Product Releases
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With new watches, Yurman seeks instant 'Classic'
By Teresa Novellino
February 24, 2009
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| David Yurman's new men's watch collection, "The Classic," includes this 3-Hand Automatic, which starts at $3,200 retail. |
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New York--David Yurman isn't new to the watch business, but its upcoming men's collection, "The Classic," elevates the brand's timepiece offerings to a more mature level and it does so at an "affordable luxury" price that company executives say is in synch with the times.
The collection was unveiled at an editor luncheon at the company's headquarters in New York on Monday, hosted by chairman and chief designer David Yurman and his son, Evan Yurman, one of the principals of David Yurman Design and creative director of the men's jewelry and men's timepiece businesses.
Scheduled to be released at the brand's 15 freestanding U.S. boutiques in May, the collection will be available more widely this fall, with a limited distribution to include about 20-30 retailers. The price points range from $3,200 to $18,000.
"These are beautifully priced, especially if you know what is in the watch and what went into them," David Yurman said of the Swiss-made collection. "It's very appropriately priced."
And price has become an issue, even for the luxury market, which was humming along steadily until October 2008, when the bottom dropped out for mainstream retail and the previously insulated luxury market alike. Now in its 29th year, David Yurman has seen previous recessions, and though this one seems unpredictable at the moment, the company is facing it head-on.
"This is not like '82, and this is not like '76," Yurman told National Jeweler in an interview after the luncheon. "It's an economic metamorphosis."
In light of the economic downturn, Yurman said the company has focused on keeping its creative juices flowing and adapting to how the American consumer has changed and will change.
"It's energizing," he said. "What you have to think about is how has the world changed? How has the customer changed, and how has the way they perceive luxury changed?"
In terms of those changes, The Classic is on target, the father-and-son design team said.
One of the most significant differences in the new watch collection is that the cases, which range in size from 43.5 millimeters to 46 millimeters, are round instead of cushion-shaped. Manufactured in Swiss watchmaking hub La Chaux-de-Fonds, Switzerland, the collection includes: The 3-Hand Automatic, which features an ETA 2892-2 movement and starts at $3,200; the Moon Phase, which features a Dubois-Depraz 9000 movement and starts at $5,800; and the Chronograph, which features a Dubois-Depraz 2050 movement and starts at $4,500.
While the company knew it could never be "a Vacheron," with hundreds of years of Swiss watchmaking history behind it, it did want to put the emphasis on a combination of technology and design--the type of design that is uniquely American, says Evan Yurman.
"I realized that I could have so much fun with this," he said. "I wanted to produce a watch that would be a platform for future designs, and I realized I could do many things, such as use enamel, add a perpetual calendar..."
From the instantly recognizable cable design on the sides of the stainless steel cases to the watch faces done up in black, white and cool neutrals, the collection pays subtle homage to the brand's signature look.
"The wave of the cables--that breathes the DNA of the brand," David Yurman said. "Real luxury has a subtlety to it."
Evan said he was also influenced by the designs of American automobiles of the early 1960s, an influence evidenced in the Chronograph's subdials, which resemble auto gauges. The alligator straps feature buffalo-skin lining, which is comfortable against the skin and offers a more organic feel. The stainless steel clasps have double pushers that allow the watch to open elegantly, revealing the "DY" logo, etched on the inside.
Moving into the watch-making arena on a more serious level was a gradual process--a lot more gradual then the Yurman team is used to, and one that required much research and many trips back and forth to Switzerland.
"In jewelry, I could do a drawing, have (our team) work up a sample, and three weeks later, it would be on line," David Yurman said. "This was two years in the making."
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