Piaget celebrates its 150th anniversary this year, and to mark this grand occasion, it’s reviving one of its most desired watches of all time: the all-gold Piaget Polo. Forty-five years since its first appearance, the historically significant timepiece is now reborn as the Piaget Polo 79.
Piaget was in its heyday in the 1970s. Its watches in hammered gold and stone dials spoke of opulence and lavish lifestyles and were worn by an aspirational class of high society and creatives that include Andy Warhol, Elvis Presley, Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis and many more. But the ’70s was also a time when there was an increasing demand for luxury sports watches and the Polo was Piaget’s response.
“We really had to answer to this particular demand of our customers who are used to getting just dress watches.’ explained Yves Piaget at the time. ‘But now our customers like to do more and more sports. That’s part of the evolution of our lives today. They want to be exquisite, even in sport. They want to wear a better watch, even in their sports. So we created this sport line which is waterproof, shockproof.”
Jumping on the bandwagon in 1979, the brand did so in the most uncompromising Piaget spirit. Where others utilised stainless steel, Piaget stuck with its reputation for being the house of gold and used only precious metals. The polished gadroon and brushed block links design continues from the bracelet and extends to the case, and even on the dial – it looked as though it was sculpted from one singular block of gold, and it completely stood out from the rest of the luxury sports watches at the time. If there was a definitive watch of the ’80s, the Piaget Polo was a strong contender, a watch that society sported at nightclubs as easily as they did at polo clubs.
So popular became the Piaget Polo that it was released in variations of round and square shapes, gem-set, bi-colour gold, time-only, a perpetual calendar … even on a leather strap. The original Piaget Polo was equipped with the quartz calibre 7P, making the watch ultra-thin and very wearable. But Piaget’s mastery of ultra-thin movements extends to mechanical movements too, and Piaget also used the celebrated mechanical calibre 9P for some models of the Piaget Polo – today these automatic versions are a grail find for collectors.
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The Piaget Polo 79 -
The Piaget Polo 79 -
The self-winding calibre 1200P1
And now, collectors can rejoice even more as the reborn Piaget Polo 79 is the purest expression of the original design, with only a few subtle updates to keep up with the modern tastes. The quartz calibre is eschewed in favour of the ultra-thin 1200P1 in-house self-winding calibre with a gold micro-rotor that can be admired through the crystal case back. The watch has also been slightly upsized to 38mm. Otherwise, everything about the watch that people knew and loved remain the same – executed entirely in 18K gold down to the hands and hour markers on the dial.
The Piaget Polo 79 was a watch that collectors have waited a long time for and the 150th anniversary of the brand couldn’t be a better occasion to revive it. And what a stunning re-edition. If this is the first of many more releases to expect from Piaget this year, then we’re off to a great start.
