Johann Rupert: "Luxury must be more discreet"

Le Point Watches, December 15, 2016

Is the winter of luxury approaching? The discreet billionaire at the head of the Richemont group confided in the "New York Times".

Extracts

“Luxury must be more discreet; Gone are the days of bling, forget it. Hatred of the rich will continue to spread, and people will no longer want to throw their good fortune in the face of others, as they may have done in the past. Designers need to start hearing this,” he warns. And his warning is, it seems, not new: for five years he has been asking his watchmaking houses to drop the "big hamburger watches", to switch to "thinness, white gold and platinum. Luxury, yes, but not ostentatious.

“Luxury is notoriously hackneyed,” the extreme watchmaker recently confided. We have to go back to real luxury, real rarity, as it existed at the beginning of the 20th century, with limited volumes. Some brands in Paris are easier to find than Monoprix or gas stations! But this side of rarity must also correspond to something real. We cannot say that we are in luxury and make millions in sales a year. »

“We are on the eve of a great upheaval, explained Johann Rupert in a press release. Globalization, the digital revolution and advances in artificial intelligence have opened up new horizons. But they also risk increasing unemployment and inequality. […] These forces threaten to eclipse extraordinary human skills and centuries of culture and know-how. »

https://www.lepoint.fr/montres/johann-rupert-le-luxe-doit-se-faire-plus-discret-15-12-2016-2090587_2648.php