The year 1969 was a turning point for western culture and for fashion. As Woodstock and the Apollo 11 moon landing were pushing the boundaries of music and science, Yves Saint Laurent, Emilio Pucci, and Pierre Cardin were transforming women’s wardrobes with their avant-garde designs. In Switzerland, meanwhile, Yves Piaget combined the energy, colour, and hedonism of the swinging sixties with the world of traditional watchmaking to create the Piaget 21st Century collection. Released at the Basel watch fair in 1969, it featured swinging sautoirs (long chain necklaces with watch pendants), large sculptural wrist cuffs, ornamental stone dials, textured gold openwork, and elaborate bracelets. In addition to merging Piaget’s strengths in watchmaking and jewellery, the 21st Century collection established the Maison as one of the most influential watch brands of the era. More than half a century later, the new Piaget Sixtie evokes the glamour of that collection—and the swinging 1960s—in its graceful lines.
“At Piaget, a timepiece is first and foremost a piece of jewellery,” Yves Piaget famously said. Founded in 1874 in the Swiss alpine village of La Côte-aux-Fées, Piaget earned a reputation for top-tier watchmaking with ultra-precise timepieces before becoming renowned as the maker of the world’s thinnest watches in the 1950s. By the late 1960s, however, changing tastes and lifestyles meant that a watch was no longer simply a timekeeping device, but also a luxury accessory. Yves Piaget saw this and, with the help of close relationships with some of the biggest celebrities of the day, including Jacqueline Kennedy, Elizabeth Taylor, and Andy Warhol, he established Piaget as the watchmaker of record to a new class of jet-setting tastemakers.
With a sinuous case in the shape of a rounded trapezoid, the new Piaget Sixtie blurs the boundary between watchmaking and fine jewellery while referencing some of the most iconic designs of the 1960s. Its “trapeze” shaped case, which first appeared in Piaget’s 21st Century collection, is itself a reference to the famous trapeze dress created by Yves Saint Laurent, while the chiselled parallel lines on its bezel (gadroons in Piaget parlance) are reminiscent of a Piaget watch owned by Andy Warhol. In contrast to these classic vintage elements, the Sixtie’s satin-finished dial features a modern blend of stick hour markers, Roman numerals, and gently rounded baton-shaped hands.
True to its origins, the crown jewel of the Sixtie collection is the Sixtie sautoir, an opulent pendant watch in 18K rose gold set with white opals and diamonds on an 18K rose gold chain, but for those who prefer to wear their timepiece in a more conventional way, the Sixtie is also available in a selection of wristwatch styles. These include stainless steel with a diamond- set bezel, two-tone stainless steel and 18K rose gold, and full 18K rose gold. In another nod to its 1960s roots, one version of the Sixtie is available with a turquoise stone dial. Combining the vivacity of the Woodstock era with the seriousness of its modern Swiss-made credentials, each of these models offers a subtly different take on the Sixtie’s retro charm, and proof that Yves Piaget’s 21st Century collection was far ahead of its time.
Feature image courtesy of Piaget.
