Introducing: Louis Vuitton Sings A New Song With The Tambour Opera Automata
Slightly less morbid, this year’s watch is inspired by Bian Lian, the traditional dramatic art of “face-changing” seen most often in Sichuan Opera. Performers rapidly switch colorful masks, seemingly by magic, and until fairly recently the techniques were a carefully guarded secret. This year instead of a skull we have a Bian Lian mask changing expression (one of five automations) and a dragon wrapped around the mask, moving its head to reveal the jumping hour in the middle of the mask’s forehead, and its tail serves as a retrograde minute hand. The power reserve is no longer an hourglass but a bottle gourd, or Calabash, believed to ward off evil spirits. The time is only displayed by activating the automation via the dragon on the case. Similar to the Carpe Diem one of the eyes of the mask is a nod to Louis Vuitton’s flower emblem, and a four petal flower replaces the number four, an unlucky number in Chinese culture.