SIHH 2018 Will Feature Public Day & More Exhibitors Than Ever

SIHH 2018 Will Feature Public Day & More Exhibitors Than Ever Shows & Events

SIHH 2018 Will Feature Public Day & More Exhibitors Than Ever Shows & Events

Are we pumped for SIHH 2018 yet? Just like the “holiday shopping season” and beginning around the same time, it seems like the new-product announcements get earlier every year. With still more than a month to go, the 2018 models that we will get to see in Geneva in January have already started coming in. The Salon International de la Haute Horlogerie (SIHH) watch industry trade show, just like its organizing body the Fondation de la Haute Horlogerie (FHH), has continued to grow and evolve each year, adding more brands as well as a day where the show is open to the public for the first time in 2017 – this time around, it will be Friday, January 19th, 2018. Now with a total of 35 brands, SIHH 2018 promises even more variety than in previous years.

SIHH 2018 Will Feature Public Day & More Exhibitors Than Ever Shows & Events
Here, the namesake section of this watch is right on display and tactile to assist you share it by simply pointing directly at it once passing through a crowded pit lane, where everyone knows everyone… and where, as I mentioned above, all of the drivers, engineers, and staff owners adore and wear some type of a rare, high-tech watch. I can’t speak for Roger Dubuis here, however I strongly believe this is the audience they’re (or at least ought to be) following together with the Roger Dubuis Excalibur Spider Pirelli Automatic Skeleton.Many Roger Dubuis watches in the brash, sporty kind of this skeletonized Excalibur Spider include a tourbillon or 2 and run well into six figures. Obviously, we’re still talking high-five amounts, instead of six — but it’s still a big difference. Roger Dubuis is about offering ‘look-at-me’ wrist presence through design in addition to dimensions, but for elbows which can accommodate the large case, titanium helps to make the Roger Dubuis Excalibur Spider Pirelli Automatic Skeleton mild and comfy. It actually is a standard three-hand caliber re-imagined — I really don’t think I could ever get tired of this massive star bridge that secures most of the moving train along with the accelerator wheels that connect the micro-rotor together with the mainspring. Like all watches from the manufacturer, the Roger Dubuis Excalibur Spider Pirelli Automatic Skeleton also boasts the Geneva Seal, so you receive the hand-applied perlage, anglage and… prestige.

You already know that SIHH is one of the two most important events for the watch industry, as its exhibitors – while much fewer than at the biggest industry trade show, Baselworld – represent many major and influential brands, and this is the time of year when they introduce their most important new products. Vis-à-vis Baselworld – where around 300 brands represent the breadth of the watch industry from high-end and mainstream to obscure startups – SIHH has always carefully maintained an image of exclusivity and “prestige.”

So, while a few brands do introduce models in the “mid-level luxury” range that the average person might be able to consider saving up for and possibly actually wearing… you can expect a lot of skeletonization, avant-garde designs, artisanal techniques and haute horology finishing, “high complications,” precious materials, and stratospheric prices. Haute horlogerie is in the name, after all. It has largely been a spectator’s show for fans of high-end watchmaking, but with recent industry trends emphasizing more “down-to-earth” (it’s all relative) models, some balance and variety can at least be hoped for.

SIHH 2018 Will Feature Public Day & More Exhibitors Than Ever Shows & Events

SIHH 2018’s 35 Exhibiting Brands

The Richemont Group along with some independent brands long represented the handful of SIHH exhibitors. However, the show’s 2016 edition added a “Carré des Horlogers” section with nine “artisan-creators and independent workshops” and expanded that number in 2017. This year, the Carré des Horlogers brands are up to no fewer than 17, with the primary exhibitors (referred to as “Historic Maisons”) at 18 for a total, again, of 35. The primary exhibitors are joined by Hermes, and the Carré des Horlogers adds five brands with Armin Strom, DeWitt, Ferdinand Berthoud, Élégante by F.P.Journe, and Romain Gauthier. See the full list of exhibitors in the image above.

SIHH 2018 Will Feature Public Day & More Exhibitors Than Ever Shows & Events

From a media perspective, Baselworld has tended to spread our resources very thinly in past years with simply too much to cover at once, so with some prominent brands having moved from Baselworld to SIHH, we can hope for some balance between the shows. Around 20,000 visitors are expected this year, and the FHH promises improved facilities and connectivity in order to make our job of bringing you high quality content more efficient – so we’ll see what that’s like in January. That’s just a glimpse into our point of view in preparing for the show.

We’ll continue providing news of new products ahead of the show – if mostly only renders and official product images from the brands with basic information before being able to see the watches in person to photograph and evaluate them in their glorious and gritty reality. SIHH 2018 runs from January 15th to the 19th, and again, the last day is open to the public with tickets on sale at the SIHH website. sihh.org