Welcome to Watches of the Week, where we’ll track the rarest, wildest, and most covetable watches spotted on celebrities.
This was a good week for the Marvel Cinematic Universe. While most prestige directors like to kick dirt on the MCU, Paul Thomas Anderson outed himself as a fan. Shang-Chi, he said, has “terrific energy,” which is the highest possible compliment to get from a Los Angeles resident. But the Marvel universe doesn’t just include movies and television shows. It also extends to a world of products that includes a partnership with luxury watch brand Audemars PIguet established in March. The first watch in what will be an ongoing collaboration is centered around Black Panther. The piece is part of a larger pop culture wave of watches: Admirers of Mickey Mouse, Mario, and Space Jam could all find luxury-grade timepieces to indulge their fandom this year. But none of those watches quite hit like this super-popular ($162,000) Black Panther watch. Serena Williams, something of a real-life superhero, is an obvious matchfor it. Also this week, Scottie Pippen shows he’s no second fiddle and Andrew Garfield keeps it classic.
Considering Eternals’ Rotten Tomatoes score, working with Audemars Piguet has to be one of Marvel’s better maneuvers of 2021. The piece contains an actual figure of the Wakandan superhero at the center that took 30 hours to carve, according to the brand. Only 250 were made and we’ve already seen several out in the wild on the wrists of LeBron James, The Weeknd, Neymar, and now Williams.
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Burbling underneath the surface of The Last Dance, amid the quest for another Chicago Bulls title and the tension between Michael Jordan’s Batman and Pippen’s Robin, was a powerful watch battle. Pay close enough attention through the course of the documentary and you’ll see both Pippen and Jordan wielding dueling pieces from the same brand, Roger Dubuis. Jordan’s watch is cool—its band is made out of literal tires that have been part of winning Formula 1 cars, which makes it perfect for a man obsessed with victory. But Pippen wore Dubuis’s Excalibur, a skeleton-dial watch with two tourbillons. And you know what’s cooler than used tires? The white gold used to make the Excalibur. Jordan’s watch retailed for $75,000. Pippen’s? $287,500.
All this to say: Pippen more than holds his own in the horological department. When GQ’s own Tyler R. Tynes interviewed Pippen about his new book Unguarded this week, Pippen wore another impressive piece: a navy Royal Oak Offshore with a matching blue camo strap. “I was as great a player as Michael Jordan,” Pippen asserted during the interview. If by “player” he means “watch collector,” I think he’s got a point.
While promoting his new movie Tick, Tick…Boom! Garfield is making plenty of news. He’s revisiting his idea that Spider-Man should explore his bisexuality, not completely denying the rumor he’ll appear in the latest iteration of the movie alongside Tom Holland, and railing against capitalism. With soundbites this loud, Garfield needed a watch that was quiet. He turned to the Omega De Ville Trésor, a piece that debuted in 1949 and is as classic as that date suggests. A watch was a must for the premiere of a movie called Tick, Tick…Boom! Let’s hope Garfield’s Omega only fulfills two-thirds of the title, though.
Gunna is finding new ways to ensure Rihanna’s next Halloween costume is more expensive than this year’s. This week, the rapper showed off his rose-gold RM 030. This is a foundational Richard Mille piece: it was the first to include a declutchable rotor that automatically disengages from the winding mechanism when it reaches maximum capacity to prevent it from deteriorating. That feature is now a signature of Richard Mille’s.
F1 driver Ricciardo appeared on The Ellen Show ready to do war with the show’s watch-fiend host. This 5271P is a heavyweight: nearly 60 baguette-cut diamonds cover the bezel and lugs, but when it comes to Patek, the sizzle and substance are always in equal balance. Although this watch is blinged-out enough for even the iciest rappers, it comes with the perpetual calendar complication that’ll please even the snobbiest horologist.