Trends in the luxury watch industry might move glacially compared to the hype-y and propulsive world of fashion, but you’d be wrong to think that tastes don’t shift among watch collectors. In 2024, stone dials were the biggest new trend of the year — building on a wave of enthusiasm for design-focused timepieces to a crescendo of tiger eye, lapis lazuli, and malachite.
How did we get here? A few years ago, the auction of Paul Newman’s own Rolex Daytona for US$17,752,500…

