Celebrate The Year Of The Horse With One Of These Limited-Edition Commemorative Timepieces
With the Year of the Horse fast approaching, now is the right time to mark the occasion—perhaps with one of these limited-edition timepieces.
Elegant, powerful, and dependable, the horse is a revered figure not just in the Chinese Zodiac, but in most major civilisations in human history as well. Possessed of great strength, speed, and noble bearing, we may no longer rely on their work, but continue to celebrate their unique qualities and relationship with humans. Artwork of horses goes back thousands of years—tens of thousands, even—a testament to the inspiration they provide. These meticulously crafted, limited-edition celebratory wristwatches for the Lunar New Year are, hence, the latest chapter in that long artistic lineage.
Vacheron Constantin Metiers d’Art The Legend of the Chinese Zodiac—Year of the Horse
As ever, Vacheron Constantin’s calibre 2660 G4 and its four small apertures at the circumference for indicating hour, minute, day, and date mean that the rest of the dial can be dedicated to artistic pursuits. This year, the dial features a three-dimensional relief-engraved figure of a horse leaping over a rock as its centrepiece, rendered in gold, on an enamel background that combines grand feu and miniature painting techniques. The watch, measuring 40mm in diameter, is available in two 25-piece runs: one in a pink gold case and the other in platinum.
Jaeger-LeCoultre Reverso Tribute Enamel ‘Xu Beihong’
Supplementing Jaeger-LeCoultre’s usual engraved-and-enamelled Reverso Tribute Enamel watches that it customarily releases for the Lunar New Year are an additional trio of special homages to the artist Xu Beihong, a pioneer of modern Chinese painting in the early 20th century. On the back side of each Reverso’s iconic swivelling case is one of three enamel miniature painted scenes directly inspired by one of Xu’s own paintings of horses. The dial side features a translucent grand feu enamel layer on top of a guilloche-patterned base: green for ‘The Running Horse’ version, blue for ‘Two Horses’, and orange for ‘The Standing Horse’. They are presented in white gold cases about 46mm long and 27mm wide, while each reference is limited to 10 pieces.
Blancpain Villeret Calendrier Chinois Traditionnel
The latest version of Blancpain’s Chinese calendar wristwatch arrives as a limited edition of 50 pieces in a platinum case, and an unusual salmon-rose grand feu enamel dial. Calibre 3638, first launched in 2012, took five years to develop and has become one of the manufacture’s signature complications, and today remains the only movement that combines a Chinese calendar with a Gregorian date and a moonphase. Five correctors, a patented mechanism, are hidden on the 45mm case, controlling the calendar’s various complex functions. The solid gold rotor of the self-winding movement sports a hand-engraved depiction of a legendary galloping horse.
Hermès Slim d’Hermès
This is not a commemorative Lunar New Year piece but, then again, every year is Year of the Horse for Hermès. This is just one of the many high-end artistic timepieces created by the maison, a design conceived by illustrator Stuart Patience that imagines its Parisian store at 24 Faubourg Saint-Honoré in a spaceship. An aventurine backdrop is hand-painted with planets and stars; floating above this, on an invisible sapphire disc, are various hand-painted Hermès accessories—a bag, horseshoe, and headphones, among others. At centre stage is a sculpted, multifaceted silver horse. Powered by a self-winding two-hand movement, this watch is available in either yellow or blue theme, limited to 24 pieces.
Piaget Altiplano Zodiac Horse Edition
This year, the ever-elegant Piaget Altiplano features the work of the most famous enameller in the watchmaking industry—Anita Porchet. A white gold dial is the base, hand-engraved to create a flowing backdrop, with sections filled in with grand feu enamel. A reared-up horse is constructed in relief over this, brought to life with cloisonné enamel, which features gold thread linework. Brilliant-cut diamonds adorn the motif’s highlights, adding a fantastical sparkle. To top it off, the 41mm white gold case, only 8.3mm in depth, sports baguette-cut diamonds on the bezel, brilliant-cut diamonds on the lugs, and a rose-cut diamond on the crown.
Arnold & Son Perpetual Moon 41.5 Red Gold “Year of the Horse”
It is specifically the Fire Horse this year, and Arnold & Son has leaned in to that theme with this rendition of its Perpetual Moon timepiece. Below the oversize moonphase indicator, which includes the constellations of Cassiopeia and Ursa Major, is a dynamic depiction of a horse in red gold applique, with hand-engraved detail lending depth and complexity. It is surrounded with specks of gold, evoking a dust cloud, hand-painted with touches of red and yellow Super-LumiNova for a fiery, glow-in-the-dark exclamation. The backdrop is black aventurine, and this timepiece is limited to eight pieces.
Hublot Spirit of Big Bang Year of the Horse Frosted Carbon
It would not be a Hublot without some kind of high-tech material and, in this case, it is frosted carbon, with its ripple-like patterning unique to each watch. The dial is a combination of hand-laid carbon marquetry, with gold-plated brass appliqués on top in a fiery horse motif. Within the 42mm tonneau-shaped case is calibre HUB1710, one of Hublot’s in-house automatic movements, with a 50-hour power reserve. This watch is limited to 88 pieces.
IWC Portugieser Automatic 42 Year of the Horse
The Portugieser Automatic 42 should need no introduction—an oversized dress watch with a movement to match, and a seven-day power reserve tracked by the subdial at 3 o’clock. This Year of the Horse edition has a steel case, paired with a burgundy dial that remains classy even as it invokes the traditional auspicious red of the Lunar New Year. Gold-coloured hands and numerals complete the theme. At the back, attached to IWC’s renowned Pellaton winding system, is a gold-plated rotor that is shaped to depict a galloping horse.
Panerai Radiomir 8 Giorni China Limited Edition
This one is not directly horse-related, but it was specifically released to mark the Chinese New Year. The Radiomir 8 Giorni China Limited Edition, which was originally released in China before being made available at other Panerai boutiques around the world, is a riff on the classic California dial. This style of dial traditionally features Roman numerals on its upper half, and Arabic numerals on the lower. For this 300-piece limited edition, the lower numerals are instead Chinese characters, making for a simple but striking change. The 45mm case has the pre-weathered appearance of the manufacture’s Brunito steel, while the hand-wound P.5000 calibre has a power reserve of eight days.
Dior Grand Soir Year of the Horse
Dior has gone fairytale whimsical for this 30-piece limited edition, with a delicate mother-of-pearl dial, sporting a floral pattern print, and set off with mother-of-pearl bushes and amethysts, spessartites, and yellow and blue sapphires for flowers—all within a demure 36mm diameter. A pair of pink gold horses elegantly navigate this idyllic landscape, watched over by pink gold butterflies. Equipped with an automatic mechanical movement, this timepiece’s steel case features a pink gold bezel set with 52 brilliant-cut diamonds.
Breitling Top Time B01 Shadow Rider
Rooted in the culture surrounding 1960s motorsports chronometers, Breitling’s throwback Top Time collection gets a commemorative edition called Shadow Rider, which is limited to 288 pieces. The shadow rider makes its presence felt via the silhouette found within the running seconds subdial at 9 o’clock, as well as an engraving on the caseback. Between 12 and 2 o’clock on the tachymeter scale lies a ‘year of the horse’ inscription. Powered by the COSC-certified manufacture Calibre 01, the timepiece’s cushion-shaped case measures a vintage-appropriate 38mm across.
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