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The Louis Vuitton Tambour High End Rainbow watch in platinum.
Louis Vuitton
The rainbow watch first surfaced in 2012 when Rolex set multi-colored sapphires into a limited-run Cosmograph Daytona. It has been around sporadically since then, but has rebounded as a full-fledged genre in the past few years. Two new expressions of the rainbow colored bezel were introduced this month by LVMH brands Louis Vuitton and Zenith, and each adds a new interpretation of the concept.
The Louis Vuitton Tambour High End Rainbow watch, with fancy colored sapphires, in platinum.
Louis Vuitton
The protocol for rainbow watches is to set gemstones into the bezel in a gradient colors that run from light to dark, with each color blending into the next one on the palette. The composition takes a lot of color matching and some precision, custom cutting. Both these new watches break the protocol in subtle ways. The Zenith Chronomaster Sport Rainbow sets the sapphires in solid color blocks of four gems each rather than in graduated hues, and the Louis Vuitton Tambour High End tweaks the formula by setting the gems on the outside flange of a steeply angled bezel, where they can be seen mainly from the side rather than face-on.
The Zenith Chronomaster Sport Rainbow, with sections of multi-colored sapphires and rubies on the … [+] bezel.
Zenith
On the Louis Vuitton piece, the bezel is angled outwards, which makes for a broader view of the gems, an effect that softens the look, preventing the gems from overpowering the dial. It makes the discreet sapphire indexes – which correspond to the adjacent color on the outside ring – stand out more. Also, while some rainbow watches mix sapphires with other gems varieties – such as more-affordable amethyst, garnet, and tsavorite – this piece contains only sapphires in a range of colors that can be a challenge to source. This is the Tambour’s first platinum case, and it’s identified with an inset 1.6mm saffron-colored sapphire, a cue that will identify all Louis Vuitton platinum watches going forward. This charming “tell,” indicating that a watch is platinum is a tradition in luxury watches: platinum Patek Philippes have a diamond set on the case side between the lugs at 6 o’clock; and Rolex platinum watches all have dials in a specific shade of ice blue.
The Zenith Chronomaster Sport Rainbow has hands treated with Super-LumiNova for night viewing.
Zenith
The Zenith Chronomaster Sport Rainbow is more like the iconic Rolex version of the rainbow genre, since it is a chronograph (in fact, the original Rainbow Daytona had a Zenith movement). But this is the first time Zenith has done its own rainbow model. Here, the 50 sapphires are arranged in color blocks rather than as gradient hues. Instead of graduating each color into the next, each block of color on this bezel is separated by a diamond. Instead of fading in and out then, the strong colors here are highly saturated for a much bolder look than the typical rainbow bezel. That goes for the 12 index gems on the dial, as well. As on the Vuitton Tambour, the gems are all fancy colored sapphires. The case is 18k white gold. One more interesting detail about both these watches is that they have hands treated with Super-LumiNova, an interesting touch that has been showing up lately on jeweled watches, giving them a more sporty vibe. Both contain automatic movements.
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