Natural Wonders: 5 Captivating Stone

From turquoise to meteorite, an array of natural stone dials endow watches with unique, organic flourishes of color and texture.

Lapidary dials made of fragile, polished stone discs first experienced a heyday following advancements in ultra-thin watch movements, particularly Piaget’s caliber 9P, which debuted in 1957.

The Swiss brand started offering avant-garde designs with stone dials in 1963. Six years later, Yves Piaget unveiled the 21st Century Collection celebrating wildly extravagant jewelry watches featuring dials set with ornamental stones, including coral, turquoise, and lapis lazuli.

According to Paul Altieri, founder and CEO of the Rolex-centric online marketplace Bob’s Watches, Rolex started using hardstone material for dials back in the 1970s. This year’s trio of Day-Date 36s with green aventurine, carnelian, and turquoise dials carries on that long tradition.

Dials made from meteorites started to emerge in the 1980s, according to Altieri. “It’s difficult to pinpoint exactly when the meteorite dials first appeared,” he says. “But based on our research and knowledge, Corum was actually the first watch brand to utilize them back in the 1980s. Rolex, though, was the first company credited with using Gibeon meteorite.” He credits 2003’s Cosmograph Daytona reference 116519 as the first Gibeon meteorite dial.

Discovered in 1838, the Gibeon meteorite disintegrated as it fell to earth, scattering pieces over the Namibian desert near the village of Gibeon. The slices of this extraterrestrial stone—composed of iron, nickel, and small amounts of cobalt and estimated at 4.5 billion years old—exhibit a distinctive striated crystalline pattern named Widmanstätten that is revealed when etched using nitric acid.

Gibeon meteorite dials have been used by many brands, including Zenith, Jaeger-LeCoultre, Parmigiani, Omega, Louis Moinet, and Bovet, which introduced a blue Gibeon dial this year.

Here are five new stone-dial watches that exhibit rock-solid allure:

Rolex Oyster Perpetual Day-Date 36

This year, Rolex unveiled a trio of Day-Date 36s embellished with stone dials that evoke the Mediterranean coast: green aventurine, carnelian, and turquoise.

The green aventurine with its finely crystallized, sparkly surface is paired with the brand’s 18K Everose gold (price upon request), the orange-tinted carnelian is matched with 18K yellow gold (US$43,900), and the finely veined turquoise is complemented with 18K white gold (price upon request). Each dial is set with diamond-hour markers, including the Roman VI and IX, and the bezels sparkle with 52 brilliant-cut diamonds. All are fitted with the brand’s iconic president bracelet, which was specially created for the launch of the Oyster Perpetual Day-Date in 1956.

Piaget Metaphoria Collection

Piaget’s Metaphoria high-jewelry collection, which launched in June, carries on the spirit of Yves Piaget’s 21st Century Collection with 52 bold pieces, including 11 watches, paying homage to nature and the living energy of oceans, mountains, and forests.

The collection’s Alitura watch features a mosaic dial assembled from pieces of black opal, chalcedony, sodalite, pietersite, and diamonds evoking a precious damask fabric. And the cushion-shaped Black Tie watch, a favorite of Andy Warhol, is refreshed in a unique forest-inspired Terrae version with a dial made of petrified wood accented with bright green baguette-cut emeralds.

Bovet 19Thirty Meteorite

For a special edition 19Thirty (US$41,000), Bovet tapped the otherworldly beauty of the Gibeon meteorite, but with a twist. Bovet coated the striated meteorite dial with a transparent blue-colored PVD (physical vapor deposition) treatment that tints the stone an intense blue while still revealing its unique light-catching patterns.

The 19Thirty collection, with its signature crown and articulated bow at 12 o’clock, was inspired by a vintage pocket watch from the 1930s. This new iteration is housed in a matte-finished 42mm sandblasted titanium case.

The manual-winding caliber 15BM04 with one barrel delivering seven days of power reserve is showcased through the clear exhibition case back, a feature that was pioneered by the Bovet brothers in the early 1800s.

Kross Studio KS 05 Timepiece Collection

Founded in 2020, the upstart brand Kross Studio launched the KS 05 collection earlier this year. Its claim to fame is a world-first central floating tourbillon movement. The unique architecture places the large mainspring barrel on the central axis with the tourbillon positioned on top under a domed sapphire crystal. The time display mechanism operates peripherally, orbiting around the barrel and the tourbillon mechanism.

Available in Grade 5 titanium or red gold—with or without diamonds set around the periphery of the case—the KS 05’s unique tri-part dial system has been produced using turquoise, obsidian, and meteorite, as well as blue and black aventurine glass (CHF 108,000, about US$123,000, in titanium). The brand plans to expand its dial options and also offers clients the opportunity to commission custom stone dials.

Audemars Piguet 37mm Royal Oak Selfwinding with Turquoise Dial

From the late 1970s to the 1990s, Audemars Piguet celebrated creativity with an array of natural stone dials made of tiger’s eye, lapis lazuli, aventurine, garnet, opal, jasper, and other varieties.

Earlier this year, the brand chose a radiant Mexican turquoise for the dial of its 37mm Royal Oak Selfwinding reference 15550BA in 18-karat yellow gold (US$61,500), imbuing it with a naturally sunny outlook.

The slender turquoise disc, measuring just 0.75mm thick, is ground, sandblasted and polished before being integrated into a gilded brass outer casing. The stone’s natural veining and color ensures that each piece is a one of a kind.

The automatic Manufacture Calibre 5900, which debuted in select 37mm references in 2022, is revealed through a sapphire crystal case back showing off its 22-karat pink gold oscillating weight and finely finished details, including polished angles and vertical satin brushing.