Picture the scene: a Lamborghini Miura is sweeping around the roads clinging to hillsides falling away into the Mediterranean on the French and Italian Riviera.
Dazzling sun fades to sunset as the car pulls up at a red carpet event and paparazzi flashbulbs pepper the driver.
Not my fantasy, but the imagined life of a man, or woman, wearing a new Hegid Mirage Soleil watch in the mind of the French watchmaker’s artistic director Jérôme Coste.
The watch is influenced by late 1960s styling when the world’s glitterati flocked to the beaches of Southern Europe and has a textured sunray dial designed to catch the light at any time of day.
Mirage is a more mainstream collection than the more niche Celeste watches from the same Paris-based business, but it has a trick up its sleeve because the time-telling watch head is a module that can be removed from its surrounding case, allowing its owner to completely change dial colour from the ivy green or blue of Hegid’s latest Mirage Soleil to previously released iterations in blue, black, pearl.
Bought as a complete watch, Hegid charges €3,320. That breaks down to €2,700 for the Mirage module, €400 for the case and the remainder for the strap and packaging. Interchangeable straps are sold separately for €50 to €220.
Prices of the various parts vary, according to style and sophistication, but you get the idea.
Back to the Riviera for design inspiration, Hegid describes the Mirage’s case shape achieving a “retro-futuristic balance in the blend of rounded corners and the frank lines of the chamfer surrounding it”.
Hegid is a wholesale brand and says the customisable Mirage concept is perfect for retailers because customers keep coming back for new modules or other accessories.
It is currently working with Manfredi in the United States, a specialist in independent watchmakers with a reputation for taking on new brands that are then picked up by other retailers across the world when they prove successful.
The company has its own boutique in Paris, but insists the store is as much about demonstrating the appeal of its watches to retail partners as it is about selling directly to consumers.
“It also helps us to see the look on people’s faces as they see how the box set and modular watch works,” says Emeric Delalandre, co-founder & chief marketing officer, of Hegid Paris.
The latest Hegid Mirage Soleil has a fluted sunray dial in blue, green or black.
Its 39.6mm case stands 11mm tall on the wrist, including the crystal of its module, and houses a Swiss-made automatic movement with 40 hour power reserve.
With all due apologies for the use of ‘Riviera’ to Richemont and their Baume & Mercier for their long time Hallmark Collection at 50, though recently updated, the Riviera, who’s advertising “Baume & Mercier celebrates the facets of the Riviera……The Riviera a Place With an Infinite Charm”, would seem borrowing at minimum. Perhaps Soliel would have been sufficient for Megid Paris?