It has been a little over a year since the Louis Vuitton Watch Prize for Independent Creatives was first announced, and LV has just published the names of the finalists and jury members for the first edition of this new biennial competition. The five finalists will present their timepiece creations to the five elected jury members at the Fondation Louis Vuitton on February 6, 2024, and the winner will be announced at a ceremony that evening, where they will receive a €150,000 cash prize, along with a year of mentorship by La Fabrique du Temps Louis Vuitton.

According to Louis Vuitton, nearly a thousand brands applied for the inaugural LV Watch Prize, and 20 semi-finalists were selected by the organizers of the event to be presented to the 45-person Committee of Experts (which included our very own Ariel Adams). Evaluated on the criteria of design, creativity, innovation, craftsmanship, and technical complexity, the five finalists were selected by the Committee of Experts, who also were tasked with electing five of their members to serve as the Final Jury that will select the winner on February 6th.

The finalists for the first edition of the Louis Vuitton Watch Prize for Independent Creatives are Petermann Bédat, Simon Brette, John-Mikaël Flaux, Andreas Strehler, and Raúl Pagès. Below we take a closer look at the horological works that these finalists will be presenting to the Final Jury in February.

Petermann Bédat — Chronographe Rattrapante

The Petermann Bédat Chronographe Rattrapante ref. 2941 is a monopusher split-seconds chronograph with a jumping minute counter and a solid platinum case that pays tribute to the classic pocketwatch. Among the three wristwatches that are finalists for the LV Watch Prize, the Petermann Bédat Chronographe Rattrapante is the most technologically complex, and it is also the only one that features a case made from precious metal.

Simon Brette — Chronometre Artisans

The Simon Brette Chronometre Artisans is a meticulously finished expression of a classic three-handed wristwatch. While the case is made from titanium on the prototype, the actual production version of the watch features a case crafted from a highly corrosion-resistant zirconium alloy, and it pairs this with a partially-openworked dial in solid 5N red gold that showcases a striking “dragon scales” pattern throughout its surface.

John-Mikaël Flaux — L’Abeille Mécanique

The John-Mikaël Flaux L’Abeille Mécanique is easily the most unusual offering among the five finalists for the Louis Vuitton Watch Prize for Independent Creatives, and it is essentially a mechanical bee clock that is crafted from gold and silver. The carousel movement inside the body of the bee allows it to rotate on its base, and the stinger of the bee indicates the current hour against the engraved scale located on the base below it.

Andreas Strehler — Tischkalender Sympathique

The Andreas Strehler Tischkalender Sympathique is the other non-wristwatch offering among the five finalists, and it is a mechanical perpetual desk calendar made from gilded brass and lapis lazuli, which also has a detachable Damascus steel pocketwatch. The desk calendar stops running when the pocketwatch is disconnected, although it features a mechanical memory and will automatically synchronize to the correct date once the owner returns and reconnects the pocket watch to the desk calendar unit.

Raúl Pagès — RP1 Régulateur à Détente

The Raúl Pagès RP1 Régulateur à Détente features a stainless steel case paired with a regulator display, although the unique detail about this watch is that it features a hand-made detent escapement. Dating back to the early days of marine chronometers, the detent escapement has the potential to offer superior precision, although the challenges of making it shock-resistant enough for use inside wristwatches has always presented a significant challenge. Raúl Pagès has solved this problem by creating a patented roller system for the movement that prevents the escape wheel from leaving the rest position when the watch is shaken or receives an impact.

As for the members of the Final Jury that will be selecting the winner of the Louis Vuitton Watch Prize for Independent Creatives on February 6th, the five individuals were elected by their peers from the event’s Committee of Experts and consist of the following people.

• Carole Forestier-Kasapi — Movements Director at TAG Heuer
• Auro Montanari — Watch collector and writer
• Rexhep Rexhepi — Founder of Akrivia and independent watchmaker
• Jiaxian Su — Journalist and Founder of SJX Watches
• Michael Tay (Jury President) — Managing Director of The Hour Glass

Naturally, we will be reporting back in early February 2024 once the final presentations have concluded and a winner for the LV Watch Prize has been selected. For more information about the Louis Vuitton Watch Prize for Independent Creatives, please visit the Louis Vuitton LV Watch Prize website.