How Exactly Did the New CEO Guido Terreni Manage to Put Parmigiani Fleurier on The Horology Map? We Find Out.

Take us through the thought process when designing the new Tonda PF collection. The first thing was to perpetuate Michel Parmigiani and his legacy within the brand. What I appreciate by meeting him is his values of competence, devotion to watchmaking plus his understatement. He is discreet, and he is not loud, and that is part of the beauty of the brand. We are not ostentatious, we are not a brand for show-offs, we are a brand for people who are knowledgeable in watchmaking and are part of an inner circle of the horology community. Our clients are the type that carries their watch and are not carried by their watch. What you see in the Tonda PF collection are the ingredients that were already in the brand. The PF logo was there before, the guilloche was there before and the knurled bezel was there before. But, we just tweaked these ‘ingredients’ to make the watch contemporary and very appealing to the customer of today. The first thing that strikes you when looking at the Tonda PF is not one particular element but the purity of the design as a whole. What you see is a very pure aesthetic, it is very minimal. And I think that the fact that all the elements are subtle and yet so striking makes the watch so special. When you look at the watch you notice its simplicity but when you go into the making of the watch the complexity to achieve each component is extremely high.

Do you think the Asian region is ready for a brand like Parmigiani? The readiness of a brand to grow depends on the knowledge of the customer. In Asia, you have a lot of knowledge. Especially in Singapore, but also in Malaysia, Taiwan and Thailand. There is an understanding that is quite immediate in what we did with the new Tonda PF and it is because we are talking to the watch connoisseur instead of the mass market consumers. They are very educated and understand what the brand is about. And because they are educated, they don’t just swallow a brand’s marketing campaigns. Instead, they judge brands for themselves and they understand the purity of what we do in terms of Horology. Simply put, there is a huge potential for the brand to grow in the region precisely because there are consumers here that are very discerning.