Louis Vuitton Revisits Its First Wristwatch With The New Monterey Ceramic

Louis Vuitton Monterey Ceramic

Long before Louis Vuitton made a serious push into watchmaking with the Tambour in 2002, the famed French luxury house had already tested the waters with a rather unusual pair of watches.

Having covered the watch industry since the mid-1980s, I remember when Louis Vuitton first ventured into wristwatches in 1988 — long before the Tambour would put the House much more firmly on the watchmaking map in 2002.

The Louis Vuitton Monterey Ceramic watches retail for $22,900.

Those first watches, the LV I and LV II, were created in collaboration with renowned Italian architect and designer Gae Aulenti. They were distinctive, to say the least, with rounded pebble-shaped cases, no traditional lugs and crowns positioned unexpectedly at 12 o’clock. They would later become known to collectors as the Monterey.

Now Louis Vuitton is looking back to that lesser-known first chapter with two new Monterey Ceramic watches that join the permanent collection, following last year’s limited-edition Monterey in yellow gold.

There are two versions of the new Louis Vuitton Monterey Ceramic: white dial with black case and green

And ceramic isn’t simply a contemporary update. The original LV II was also made in ceramic, making these new watches as much a return to the Monterey’s roots as a reinvention.

The two new models come in glossy black or deep green ceramic and retain the original 37mm diameter. The green version is particularly punchy, with a matching matte green lacquer dial accented by bright yellow hour and minute hands and a blue seconds hand. The black version is more graphic, pairing glossy black ceramic with a matte white lacquer dial, red hands and minute track, and a slim blue seconds hand. Both retain the distinctive railway-style tracks, stylized numerals and Clous de Paris steel crown at 12:00. Personally, I love the placement of the crown at 12:00z; it keeps the case sleek looking.

The Louis Vuitton Monterey Ceramic watches feature an automatic movement and a closed caseback..

Complex Casemaking

Creating those smooth pebble-shaped cases is more involved than their simplicity suggests. Louis Vuitton starts with zirconium oxide powder blended with pigments, compacts it into blocks and machines the basic form before firing it at more than 1,000°C. Because ceramic shrinks during firing and can no longer be machined afterward, the cases are subsequently ground and polished by hand to achieve their fluid shape and glossy finish.

The biggest departure from 1988 comes inside. The original watches were quartz powered; the new Monterey is fitted with Louis Vuitton’s manufacture automatic LFT MA01.02 caliber, offering hours, minutes and seconds and a 45-hour power reserve. Despite its detailed finishing and rose-gold rotor, the movement remains hidden beneath a closed caseback.

There is something appealing about Louis Vuitton choosing to resurrect this relatively obscure piece of its watchmaking history. The Monterey preceded the Tambour by more than a decade and never became the watch most associated with the House. But nearly 40 years later, its strange little pebble case, offbeat crown placement and highly graphic dial don’t look dated. If anything, they look surprisingly current. The Monterey Ceramic retails for $22,900.