Smaller Watches Are the Biggest Timepiece Trend of 2023

(bnnbloomberg.ca) - Ever since the wristwatch was invented, its makers have grappled with the question of how big it should be. Thick as a hockey puck or puny as a nickel? At the moment, watchmakers are leaning into the latter, a trend that crescendoed last month at Watches and Wonders, the annual luxury watch fair in Geneva. More than a dozen brands welcomed new product lines in small sizes—or welcomed reduced versions of existing popular models. Like hemlines, watch proportions wax and wane in cycles. For men they started out big, since the first ones were pocket watches with straps attached to them. Louis Cartier made an early version in 1911 for his friend, aviator Alberto Santos-Dumont, who was tired of having to yank out his pocket watch to navigate while in flight. It wasn’t long before it dawned on watchmakers that an enormous timepiece on the wrist was unwieldy and unnecessary, so they began to reinvent movements on a smaller scale.