For a long time now, high-end Swiss watchmaker Audemars Piguet has been dabbling in the world of art. The most recent manifestation of that interest is this collaboration watch between Audemars Piguet and contemporary artist KAWS (Brian Donnelly), known as the Royal Oak Concept Tourbillon Companion timepiece. It is a limited-edition luxury watch meant to combine the high-end hipness of the Royal Oak Concept collection with the popularity of the KAWS aesthetic in the Pop Art collector world.
As Audemars Piguet aptly puts it, the product “reinterprets Haute Horlogerie (i.e., their products) through the lens of artist KAWS.” The result, like much else that KAWS is known for, blends existing ideas into something novel that is clearly evocative of both the profile of the iconic Royal Oak and the KAWS universe, complete with character in the center of the dial. The KAWS Royal Oak Concept Tourbillon Companion certainly isn’t for everyone, but it is among the more serious pop art luxury watches to come out this year. Audemars Piguet has used the Royal Oak Concept as a platform for other limited-edition collaboration timepieces (such as those celebrating the Marvel superhero universe via Spiderman and Black Panther models), which aren’t quite as visually interesting or cohesive as what they did with KAWS here.
The first time I recall that KAWS did a collaboration with a luxury watchmaker was during the second ownership phase (it is in its third phase now) of Swiss watchmaker Ikepod back in 2012. Now the KAWS aesthetic is back in a watch that costs over $200,000 and is for high-end collectors only. This watch is so high-end mainly because underneath the art is a Royal Oak Concept Tourbillon timepiece – which is always rather high-end. The dial has a three-dimensional representation of the KAWS character (which I believe is known as “Companion”). The entire theme of the watch if I am to understand it correctly is that a KAWS Companion is inside of the watch, existing within it. So the outcome is KAWS within an Audemars Piguet. When you see the watch on the wrist, it looks as though the KAWS companion is viewing the world through the lens (quite literally) of Audemars Piguet, while this creative exercise is supposed to be an Audemars Piguet product through the lens of KAWS. Mr. Donnelley seems to be playing with irony here.
The periphery of the dial has a solid hour triangle and open minute triangle that float around the dial, eschewing a traditional central mounting. That leaves an opening for the tourbillon and an unobstructed view of the dial composition. This is like a very high-end Mickey Mouse hands watch, but in Audemars Piguet form, with a tourbillon, and much less an intention to have mainstream appeal. Audemars Piguet likes to position their timepieces more as collectible art versus commoditized timekeeping, so collaborations with such creators and artists make sense.
KAWS has also apparently been commissioned to create an 11-meter tall COMPANION (companion) sculpture for the Audemars Piguet manufacture in Le Brassus. That means the small composition on the watch will have a real-life analog at the brand’s headquarters in Switzerland. That’s pretty cool, I guess. Many of these street artists had humble beginnings (some of their outdoor “installations” may not have been perfectly legal in their placement) but created a name for themselves over time and eventually became staples of new wealth eager to invest in modern art as opposed to classics that had little relevance in their lives. KAWS is no novice to success at this point, but it must be pretty cool when companies like Audemars Piguet want to put your intellectual property both on the dials of their high-end watches, as well as on their grounds.
The Audemars Piguet Royal Oak Concept Tourbillon Companion watch is sober in style compared to many of the colorful or wild art watches we have been seeing lately. KAWS opts for a mostly gray-hued theme, including matching colors and a mostly titanium construction for the case. The Royal Oak Concept case in this form is 43mm wide and a hefty 17.4mm thick with 100 meters of water resistance. In addition to the KAWS Companion figurine on the dial, the bezel screws/bolts have been changed to have KAWS’ signature “X” design (usually used for eyes) in each of them. Inside the watch is Audemars Piguet’s in-house Caliber 2979 manually-wound tourbillon movement which operates at 3Hz with 72 hours of power reserve. It is a rather simple mechanism (albeit very pretty in execution) that indicates the hours and minutes, with the seconds via the 60-second tourbillon (which isn’t actually all that easy to see).
KAWS seems to have intended this Royal Oak Concept Titanium Companion as the ideal watch he wants to wear. In that regard, this collaboration is successful because the artist designed the object for their own taste — of course, plenty of his fans and those of Audemars Piguet will be similarly romanced by the theme. Audemars Piguet is actually making a fair number of these watches as the limited edition is 250 pieces. That seems a bit high (especially all in the same color) for an exclusive art watch, but AP (and the artist) knows its market. Price for the limited l-edition reference 26656TI.GG.D019VE.01 Audemars Piguet x KAWS Royal Oak Concept Tourbillon Companion watch is 200,000 CHF. Learn more at the Audemars Piguet website.
