The website for The Keystone, a high-end vintage watch dealer in Los Angeles, features a section dedicated to “holy grails,” or collectible watches distinguished by their quality and rarity. Exhibit A: the Patek Philippe Ref. 591 chronograph that appears at the top of the page. Housed in a 34 mm rose gold case, the c. 1939 wristwatch was sold by Walser Wald, a renowned Patek Phillipe retailer in Buenos Aires, and features a genuine rarity: the dealer’s signature on its salmon-pink dial.
Among the 16 additional grails listed on the site, the usual steel suspects (the Royal Oak, the Nautilus and, of course, the Daytona) are missing in action. Instead, they’ve been upstaged by a slew of surprising, even festive pieces—including four models set with a kaleidoscope of colored stones, such as a yellow gold Rolex GMT-Master “SARU” ref. 16758 featuring blue SApphires and red RUbies on the bezel.
The Keystone’s selection of vibrant, gem-set wristwatches—be they models set with faceted stones, usually sapphires, or those bearing dials made of colorful hard stone—isn’t exactly new. “We have always been drawn to watches with gemstones,” co-founder Max Abbott tells Robb Report, acknowledging that for a long time, “we were outliers in that regard.”
What’s new is that buyers are now getting the memo. Dealers at the Original Miami Beach Antique Show earlier this year noted the rising popularity of stone dial watches from brands like Rolex and Piaget. At The Keystone, the trend is playing out much the same way. “We’d put up these fossil dials and really funky stuff that eight years ago didn’t get the love that they should have been getting,” Abbott says. “And now buyers are really starting to get it.”
The faceted pieces, however, tend to draw more knowledgeable collectors. “The brands we tend to focus on—like Patek Philippe, Rolex, Cartier and Audemars Piguet—all have very high standards for quality and setting in their jeweled watches,” Abbott says. “This gives collectors the confidence that the brands bring the same intense focus for quality of stones as they do for their watchmaking. Another great thing about gem-set watches is that they do not take themselves too seriously.”
The less sober, more fun approach to watch collecting extends beyond buyers’ newfound interest in vintage Rolexes steeped in the brand’s more bohemian vibe—like these groovy styles that Italian Watch Spotter highlighted a few years ago—to modern chronographs bedecked with multicolor sapphires. Take the $112,100 Chronomaster Sport Rainbow that Zenith introduced at LVMH Watch Week. Set with 5.36 carats of baguette-cut diamonds and sapphires, the 41 mm piece is encased in white gold and features rainbow hour markers on a black lacquer dial.
“It’s very much a gem-set sparkling product,” Romain Marietta, Zenith’s chief product officer, explained as he presented the brand’s novelties. He noted that the Chronomaster Sport Rainbow marks the first time that Zenith has made a watch in full white gold, with a white gold bracelet, and the first time that the rainbow bezel appears in the Chronomaster collection. “It has a black dial to create contrast and to make the stones really pop,” he added.
Yoni Ben-Yehuda, head of watches for the retailer Material Good, saw the color trend coming when he spoke to Robb Report in December about his boldest predictions for the new year: “I think 2025 will be the year of exotic dials,” he said. “I think we will see a huge renaissance of stone dials from both the independent brands, along with some of the more forward-thinking larger houses. A play in materials, from colors to textures, will add depth and life to dials and highlight complications.”
The color phenomenon reflects a truism about the modern watch market in the post-post-pandemic era: “It’s people wanting something different rather than getting the coin that everybody wants,” Abbott says. “Everybody wanted a 5711. You got it, cool—you got the token. But now people, I think, want to express themselves and differentiate themselves.”
Color us thrilled!
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Victoria Gomelsky
Victoria Gomelsky is editor-in-chief of the jewelry trade publication JCK and a frequent contributor to the New York Times and Robb Report. Her freelance work has appeared in AFAR, WSJ Magazine and More.
