Gabriel Colliard is a Argentinian artist and enameller with over a decade of experience working with high-end Swiss watch brands including the likes of Patek Philippe and now MB&F. For the new MB&F LM101 Gabriel Colliard series, the artist was given creative licence to explore colours and composition of his choice, returning to one of his favourite subjects: the natural world of the Animal Kingdom. There are three designs in the collection, each limited to eight pieces.
The three watches are: Macaw – Red, Monkey – Blue, and Crocodile – Green, each depicting the focal animal in Cloisonné enamel on the dial plate of the LM101. To accommodate the enamel, the normal subdials that play home to the time display and power reserve indicator have been removed, which allows for a single, complete image across the breadth of the piece. In order to keep the watch a useful timepiece, the respective hands have been elongated so that they don’t get lost against the image behind.
Going through piece by piece, the Macaw – Red features two scarlet macaws against a blazing red sky over the golden coastline where a dark forest on the left meets the ocean on the right. Depicting an entire scene in a single focal colour while retaining the ability to convey landscape and shape was one of the primary challenges of each composition.
Second is Monkey – Blue, which shows the titular monkey wandering out of a lush forest rich with fruit to approach a lake in the distance. The monkey itself is a textbook example of how Colliard has used different pigments to add shade and light to his composition while the gold wires of the cloisonné help to define and outline key areas.
Crocodile – Green switches things up by using the gold wire as part of the actual texture of the image rather than guiding and demarcating space. By which I mean that the crocodile’s scales along its body and tail are presented in gold rather than through enamel. It introduces an interesting element of stylisation that makes it feel distinct from the other two.
Each version is housed in a 40mm diameter platinum case that measures 16.55mm height due to the arching sapphire crystal that has to cover the tall verticality of the flying balance. The custom movement was developed in-house with the assistance of Kari Voutilainen. It’s manual winding with a 60-hour power reserve. When looking through the exhibition caseback, you can see that the Colliard editions feature a bespoke ratchet wheel with an enamel decoration that matches the colour scheme of the dial.
For pricing and availability, each version of the watch is limited to eight pieces at CHF 98,000 (approx. £89,500) excl. VAT. There is another metric that affects the watches’ availability and that’s the fact that each dial takes a full month to produce, meaning that with 24 watches in the series, it will take the next two years to complete orders at a minimum. I really like these watches. The combination of a traditional Métiers d’Art display paired with the space-age, science fiction vibe of an MB&F gives the piece an intriguing contrast.
Price and Specs:
More details at MB&F.
