Hermès suspends time with Watches & Wonders 2025 releases

Time, for Hermès, has never been about discipline. It’s about rhythm. Feeling. A glimmer between past and present, tradition and play. At Watches & Wonders 2025, the Maison continues its quiet rebellion against the ticking clock – offering time not as a constraint, but as a canvas for expression.

From the whimsical pause of Le temps suspendu to the sculptural elegance of Maillon libre, each creation reframes the role of the watch. These aren’t just instruments of precision. They’re gestures of freedom – disrupting linearity, playing with form, hiding time, revealing it again, like a magician’s sleight of hand.

Le temps suspendu: The art of pausing time

What if you could press pause on time? In 2025, Hermès invites us to do exactly that. With Le temps suspendu, time is not measured but suspended – liberated from urgency, offered back to you as a moment to savour. First launched in 2011 as a joyful subversion of traditional watchmaking, the Maison’s iconic complication returns, breathing fresh life into both the Arceau and Hermès Cut collections.

On the Arceau Le temps suspendu, a 42 mm case in white or rose gold frames an open-worked dial that lays bare the complexity of the time-stopping module. Here, the Manufacture Hermès H1837 movement powers a delicate ballet of mechanics, while the dial – available in sunburst blue, brun désert or rouge sellier – remains free of hands when time is paused. The asymmetrical lugs, a hallmark of the Arceau, lend quiet movement to the design, like time stretching softly rather than ticking forward.

The complication also finds a new home in the Hermès Cut, introduced just last year. Sleek, modern and architectural, its 39 mm rose gold case contrasts sharply with the whimsical nature of suspended time. The H1912 calibre brings precision to the play, while a counterclockwise indicator injects an element of the surreal. Available in several versions, including a fiery red limited edition, this is Hermès at its most conceptual – disrupting reference points and inviting us to exist outside of them.

Maillon libre: Time as ornament

With Maillon libre, Hermès blurs the line between jewellery and timekeeping in the most audacious way. Inspired by the house’s anchor chain motif, this new collection transforms the idea of the link – both metaphorically and literally – into something expressive, sculptural and unexpectedly radical.

The bracelet watch is a study in contrast: soft curves and rigid links, playfulness and precision. A central stone—either terracotta tourmaline or diamond – anchors the composition, while the undulating structure of the bracelet conceals the time display within. The watch doesn’t scream for attention; it reveals itself slowly, almost imperceptibly. The surprise of finding time where you least expect it is pure Hermès—equal parts elegance and irreverence.

Then there’s the brooch watch: a nod to nomadic elegance and one of the oldest masculine accessories, reimagined for today. Worn on the chest or strung on a leather cordlet like a pendant, it’s both a celebration of Hermès’ leatherworking roots and an invitation to wear time differently. Jewellery first, watch second – Maillon libre treats time not as a taskmaster but as a talisman.