One of a kind Gerad Charles sells at Christie for $120,000.

We rarely write about auctions, as frankly they're normally pretty dull.  When we do it's only when there's a combination of an unusual piece and record breaking or unreasonable price being met.  The Gerald Charles watch sold at Christies rare Watches auction on May 12 2025 meets both these criteria.

The piece itself is a one of a kind edition of the brands GC39 Remaster.  The watch sells in steel for $38,000, and this version in titanium has a unique opal dial.  Movie fans will remember an opal featured in Uncut Gems a few years ago.  In the film Kevin Garnett was captivated by the way light played through the stone.  This dial demonstrates all this beauty on top of a jumping hours complication.  The real personal touch is the winning buyer will have their initials engraved on the back of the case.

As for the sale price?  The watch was predicted to sell for  $47,000, a bit over the price a steel model goes for, however, the hammer price was $120,000, almost three times the pre-auction estimate.  

The buyer's anonymous, and apparently the proceeds will go to a children's charity that helps children digital lives.  Difficult to know what that means, and obviously if someone really wanted to help they shouldn't need to get a luxury watch in exchange for doing so.  However one things for certain in respect of what this sale shows, at a certain level of the economy the cost of living crisis doesn't appear to exist. 

 

Bang Olufsen A1 3rd Generation - No difference really but we want it

 

Bang Olufsen have announced the release of the third generation of their A1 speaker, and we have be entirely upfront, that we are conflicted.

This entry will be brief.  As brief as the differences between the generations.  Same body. same dimensions, same weight, same appearance.  If the only thing that matters to you is aesthetics then move along.

However, the new model bas better bass response, longer battery of 24 hours non stop playtime and improved bluetooth connectivity.  However it looses Alexa connectivity.  But why anyone would want that on a bluetooth speaker is a mystery.  Also it's conference calling is advertised is far better.

This is where the conflict comes for us.  It's fundamentally the same as the previous mode.  It seems to carry on the B&O releases recently which seem to be mere cosmetic improvements, such as the recent earbud release we wrote about (here).  But, all that being said, we still want it.  This might be testament to th underlying exceptionality of this product,  In any case, we ar all in. Available now for £299 and Bang Olufsen's website and stores, and it does at least have some new colours.

ST Dupont jumps on Branding Change Bandwagon with Bland Serif Logo

The ceaseless march towards dull conformity amongst luxury brands continues, with ST Dupont's quietly introduced new logo.  

We have lost track of the amounts of brands that followed Hedi Slimane's Dior, then Saint Laurent Paris, rebranding.  Yet the amusing thing that these lemmings rushing towards the cliff edge fail to understand is that it's not a smart move.  Homogeneity is precisely what consumers are attempting to move away from by purchasing luxury goods.  By adopting a stale Serif look because SLP"s stock went up just makes your brand look boring.

While the Arnault family's entire progeny seem to think it's a great idea, as demonstrated by them removing every ounce of originality in everything they touch.  Other companies realise their error and revert.  For example, we wrote of Burberry and Saint Laurent Paris returning to the classic logo.  Albeit in the most confused way possible. (Burberry article here, and SLP article here)

So it comes then to ST Dupont.  Who scrapped the elegant calligraphy of a logo that can be found on lighters for over 100 years, and opted for the standard Serif mundanity.  In fact, we dislike this even more, as it has an annoying ST orphaned to the left of a large bold "Dupont".  It makes the logo look more like it's a collectible for the Dupont chemical company than a lighter from the storied smokers brand.  

Sadly this new logo has already made its way onto lighters and products in their catalogue.  So it's a good chance it will be around for a while.  Until they realise their error and go back to the only one that worked.  If it aint broke, don't fix it.  A saying "Dupont" might need to reconsider.

 

Prada Braves Choppy Luxury Waters Buying Versace for $1.35bn.

 

We steer clear of global geopolitical events usually on this little blog, and we won't change that in any significant regard today.  We can however without being partisan make an objective statement, that at time of writing in early 2025 the luxury market is struggling, with even Hermes targets not being met, and that due to world events, it's a tough time to be a luxury brand.  These facts make Prada's decision to go ahead with acquiring Versace a particular bold move.

The reality is that deals like this are years in the making.  Numerous high-level meetings, and copious due-diligence studies. These stages take considerable time.  There may even have been some sort of penalty for not completing the acquisition after a certain point.  Nonetheless, to take a large chunk of capital, even if partially leveraged by debt, in such uncertain times, is admirable.

We applaud the brazenness of the act, and are hopeful it reinvigorates both brands.  With Versace's glamour dragging Prada out of its dull eternal 1960's aesthetic, and Prada tempering some of Versace's most vulgar excesses/. Let's wait and see. 

The RowLaunches Homewares in a Typically Annoying fashion.

Some luxury brands effortlessly manage to command the market, and supremely dominate with the history and cachet to maintain their permanent position.  For example, Hermes.  Other brands have a quietly confident and elegant turn to them, which manages to imbue them with a sense of relaxed elegance.  Such as Brunello Cucinelli.  Others are try-hard and kind of annoying.  The Row fans into the last of these in our view, and their launch of homewares has demonstrated this once again.

Don't mistake this for disdain of the quality.  The Row produces clothing which feels like the wardrobe from that 1990's Ryan Phillipe Dangerous Liasons. Ultra high-end minimalist chic luxury. And the fact this comes from former Disney stars, even if they only touch lightly on it, is remarkable.  But it is absolutely necessary to be so irritating about it?

Form the secret last-minute fashion show notifications, to the demand that attendee's surrender their mobile phones at the door.  It's all so extra, and quite silly.  If the products weren't so good, we'd have nothing but pure hate.  For their new homewares they did the same.  A surprise announcement out of nowhere. So dumb.

The products are characteristically exceptional.   Solid colour throes, wool bedding, and the finest cashmere, it's an outstanding selection of the very best simple interior pieces, with prices starting from £1,200 for small cushions.  Great item's, and the start of a premium home interior collection, but seriously, drop the pretentious marketing.

Louis Vuitton Music Player Bag, April Fool?

 

Currently ding the rounds on the Social Media circuit and blogosphere is the Louis Vuitton Music Player Bag.  If this is teal, and if it will be produced, it's reported it will be a leather bag with a faux screen, resembling a classic Apple iPod, retailing for around £1,000.

It's no secret that we are quite critical of Louis Vuitton's creative direction.  They seem to genuinely lack creativity, relying on stunts, and "statement" pieces, that are just designed to shock.  However, this actually seems quite charming to us.  It is a genuinely fun little piece.  Like it or not, LV are good at quality, and something as fun and charming as this, created with LV's quality control, might be an actually interesting item.

However, all the article's seem dated from March 29, and April 1 is a mere 2 days later.  Furthermore, there doesn't see to be anything on Louis Vuitton's own website.  Therefore, this might just be an April Fool's joke.  We hope not, because this is actually quite fun.  

Saint Laurent Paris quietly rebrand their logo to a Classic Look.

 

In 2012 Hedi Slimane made waves in the fashion industry by completely revolutionising Yves Saint Laurent.  They took the brand, which by this point had stagnated hugely from its origins, and turned it into a rock n roll luxury slim cut affair which has taken it from strength to strength.  Now, if you see a celebrity with a wool teddy, or slim cut dark overcoat, there's a high chance it's from Saint Laurent Paris.

This last point however, the naming of the brand, caused perhaps more controversy than any other.  Numerous articles were written about whether the new sans serif simplified logo, which dropped the "Yves", was a tribute to the brands creator, or a disservice.  It got to such a point that Hedi, normally very reticent to speak to media, gave an interview to Vogue to justify their choices (here).

However, what has seemingly gotten no attention, and is not being discussed anything like Slimane's move, is the fact that the new creative director, Anthony Vaccorello, is quietly changing the logo again.  Seen above, the new logo appears to be a return to the traditional stylised font, but dropping also the "Paris" from it.  

This appears to be a very inconsistent move from our analysis.  The website has the new logo, some shirts, knitwear and coats have it, while a lot of outerwear has the old logo.  Furthermore, there are several leather jackets with the new logo, and "Paris" in the old font.  

We're not quite sure why the move has been made, and confused why it's been done so inconsistently.  Gut instinct suggests Vacorello wants to make their mark.  However, they seem to have failed, as we can't find anyone discussing it.  Also, if you want to make a mark, why not have a consistent roll out across all levels of the brand?

It seems to us that this is probably a case of Vaccarello wanting to distinguish themselves, but corporate preventing them from doing so from fears of loosing money to consumers that might not like the new style.  This indicates Vacarello probably doesn't have the same weight as Slimane, so wasn't able to make the bold move the Belgian made.  We predict this will either fizzle out, and return to Slimane's logo, or we will just see the inconsistent branding across lines.  Until of course Vaccarello is replaced with someone who can introduce something new.

Frederique Arnault Proves Nepotism is Real Being named Loro Piana CEO.

About a year ago we wrote of how the Arnault family is the real-life Succession family, and how much they seem to enjoy promoting non-achieving family members despite their non achievements, if anyone's interested, that's here.   In that same article we wrote about how despite Frederique Arnault's tenure at Tag Heuer seeing Tag's popularity declining, they were being named as the head of LVMH's entire watch division.  

Well, it appears that failing upwards is real.  According to this article from Professional Jeweller,  LVMH's Watches & Jewellery sales have declined 2% under Frederique, and profit from recurring operations has fallen by 28%.  However, the young fellow, and we do say young as they are 29 years old, is the named new head of Loro Piana.

Who knows what this will result in.  Loro Piana can't become much worse than it is, it's currently pretty stale and rather bland.  But we have confidence in Freqerique, we think they might be able to destroy this brand completely.

In all seriousness, this is, as the title suggests, the most blatant nepotism.  But, to be fair and balanced, wouldn't you do the same in Bernard Arnault's shoes?  After all, you can only really trust blood at the end of the day, and letting his children fail while experiencing a range of the luxury empire's brands means they will have fingers in a lot of pies, and a overview of all the groups operations.  Ready to take the reigns, and keep it firmly in the family.  Or they'll all spectacularly fail and destroy it completely. Either way, you'd probably still do the same thing.