Later this month, February 17th, we’ll be moving into the New Lunar Year and the advancement of the Chinese zodiac. For 2026 that means the Year of the Horse, and more specifically, the fire horse. It symbolises passion, freedom and opportunity – which I suppose in wristwatch terms means if you have the opportunity to buy a watch you’re passionate about, go for it. On a watchmaking level though it means that brands across the globe are celebrating our equine friends, here are some of our favourites:
Arnold & Son Perpetual Moon 41.5 Red Gold “Year of the Horse”, £62,000
Arnold & Son always impress with their contributions Chinese New Year wristwatches thanks to their consistent approach. A gorgeous micro-sculpture of a horse can be seen galloping surrounded by glowing embers across a rocky landscape, set against a backdrop of stars below the titular moonphase complication. The storytelling and scene setting of Arnold & Son’s Metiers d’Art is incredibly strong. Plus it’s powered by the A&S1512 calibre, which if beautifully finished, featuring manual winding and a double barrel system.
More details at Arnold & Son.
Bulova ‘Year of the Horse’ Super Seville, £599
Given that the Zodiac cycle lasts 12 years, if you want to get on the horse so to speak, you have to start somewhere. And where better than the Year of the Horse itself. That’s precisely what Bulova have done with their first ever watch produced for Chinese New Year. It features a gold-tone steel case with retro TV shape and coin-edge bezel, inspired by symbols of good fortune in China. The central motif of the horse is depicted rearing, surrounded by floral motifs. It’s powered by the Bulova signature precisionist quartz movement in a limited edition of 888 pieces.
More details at Bulova.
Dior Grand Soir Year of the Horse, £36,000
We don’t often talk about Dior watches due to their haute jewellery focus, but when it comes to a celebration like Chinese New Year, they always deliver. Rather than the epic scenes of galloping and rearing stallions seen in the Arnold & Son and Bulova, we have a much more delicate, countryside scene. Two golden horses in a mother-of-pearl glade with gemstone flowers and pink gold butterflies. The combination of Metiers d’Art skills and the layering of different elements invites careful observation.
More details at Dior.
Girard-Perregaux La Esmeralda Tourbillon ‘A Secret’ Eternity Edition, £390,000
Girard-Perregaux’s La Esmeralda is one of their most ambitious pieces of haute horology, combining multiple disciplines from the Metiers d’Art including micro-sculpture, enamel and guilloché. Two sculpted horses produced in gold run rampant across the display against a red background, while the hunter caseback features three more horses, this time painted in enamel.
More details at Girard-Perregaux.
Héron Mirabel Firehorse, £470
Héron have launched a 24 piece limited edition of their Mirabel for Chinese New Year, thematically called the Firehorse. It features an orange agate stone dial, cut extremely thin so that in low light conditions the entire display glows as it sits on top of a layer of lume. It makes for a dramatic display. Additionally, it has a floating seconds hand in the shape of a traditional Chinese coin. It’s inspired by the tradition of giving children envelopes with a small amount of money inside.
More details at Héron.
Minim MN01 嬌(Giu1), £1,199
While the majority of the brands in this article are honouring and paying tribute to Chinese tradition, Minim is one of the few brands whose origins are actually Chinese, as its founder was raised in Hong Kong. Therefore, the traditions are rooted more firmly in the brand’s cultural identity – the name of this watch, 嬌(Giu1) not only means grace and tenderness but is the given name of the founder’s mother who was born in the Year of the Horse, adding an extra personal touch to this 50-piece limited edition with red CNC machined guilloché.
More details at Minim.
Louis Moinet Tourbillon Puzzle Fire Horse, POA
Louis Moinet have turned to the art of micro-painting for their contribution to Chinese New Year. Set on an 81-piece jigsaw puzzle arranged over 4 layers, it’s a striking artwork that depicts a horse with a fiery mane galloping in the wind with its head thrown back in triumph. Meanwhile the signature off-centre tourbillon beats at 6 o’clock with the skeletonised cage revealing a fire opal at its base – completing the fire theme of the watch.
More details at Louis Moinet.
Swatch Riding the Clouds, £86
Riding the Clouds by Swatch features twin horses with manes and wings of flame riding across the sky in a representation of the sun. The position and colours of the horses (one in white and the other black) evokes the symbol of yin and yang, the eternal balance of harmony. The artwork was created by Yu Wenjie, a former artist in residence at the Swatch Art Peace Hotel – a Shanghai based art installation and Swatch group boutique centre.
More details at Swatch.
Hublot Spirit of Big Bang Year of the Horse, £31,200
In traditional Hublot fashion, their Year of the Horse watch is a bold timepiece fusing notions of sportiness and urban style. It has a 42mm tonneau case in frosted carbon, paired with a polished black dial on top of which is an applied figure of a horse made from the unusual technique of carbon marquetry. It’s outlined in gold to give it an impactful flair in contrast to the black. It’s a limited edition of 88 pieces.
More details at Hublot.
Blancpain Villeret Calendrier Chinois Traditionnel, POA
Blancpain produce almost the exact same watch for Chinese New Year every year. A full Chinese perpetual calendar with both western and eastern concepts of time included, decorated with that year’s zodiac animal on the rotor. Adding a bit more visual distinction to this year’s launch is the use of a salmon-coloured dial to make it distinct from previous editions. It’s a 50 piece limited edition in platinum housing the calibre 3638.
More details at Blancpain.
Tag Heuer Carrera Chronograph Year of the Horse, £6,850
Tag Heuer have gone for a predominantly fire theme for the dial of the Carrera Chronograph Year of the Horse with an ember like golden dial with red chronograph hand and matching 30-minute subdial. An aperture at 9 o’clock reveals the Chinese character 马, which translates simply to horse. Turn the watch over though and a horse reveals itself on the sapphire caseback, with the number 7 on its side in reference to the calibre TH20-07 visible beneath it.
More details at Tag Heuer.
Oris Year of the Horse Limited Edition, £6,100
Oris have broken out the calibre 113 for the Year of the Horse Limited Edition, a 10-day power reserve movement with business calendar that displays the days, date, months and weeks. The non-linear power reserve indicator features a horse at full gallop to represent full power and a horse sitting down for empty. It features dark reds and browns to fit the fire horse theme, though they’ve taken it to the next level with the strap, which is made from Cordovan leather, aka horse leather.
More details at Oris.
Ball Engineer II Galloping Horse, £1,880
Ball have launched the Engineer II Galloping Horse for Chinese New Year. It features a tiger’s eye semi-precious stone dial with micro gas-tube hour markers for luminescence in low light conditions. The orange and brown tones conjure the image of flame racing across the plains while a horse sculpture at 6 o’clock gallops across the display. It’s powered by the Ball calibre RR1103, protected by 4,800 A/m magnetic field and 5,000G shock resistance.
More details at Ball Watches.
Vacheron Constantin Métiers D’art the Legend of the Chinese Zodiac – Year of the Horse, POA
Vacheron Constantin, similar to Blancpain, tend to release the same watch each year updated for the new zodiac. In this case it’s an hours, minutes, day, date display split across four apertures in order to create space for the central Metiers d’Art sculpture of a rearing horse against a Grand Feu enamel backdrop. It’s available in two editions, each limited to 25 pieces, one in pink gold and the other in platinum.
More details at Vacheron Constantin.
Jaeger-LeCoultre Reverso Tribute Enamel ‘Horse’, POA
Jaeger-LeCoultre continue their zodiac cycle with the Reverso Tribute Enamel ‘Horse’. As the name suggests, it’s based on the Reverso Tribute model with its signature reversible display, with one side displaying the time and the other showing a golden horse against a pristine enamel background. The way the horse appears out of clouds of mist does somewhat remind me of Arwen banishing the Nazgul in Fellowship of the Ring.
More details at Jaeger-LeCoultre.
Piaget Altiplano Zodiac Edition – The Horse Edition, POA
The Piaget Altiplano Zodiac Edition – The Horse Edition features a Metiers d’Art dial produced by Anita Porchet, a well-regarded independent enameller and artist from Switzerland. It depicts a horse against the night sky as rays of moonlight illuminate its shadowy coat in highlights of gold. It’s made using a combination of enamel and paillon techniques – paillon being a type of thin foiling. There are also plenty of diamonds.
More details at Piaget.
Longines Master Collection Year of the Horse Edition, £2,700
The Longines Master Collection Year of the Horse Edition features a red display, in celebration of the colour which is seen as lucky in Chinese culture. The caseback reveals a leaping horse on the gold-coloured rotor. The watch itself has a moonphase with date display housed in a 42mm diameter steel case. It’s presented on a leather strap and is powered by the calibre L899 with 72-hour power reserve. It’s also limited to 2026 pieces at £2,700.
More details at Longines.
IWC Portugieser Automatic 42 Year of the Horse, £12,000
IWC continue their tradition of releasing a burgundy timepiece in celebration of Chinese New Year. This edition features central hours and minutes, a small seconds at 9 o’clock, date at 6 and power reserve indicator at 3 o’clock. The last of those functions features a horse marker at the top. Another horse is found via the watch’s caseback that reveals a fully horse shaped rotor attached to the calibre 52011.
More details at IWC.
Gucci Equestrian G-Timeless Metier d’Art, POA
The Gucci Equestrian G-Timeless Metier d’Art was not specifically produced with Chinese New Year in mind, but is so appropriate for the time that I can’t help but include it. It features a scene of a jockey riding a horse as the world appears to whip past them full of motion blur – an impression carefully crafted by lines of tsavorites. The dial itself is produced using traditional wooden marquetry in Italian olive. The design is based on a 1950s archival scarf.
More details at Gucci.
Harry Winston Chinese New Year Automatic 36mm, POA
Harry Winston were once one of the major players in haute horology, but these days tend to stay more closely aligned with the jewellery side of the business when it comes to their watches. That’s what we have here with the haute jewellery Chinese New Year Automatic 36mm in rose gold with diamond hour markers and a gem-set bezel. It features a fiery red lacquer horse against a mother-of-pearl dial. It’s a limited edition of 8 pieces.
More details at Harry Winston.
Breitling Top Time B01 Racing Shadow Rider, SGD 9,888 (approx. £5,700)
Breitling have plenty of European and even UK exclusive watches so logically I know there must be exclusives in other regions too, but it stings when they’re as cool as this one. This Asian exclusive Top Time B01 Racing Shadow Rider has a cool, predominantly monochrome design in black and white punctuated by red. The 9 o’clock small seconds subdial features a horse’s head in its centre, reminding me of Ferrari – there’s also a Year of the Horse inscription in the tachymeter. It’s limited to 288 pieces.
More details at Breitling.
I do like the red dial ones that are more understated, like the Longines, but wheres the Horse on the dial? . The Minim is beautiful but I don’t see the Horse relationship either. The Ball watch is really cool, but not the color or I’d be tempted to order one, I’ve been admiring Ball for quite a while to add to my collection, they have a nice attention to detail but they keep putting out basically the same designs and colors, this one is different at least.
The Breitling, nope, just a copy of an existing style with some minimal changes.
The nicest one for me is actually a Movado Year of the Horse, black dial with a Gold horse.
Personally I can’t quite see the point of watches being released that are directly related to the Chinese new year, what is so different to Christmas or Diwali or any other annual event. It seems that this particular festival has watches released that are (generally) so “over the top” (in terms of bling and cost!), that it makes the normal “man in the street” almost choke on their noodles.
I’m not going to list the makes that are featured that are so hideous and so ludicrously expensive, I will let each of us make our own views known, but will mention a couple (sadly only a couple) that are more realistic (both in terms of style and cost), that are attainable and tasteful in equal measure, Heron and of course Longines. Nobody reading this and knowing my preference for watch make and “under the radar” styling will be surprised at my vote going to the Longines, – class and simplicity wins against crass and cash every time.
Watch companies are businesses. There is a huge Chinese market, in Chin and in pretty bunch every other Western economy. Designing watches that appeal to that audience, combined with the fact also as you said Christmas, Hanuka, Diwali come every year but the year of the fire first wash last here 60 years ago so I (as a true Anglo Saxon white guy from the UK) would say these might be slightly more special than your Timex Santa watch?
You don’t understand because you’re not Chinese.
Hello Dezza,
I completely agree with you regarding the excessive “bling” and the exorbitant prices being attached to these watches. It seems the brands are capitalising on the Chinese zodiac cycle, particularly with this year being the Year of the Fire Horse, which only occurs once every 60 years.
I’m especially drawn to the understated design of the Longines Year of the Horse. Its simplicity is refreshing compared to many of the more embellished releases. It’s just frustrating that I’m unable to purchase one.
MG