Lady Rencontre Céleste Watch

POETRY OF THE HEAVENS

Watches and Wonders 2026

For more than a century, Van Cleef & Arpels has pursued the dream of living in time with the cosmos. Awed by the spectacle of the stars and the heavens, the Maison pays tribute to celestial wonders through creations that express the full scope of its expertise. As of 1929, it designed a pocket watch fitted with a complication showing phases of the Moon. In the 1950s, Van Cleef & Arpels once again turned its gaze to the night sky, especially with the Meteor secret watch.

This year, the Maison is observing the Moon’s subtle variations through a new Poetic Complications timepiece. The hours of Poetic Astronomy tick by in harmony from one time zone to the next, within an elegant setting highlighting the art of enamel. Meanwhile, Van Cleef & Arpels’ jewels that tell time interpret the boundless depth of the sky in rare materials. Finally, the Extraordinary Dials collection welcomes two new watches—legendary tales of love set against a celestial backdrop.

"Watches and Wonders 2026 gives us the opportunity to again showcase our Poetic Complications collection. Born in 2006 with the Lady Arpels Centenaire watch and its Quantième de Saison movement, this assortment instills emotion thanks to the confluence of watchmaking expertise and a narrative vision of passing time. Over the years, these creations have become iconic embodiments of the Poetry of Time dear to Van Cleef & Arpels. This conception is further enriched today with a new and enchanting chapter."

Lady Rencontre Céleste et Lady Retrouvailles Célestes

A founding source of inspiration for the Maison, love sets the joyous cadence of the Poetry of Time, offering a vision of watchmaking suffused with dreams and emotion. This year, the poignant potency of this theme is providing Van Cleef & Arpels with the elan for a duet of Extraordinary Dials. Through consummate mastery of artistic crafts, these new creations tell the story of a legendary couple: Vega and Altair—also known as Niulang and Zhinu. Complementing one another, the watches express the wistful encounter of these lovers and the rapture of their reunion.

A medley of blue, the Lady Rencontre Céleste watch portrays the couple, hands clasped, framed by a star-studded sky. Their white gold silhouette appears behind sparkling clouds adorned with diamonds set in plique-à-jour enamel. Their faces, suggested by rose-cut diamonds, are manifestly engrossed in mutual contemplation. This enchanting tableau glows with the soft light of a Moon set with diamonds. The background of the dial, glazed in champlevé and grisaille enamel, is further embellished with a subtle sapphire crescent, the setting beads infused with color thanks to the miniature painting technique.

The Lady Retrouvailles Célestes watch also brings this savoir-faire to life in gently glittering tones of pink and mauve. The background of the dial, fashioned in champlevé enamel, hints at the emotions harbored by the two characters standing before a crescent of mauve sapphires. Arms outstretched in longing, they seem to be awaiting their reunion across an aerial bridge of sculpted white gold birds. Clouds and veils in plique-à-jour enamel and diamonds set in enamel round out the tableau, lending the scene striking transparency effects.
The courtship continues on the back of the watches, with the Summer Triangle asterism, formed by three of the firmament’s brightest stars—Altair, Vega and Deneb—engraved in the night sky.

Variations on enamel

To breathe life into these enchanting decors, Van Cleef & Arpels brings together several artistic crafts, each calling for patience and exacting precision. The champlevé enamel technique, used to adorn the background of the dials, consists of designing a motif via chambers carved in the precious metal which is then filled with several layers of enamel. The piece is fired after each step. For the final firing, a lapidary procedure eliminates excess material and reveals a dazzling decor framed by fine metal contours. On the Lady Rencontre Céleste model, this technique is used with grisaille enamel, savoir-faire developed in France as of the 16th century and which draws forth chiaroscuro and perspective effects by combining two colors of enamel. Meanwhile, plique-à-jour enamel allows light to pass through the fabric of Zhinu’s gown, like a stained-glass window. The motif is outlined in an openwork gold structure and then filled in with fine layers of enamel. This exacting technique imbues the dials with interplays of transparency that underscore the depth of the scene.

Van Cleef & Arpels complements these ancestral methods with an innovative enameling technique that accentuates the three-dimensionality of the decors. Developed by the Maison to give form to sketches composed by the Creation Studio, this patented savoir-faire is the fruit of two years of research and development. Setting in enamel involves fixing precious stones directly in plique-à-jour enamel, with no other metal components. This process generates a feeling of weightlessness that accentuates the glow of the precious stones. There thus emerges a dialogue between science and art, between technical demands and stylistic intent, all dedicated to narrating the tale expressed in the creations.