Square watches have always been somewhat cool, but they never really sold that well. However, in the past few years, there has been a visible renaissance of square and rectangular watches, wherein these have landed on more wrists than at any other point in recent history. The release of the Patek Philippe Cubitus late last year officially brought square watches into the limelight.
The idea of square watches is not new. In fact, one of the earliest pilot’s wristwatches happens to be square, the Cartier Santos. In 1904, Alberto Santos-Dumont, an aviator, was presented with a wristwatch by Louis Cartier so that Alberto would not need to pull out his pocket watch whenever he needed to check the time while flying. Little did they know, the Cartier Santos would become one of the most important watches in history.
Aside from the Cartier Santos, Tag Heuer had also created its own iconic square watch in 1969 through the Monaco, an ode to the famous Grand Prix. The Monaco was popularised by Steve McQueen when he chose to wear the watch in the 1971 film, Le Mans. From then on, the Monaco has been one of the most recognisable racing-inspired watches.
Other leading Swiss manufacturers decided to take a crack at designing square watches to little or no avail. Jaeger-LeCoultre, one of the most respected watch manufacturers, even took its already iconic Reverso model and produced square versions of it, the Reverso Squadra. The watch only enjoyed a short and relative success before it was eventually discontinued after around a decade of production.
From the millennium up to the early 2020s, the world witnessed the incredible rise of steel sports watches. These watches were mostly round or angular at best. The Patek Philippe Nautilus Ref. 5711/1A, one of the most highly-coveted watches of that time period and up to this day, has a case shape in between what you would call round and square. By 2021, the watch was discontinued, leaving the world with mostly rounded watches once again. It was somewhere at this point when square watches started to pick up due to a confluence of circumstances.
Vintage-inspired
One of the open secrets of the world of fashion and style is that it is cyclical. Old trends will fade but can come back in some way, shape or form in the future. The watch industry is not exempt from this phenomenon. As such, watches that became symbols in their days like the Cartier Santos, the Jaeger-LeCoultre Reverso and the Tag Heuer Monaco started to creep their way back into favour with the watch community towards the end of the 2010s.
In 2019, Cartier released the Santos-Dumont line that reintroduced the design of its first pilot’s watch dating back to 1904. Not long after, Hublot introduced the Square Bang Unico in 2022, a square version of their popular Big Bang model line. Finally in 2024, Patek Philippe, after much anticipation, released the polarising Cubitus line. Upon examination of these new releases, clearly, these are modern watches that honour design cues from the past.
Anti-sports watch hype
At the peak of the Covid-19 pandemic, all of the hype was with stainless-steel sports watches. During that period, everyone seemed to be wearing or yearning for a stainless-steel sports watch. Eventually, people got tired of hearing about and participating in this hype and started to explore the beauty of other watches. With this shift, the square watch design was one of those that benefitted the most when people started to go beyond the stainless-steel sports watch hype.
Readily available
In relation to the previous point, one of the reasons why the square watches emerged in recent years is because of their relative availability. Except for the Patek Philippe Cubitus, square watches are usually not subjected to long waitlists and purchase history for you to buy or try one on at the boutique or authorised dealer. This availability is very much a stark contrast to stainless-steel sports watches, wherein up to today, there is still a considerable waitlist for you to be allocated one.
Conversation starter
In addition to what was previously mentioned, square watches have always possessed this cool design code that makes them stand out. If you want to blend in with the crowd, a square watch is definitely out of the question. Whenever you wear a square watch, you can easily catch the eyes of other watch enthusiasts at the opposite end of the room, which can then lead to interactions and meaningful conversations. Ultimately, these square watches or those that have unconventional designs may indirectly lead to networking with different people.
This is a repost of an article written by Watch Manila Founder Atty. Sieg Suarez for L’Officiel. You may access the L’Officiel post here.
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