits, caused a sensation a few months ago by presenting the thinnest mechanical watch ever made, the Octo Finissimo Ultra COSC. A timepiece just 1.70 mm thick, as thin as a 0.10 euro coin. At Geneva Watch Days, the maison unveiled another innovation: the Octo Roma Grande Sonnerie Tourbillon includes a carillon capable of playing a personalised melody conceived by conductor Lorenzo Viotti. 
Geneva Watch Days aims to attract tens of thousands of curious watch enthusiasts over four days of festivities. Every evening, brands gather in the pavilion to meet customers and collectors.    
Every afternoon, the public has free access to the hundred or so watches on display in the pavilion, located on the famous Rotonde du Mont Blanc, which faces the watchmaking capital’s emblematic jet d’eau. Guided tours are organized daily by experts from the Fondation de la Haute Horlogerie (FHH).    
In the adjacent glass-walled area, conferences are held by the brands and partner organisations, such as the Grand Prix d’Horlogerie de Genève (GPHG), which each year rewards the finest creations in the sector.   
Oris has used the fair to present a limited edition of 1000 pieces of its famous Diver Sixty-Five, the result of a collaboration with the French Football League’s (LFP) charity partner CNAPE (Convention Nationale des Associations de Protection de l’Enfance), entitled “Défenseurs de l’enfance”. For the first time, the brand’s logo is handwritten, as if a child had decorated the dial.   
Another Swiss brand, Girard-Perregaux, which is also one of the main organizers, reveals two new products, including “one of the most open and transparent high horlogerie that exists”, according to its CEO, Patrick Pruniaux.   
The Tourbillon with Flying three bridges, a re-edition of one of the brand’s iconic models, reveals the signature mechanical marvel of Girard-Perregaux, one of the few watchmakers to have won the prestigious Aiguille d’Or, the supreme award for haute-horlogerie, in 2013 after a 10 years’ work.   
“I’ve always had a lot of passion for craftsmanship and I believe its message goes beyond the feature of the watch: it’s also sharing the passion and all the emotion that is inside. I think it matters more and more to the end consumer”, Patrick Pruniaux explains.    
After three euphoric years, the Swiss watchmaking sector is experiencing a slowdown, mainly due to falling sales in China. “We have one region that is negative and all the others that are positive. But last year was by far a record year. Trees never grow to the sky,” says Babin, who says he is pleased with the resilience of watch consumers around the world.   
According to Delphine Bachmann, the Geneva State Councillor for the Economy and Employment, Swiss watchmaking exports reached approximately 26.7 billion francs (€28.4 billion) in 2023, nearly half of these exports come from Geneva