SimplyAbuDhabi XLIX

F rom prowling panthers to diamond- encrusted crocodiles, Cartier’s extraordinary animal watches transform the passage of time into something altogether wilder. Drawing on more than a century of jewellery savoir-faire, the Maison brings its celebrated menagerie vividly to life. Cartier has never regarded the animal kingdom simply as decoration. Across generations, its creatures have prowled, coiled, and pounced through jewellery and watchmaking, evolving from graphic motifs into astonishingly lifelike sculptures. Presiding over them all is the panther, whose spotted coat first appeared on a Cartier watch in 1914 and whose three- dimensional form became one of the Maison’s defining signatures in the late 1940s. Today, that rich bestiary provides fertile territory for Cartier’s jewellery-watchmakers, who move effortlessly between realism and abstraction, transforming precious stones and metals into creatures seemingly caught in motion. The Tiger Jewellery Watch is a particularly exuberant example. Sculpted in yellow gold, the tiger appears to grip the circular watch case between its jaws, its pear-cut emerald eyes fixed intently on the golden sunray-brushed dial. Black spinels and lacquer create graphic stripes, while yellow and orange sapphires and warm-toned spessartite garnets mingle with brilliant-cut diamonds across the head and flexible bracelet. The effect is part watch, part jewel, and part miniature sculpture, a study in colour and character that contains some 3.3 carats of diamonds alone. Simply Abu Dhabi | 223