Vacheron Constantin has unveiled the Métiers d’Art Tribute to the Animal Kingdom, a collection of six concept watches that showcase unusual artisanal crafts adapted to the miniature scale of a watch dial. Each watch features a unique animal composition created by an independent artist, utilizing techniques such as featherwork, glass sculpture, micro-origami, gold embroidery, paper sculpture, and wood marquetry.
- 42mm case size
- 12.9mm thickness
- Calibre 2460 G4 automatic movement
- 40-hour power reserve
- 30m water resistance
The collection features six distinct watches: Feathersnake (featherwork), Glassoctopus (glass sculpture), Oraygami (micro-origami), Tigerbroidery (gold embroidery), Papercroc (paper sculpture), and Woodenwings (wood marquetry).
The time display uses four peripheral apertures for hours, minutes, day, and date, leaving the central dial free for the artwork.
The Feathersnake dial uses over 200 individually cut pieces of feather from seven Lophophore feathers, with goose feathers for the background, taking 250 hours to create.
The Glassoctopus is a transparent glass sculpture created by heating and melting glass rods, with challenges in managing refraction and reflection.
The Oraygami features six manta rays folded from specially dyed Japanese paper, with a new origami folding sequence developed for accuracy.
Tigerbroidery uses 9k gold wire for embroidery, with some threads coated in ceramic and silk for finer details like the tiger's eyes and nose.
The Papercroc utilizes embossed and cut cotton paper to create a white-on-white crocodile scene, using two different paper weights.
Woodenwings employs miniature marquetry with twelve different wood species, including layered veneers for the falcon and a feather-by-feather construction for its wing.