Rihanna might be the best in the biz at using a watch to elevate her already incomparable style. When she’s running out for groceries, she wears a watch typically reserved for a red carpet. She attaches pieces worth hundreds of thousands of dollars to her neck and her ankle, elevating them beyond watches to powerful fashion statements. This week, in Beverly Hills, searching for something to match her pink sweatshirt, the singer settled on an Audemars Piguet Royal Oak Self-Winding in pink gold with a matching pink Grande Tapisserie dial.
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Rihanna’s watch is a particularly cool 34-mm Royal Oak. The combination of pink gold case and bracelet with a matching, bright pink Grande Tapisserie dial is an arresting look, while a case depth of just 8.8-mm means it could theoretically slip right under a cuff if desired. (The point of such a watch certainly isn’t to hide it, however.)
Rihanna is no stranger to the Royal Oak, either. The pop star’s been spotted in the 23-mm Mini Royal Oak in yellow gold both on its own and in a full stack of spangled gold bracelets. She’s also a noted wearer of significant watches, having rocked everything from a Jacob & Co. Brilliant Skeleton Northern Lights to a classic Rolex Day-Date and a cool Cartier Santos in yellow gold with a matching bracelet. With wide-ranging taste and a watch box full of bangers, she may in fact be one of the most significant collectors in the musical sphere—and one of the most inventive.
Rihanna’s new Royal Oak with a pink dial is an under-discussed version of the beloved 1972 design. While we’ve spilled plenty of ink about stacking Mini Royal Oaks and waxed poetic at length about complicated ROs, the 34-mm references don’t get nearly as much love as their ‘Jumbo’ (and teensy) cousins. Born as a 39-mm watch, the original Gérald Genta-designed model was considered oversized for the time, while the recently reissued Mini is that watch’s miniaturized foil.
The 34-mm references, available in all manner of cool finishes and configurations, live someplace in the literal and figurative middle: What in recent memory would’ve been decidedly considered a lady’s size is now once again unisex in the manner of midcentury Rolex Oyster Perpetual and Air-King models or Omega Seamasters. And while you can’t quite stack ‘em in the manner of the Minis—and while most men will undoubtedly still spring for larger versions—the Rihanna’s Royal Oak is a thing of versatile beauty. Unlike the Mini, it’s an automatic watch, giving it some welcome points with us horological nerds. Also, its octagonal bezel and famous integrated bezel mean that it wears somewhat larger than its measurements would lead you to believe.
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A$AP Rocky’s Rolex Day-Date
Appearing at the New York premiere of Spike Lee’s Highest 2 Lowest this week, A$AP Rocky wore a yellow gold Rolex Day-Date ref. 18038 that we’ve seen before. Rewind the clock to early 2023, and it would appear that his girlfriend Rihanna wore the same one while out and about in L.A. (Makes one wonder who’s borrowing from whom, doesn’t it?) The five-digit Day-Date is a classic for good reason: When the ref. 18038 debuted in 1977, it boasted a new quickset date function, making the setting process significantly quicker. (It wasn’t until 1988 that the so-called “double-quickset” function would debut, however, allowing for fast updating of the day display.)
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Pierce Brosnan’s Girard-Perregaux Vintage 1945
Pierce Brosnan, the dapperest of James Bonds, stepped out in New York City this week looking handsome as ever and wearing a yellow gold Girard-Perregaux Vintage 1945. A noted watch guy, Brosnan has plenty of interesting pieces in his collection but the Vintage 1945 might be the former Bond’s most unusual. With the watch’s Art Deco-inspired rectangular case, it recalls classic dress models but also includes a few avant-garde touches that watch guys pine after. The mix of smaller and larger Arabic indices provides some welcome visual interest, while an angled date window at 1:30, a power reserve indicator between 3 and 6 o’clock, and a running seconds display between 8 and 10 o’clock add a bit of complicated whimsy.
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Luis Enrique’s Casio x PAC-MAN Watch
Paris Saint-Germain’s manager Luis Enrique may not be a household name, but the guy is now a horological hero for rocking a Casio x PAC-MAN ref. CA53WPC-1B during this week’s game against Tottenham. A colorful version of the brand’s classic 1980s calculator watch, it features a bright yellow bezel paired to a black rubber strap, a negative LCD screen, and an array of buttons. A celebration of 45 years of PAC-MAN, it may be the best use of $79.95 in the entire horological universe. The one drawback? It unfortunately does not contain a miniature PAC-MAN game. (It does, however, tell the time.) Credit to master watch spotter Nick Gould for this eagle-eyed catch.