Louis Vuitton Pulled Out All the Stops for Its New Spin Time Watches
Last week in New York, droves of watch nuts assembled on 57th Street to see what the folks at juggernaut luxury conglomerate Louis Vuitton Moët Hennessy have in store for 2025. Dubbed LVMH Watch Week, the proceedings were jam-packed with new releases from specialised watchmakers like Zenith and Hublot as well as offerings from renowned jewelers like Bulgari and Tiffany & Co. But one of the true standouts came from the maison whose moniker is right there in the name of the event itself: Louis Vuitton.
Since the relaunch of the flagship Tambour watch in 2023, Vuitton has aggressively reestablished itself as a real player in the world of high horology. And this year, it delivered something pretty exceptional in the form of six—count ‘em, six!—new riffs on the house’s signature Spin Time complication.
If you’re unfamiliar, Spin Time does pretty much what it says it does. Skipping the hour hand, the dial is instead outfitted with 12 cubes, one of which spins around to a different color to mark the hour as the previous hour marker simultaneously spins back to match the other 11. It’s a pretty cool little trick that requires a whole lot of watchmaking wizardry to work properly. (The minute hand shows the time in the traditional manner.)
The first Spin Time watch arrived in 2009 with the first movement created for Louis Vuitton by Swiss manufacture Fabrique du Temps working away inside. A couple years later, in 2011, Fabrique du Temps became an official part of the Vuitton family. “Without Spin Time, we would not have embarked on the challenge of entering high watchmaking in this manner,” Jean Arnault, Louis Vuitton’s watch director, said in a statement. “And consequently, we would not have integrated La Fabrique du Temps, which is a founding moment for our watchmaking.”
This year, the team went all out, crafting movements entirely in-house for every limited-edition model in the collection. The iconic Tambour shape has also been tweaked, most notably with integrated lugs that make the new Tambour Taiko case wear much smaller on the wrist than the listed case diameter—there are 39.5mm and 42.5mm versions—might suggest.
To add to the overall sense of cohesion, each watch is made from white gold and features a “dolphin gray” colour on the dial and Spin Time cubes (though different finishing techniques mean you’ll still get some variation from watch to watch). Still, despite a couple of models absolutely encrusted with diamonds, one watch from the collection really stood out to us.
The watch in question is properly named the Tambour Taiko Spin Time Air Antipode. With a “floating” display in which the Spin Time cubes seem to be suspended in midair, it offers a whole new take on a world time complication. Usually, you’ll see cities in 24 separate time zones on one of those watches. With the Antipode, you’ve only got the 12 cubes aligned with each hour. But on each of those cubes, you’ve got two cities—each 12 time zones apart—listed. One is displayed in a darker color to indicate night, and another in a lighter color to indicate daytime. In geographical terms, the “antipode” of any spot on Earth is the location diametrically opposite it—hence the name. And don’t worry, if you’re just looking for local time, that’s indicated by a highly legible yellow arrow that points at the hour where you are, plus a traditional minute hand.
If the 42.5mm Antipode isn’t your thing, you can choose from a more compact Spin Time at 39.5mm that’s available with or without a generous dusting of diamonds, the 42.55 Spin Time Air (also available with and without gemsetting), and a 42.5mm tourbillon version. or you could opt for the new 37mm Tambour Convergence, with its own avant-garde take on displaying the minute and hour of the day. Whatever you choose, it’s sure to be strong evidence that Louis Vuitton is serious about this whole watch thing—and we’re all lucky to be here to see the results.
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