Bulgari are on a roll. At a time at which many watch companies are suffering and sales are falling, Bulgari announce that they are enjoying double digit growth in their watch division. This year, Bulgari presented their first ever jewellery snake watch, a product masterminded by senior designer Fabrizio Buonamassa Stigliani, and his brilliance at combining Swiss watchmaking skills with an Italian design approach, and jewellery expertise from the Italian town of Valenza. Any Bulgari watch with a snake on it brings to mind Cinecittà, Elizabeth Taylor and her role as Cleopatra in which her stage jewellery wasn’t much different from the pieces that she had bought at Bulgari in Rome and brought with her to the set.

Bulgari’s snake watches generally had a bracelet in the form of a snake. For the first time, Serpenti Incantati has the case in snake form, framing the dial. The 30 mm case has a jewellery bracelet or a satin strap. In the case of the former, the watch is exceptional for the supple bracelet, the links providing a subtle, snake-like movement that makes it very comfortable on the wrist. The diamond-setting technique is unusual, based on an apparently random positioning on the stones. The watches have a quartz movement.

Price

There are many different versions of the watch: these two Serpenti Incantati pieces are in pink gold set with rubellites, or white gold set with diamonds. The version in pink gold and rubellite costs €73,000, the version in white gold and diamonds costs €83,000.