Diana Cosmin: Becoming Clock-wiser

We interpret the rhythm of the world via the timepiece residing on our wrist. Some watchmakers, such as Hermès, occasionally grant us the illusion that we can “freeze” time by simply pressing a button, but we can never mess with its rhythm and pace.
Historical times have their own pacing and, just like the hands on a timepiece, we can only go with their flow. In these years of profound societal change, the watch industry wants to groom millennials for consumption and to seduce a new generation, whilst keeping a somewhat obsessive eye on the past. Their references seem to have stalled in the pre-crisis era, with its double digit growth, and in the world as they knew it before the “catastrophic years”, as Rolex’ Eric Bertrand dubbed them.
Nonetheless, for a generation that chooses, acquires and acts according to the way it wants to be socially perceived, timepieces will never get to be careless buys such as the random hoodie seen on Instagram. They are personal discoveries, as the wristwatch increasingly becomes people’s single manifestation of loyalty towards an object. It entails financial, emotional and social engagement, as the new social status is actually the status on the social networks they care about.
The answer to the collective dilemma – “What do millennials really want?” – may not be the conveniently profitable “Lots of new watch launches every year”, but rather the relief of knowing that in this crazy consumerist world there is one object they can still be monogamous about. Something that speaks their story and aligns indefinitely with their values, from personal taste to their deeper sense of self.
The new “clockwise” – or rather the new and wiser form of normality in the industry – resides in the watchmakers’ ability to bring together the millennials’ interest in sustainability, ethics and effortless cool with their secret desire of having the watch on their wrist quietly tell the world all that about them. Without them having to utter a single word.