With the Rolex rumour mill in full swing, which horologist will unveil the best new men’s watch of 2025? Headline-grabbing pieces of recent years have belonged to Patek Philippe, Omega and Swatch, but with 2025 throwing up several milestone anniversaries – and no one likes to revel in an anniversary quite like a watch brand – this year promises to deliver a hatful of horological updates, reissues and resurrections. As the watch world descends on Geneva for annual industry get-together, Watches & Wonders, Luxury London considers the most significant new timepieces of the year so far. 

Patek Philippe Quadruple Complication Ref. 5308G-001

The biggest watch story of 2024 belonged to Patek Philippe, whose Cubitus collection represented the horologist’s first new family of watches in 25 years. Much of the comment around the Cubitus centred on its size, critics questioning its 45mm case. This year, commentators may be satiated with two new full-gold models that have had their waists pinched by five millimetres. Choose between white or rose gold.

Elsewhere, among a portfolio update that includes 15 new references, there’s a beautifully simple, three-hand Calatrava with a gorgeous rose-gilt opaline dial, and this, a chronograph equipped with both a minute repeater and an instantaneous perpetual calendar – three of the most difficult to achieve complications in watchmaking. Like a space-age car teased at an automotive trade show, the timepiece debuted in 2023 as a salmon-dialled concept at the Watch Art Grand Exhibition in Tokyo. A platinum-cased, blue-dial version now enters Patek Philippe’s main catalogue.

We’ve seen Patek Philippe chronographs incorporate minute repeaters and perpetual calendars previously. The ‘Quadruple’ in this case refers to the addition of a split-seconds function – allowing the wearer to measure two periods of elapsed time simultaneously.

£1,059,630, visit patek.com

Rolex Land-Dweller

Given that the speed at which Rolex typically updates its product portfolio tends to lend new meaning to the word ‘incremental’, and that even the smallest of alterations, a new coloured bezel, say, can send WhatsApp groups into a frenzy (if you’re in one, you’ll know), you can imagine the commotion created when ‘the Crown’ drops a new collection entirely.

In the case of the Land-Dweller, the delirium was mitigated slightly by the fact that someone had discovered that Rolex had trademarked the name back in 2023 – the watch world has been waiting for the drop ever since. This year, it arrived: a brand-new family initially consisting of a 36mm watch and two 40mm models, available in white gold, rose gold and platinum, with or without diamonds.

There was big news on the inside, too. For the Land-Dweller, Rolex has scrapped the traditional Swiss lever system, used in every mechanical watch the brand has ever made, in favour of a new patented escapement, which it christens ‘Dynapulse’. Already an industry leader in precision, Rolex’s new, more efficient escapement promises to achieve even greater levels of accuracy. But then ‘rest’ and ‘laurels’ have never been words you’d associate with ‘Rolex’.   

From £13,050, visit rolex.com

IWC Ingenieur Automatic

In the early 1970s, IWC commissioned renowned watch designer Gérald Genta to redesign its innovative, soft-iron, anti-magnetic watch, the Ingenieur (Engineer in English). Like Patek Philippe’s Nautilus and Audemars Piguet’s Royal Oak – both, famously, of Genta’s hand also – the Ingenieur morphed into something of a halo product for the name on its dial. Unlike the Nautilus and Royal Oak, however, the Ingenieur gradually slipped from the imaginations of the watch-buying masses, eventually going out of production.

Then, in 2023, to much fanfare, Genta’s original Ingenieur was resurrected as the new-but-faithfully-retro Ingenieur Automatic 40. One of the most-talked about watches of that year – as Genta’s initial timepiece had supposedly been back in 1976 – the contemporary collection debuted in four references; three in stainless steel and another in titanium. Fast forward two years, and 2025 is proving to be another bumper year for the Ingenieur with a raft of new references released at industry get-together, Watches & Wonders. 

As well as three petite 35mm versions, there is a 40mm model with a case and bracelet crafted entirely of 5N gold (£40,200); a 42mm model in full black ceramic (£16,800); and, sandwiched between the two, a stainless steel 41mm version equipped with a perpetual calendar (£32,000). In 2023, the new-old Ingenieur was introduced as a springboard. This year, we discovered in which direction that launchpad was facing. 

Visit iwc.com

Tudor Black Bay 58 Burgundy

During the 1990s, a decade-and-a-half before the brand was so successfully relaunched, Tudor unveiled a prototype of its Submariner with a brilliant burgundy dial and matching burgundy bezel. The watch never made it into production, remaining in the company archives, but this year inspires a new Black Bay 58 in the same cherry-red colourway as that long-forgotten almost-watch.

It represents the first Black Bay 58 to have a sunburst dial, adding a contemporary touch to an otherwise decidedly retro design, and is offered on Tudor’s five-link bracelet – another first for this family of watches (a three-link bracelet and rubber strap are also available). Inside a 39mm case is an automatic calibre certified by METAS (whose precision certificates Tudor seems to be valuing over those of rival institute, COSC), which boasts a 65-hour power reserve. In an industry where price points climb perpetually skyward, Tudor continues to tilt the bang-for-buck balance in favour of its followers.

From £3,820, tudorwatch.com

Hublot SPIRIT OF BIG BANG CERAMIC

Hublot’s run as one of modern horology’s most important watch brands was built on timepieces with round cases. Then, in 2014, the watchmaker took its brawny, world-beating circular Big Bang and elongated it via a barrel-shaped case to give us the Spirit of Big Bang. This year, for the first time, the muscular collection gets the ceramic treatment.

Sporting cases and bezels crafted in coloured ceramic, the chronograph will be available in Sand Beige, Dark Green and Sky Blue. Visible through skeleton dials, is a modified version of the famous high-beat El Primero movement, manufactured by Hublot’s LVMH stablemate, Zenith.

From £23,500, visit hublot.com

Hermes Arceau L’heure de la lune

When Hermès launched the Arceau L’heure de la Lune at the 2019 International Salon of Haute Horology, the timepiece wowed showgoers for its playful way of presenting moon phases for the Northern and Southern hemispheres on discs that rotated around the dial while displaying the time. The timepiece impressed the judges at that year’s Grand Prix d’Horlogerie de Genève, too, who acknowledged the watch with its Calendar and Astronomy Prize.

This year, Hermès bolsters the collection with three new models, the dial of each comprised from a different meteorite. A white gold version with a blue titanium bezel (pictured) sports a face fashioned from lunar rock. Out of this world, quite literally.

POA, visit hermes.com

Panerai Luminor Perpetual Calendar GMT Platinumtech

Panerai’s new Luminor Perpetual Calendar GMT Platinumtech is comprised of a proprietary platinum that is 40 per cent harder than your average platinum and 33 per cent heavier than 18-carat gold (at 44mm it’s got size and heft). But the main story here is a striking blue sapphire crystal dial, offering a hypnotic glimpse into the watch’s day and date disks doing their thing beneath. Unusually for a perpetual calendar, the month, year and leap year are displayed via an exhibition caseback.

£53,700, visit panerai.com

Breitling Top Time B31

Hollywood golden boy Austin Butler has joined Breitling’s ‘Squad’ of ambassadors, his first role being to provide the chiselled cheekbones for the brand’s Top Time campaign. The latest watches in the Top Time lineup introduce Breitling’s Calibre B31 – the first three-hand manufacture movement designed and developed inhouse. The COSC-certified chronometer was four years in the making, we’re told, undergoing the equivalent of 16 years of use in testing. 

£4,550, visit breitling.com

Piaget ANDY WARHOL WATCH

When Yves Piaget met Andy Warhol in 1970s New York, a life-long friendship was formed. The artist, and watch lover, went on to amass seven Piaget watches within his collection. His favourite was the 15102, renamed the Black Tie in 2014, and from this year officially known as the Andy Warhol watch. A slew of new colourways have been launched, including this version with a dial made of deep green meteorite and a gadroon-heavy white-gold case.   

POA, visit piaget.com

A. Lange & Söhne 1815

Leave it to A. Lange & Söhne to deliver a lesson in paired-backed panache. The German watchmaker updates in 1815 line with a classic three-hander in a demure 34mm case (seen here in pink gold, also available in white gold). Inside is a new, hand-wound movement that increases the power reserve to 72 hours. Movement decorations, including a hand-engraved balance cock, the three-quarter plate, and Glashütte ribbing, can be seen through a sapphire crystal caseback.

Approx. £22,600, visit alange-soehne.com

Richard Mille RM 43-01 Tourbillon Split-Seconds Chronograph Ferrari

In the latest issue of Luxury London Magazine, we preview the new Ferrari 12Cilindri, a 6.5-litre V12 supercar capable of propelling itself from 0 to 62mph in 2.9 seconds. Hear this: the cheaper of the two watches Ferrari has just made with Richard Mille costs three times as much as the 12Cilindri. In fact, the watch, an asymmetric tourbillon-equipped split-seconds stopwatch (sans diamonds, by the way) costs more than any supercar Ferrari currently manufacturers. There are two options, a more affordable (ahem) titanium version, with red accents, and another rendered in a special type of carbon, with yellow accents. Just 75 of each will be made. Prices at the loftiest end of premium watches often require some mental mechanics to get your head around. But, at approx. £1 million and £1.15 million, respectively, this brace of bonkers chronographs leaves you wondering whether things have all gotten a little Emperor’s New Clothes. Torque indicator, or not.      

Visit richardmille.com

Harry Winston Ocean Tourbillon GMT Worldtimer

Look past the 388 baguette-cut diamonds, and you’ll see that the dial of Harry Winston’s latest Ocean timepiece is made from a handsome, metallic-like material that shimmers like the night’s sky. That material is polished black hematite, a naturally occurring, almost-black iron oxide mineral with a highly characterful lustre. Harder than iron, hematite is nonetheless difficult to work with because it is so brittle. Harry Winston is, naturally enough, renowned for its gem-setting skills, but deserves credit here for creating such a unique and distinctive dial – any two of which will never the same. 

POA, visit harrywinston.com

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