Swiss watchmaker Baume & Mercier is marking 2026 with two significant product launches and a refreshed brand campaign that ties its nearly two-century-old identity to the moments that define everyday life. The campaign, titled “Celebrating meaningful moments since 1830,” positions the brand’s watches not just as accessories but as objects connected to personal milestones, whether large or small.
Paying tribute to its own history, the brand’s first launch is the Riviera 73, a new series within its long-running Riviera collection. When the original Riviera launched in 1973, it was one of the first steel sports watches to carry a sense of elegance, built around a twelve-sided, dodecagonal, case that was unlike anything else available at the time. That original design went through five generations of updates over the decades. The second generation, released in 1980, introduced two-tone versions and marked the first time the name Riviera appeared on the dial. By 1983, the collection featured an ultra-thin quartz movement measuring just 2.5 mm in thickness, alongside complications including a split-seconds, a perpetual calendar, and a second time zone.
The third generation in 1985 softened the case edges and introduced a miniaturised crown for improved water resistance. The fourth generation in 2004 offered two styles, a classic and a sportier model with four screws on the bezel. In 2021, the fifth generation brought 36 mm and 42 mm models with the Baumatic movement and a mountain-and-wave dial pattern, later extended to 39 mm and 33 mm variants. Most recently, in 2025, the collection added 41 mm chronographs. The Riviera 73 now brings the collection back to its founding aesthetic with three new 39 mm models.
Powered by a quartz ETA F06.115 movement with a five-year battery life, each model measures 7.7 mm in thickness, keeping the proportions slim and comfortable on the wrist. The twelve-sided bezel is free of visible screws, which preserves the clean geometry that made the original design stand out. Wide dial openings and minimal detailing bring the overall look closer to the 1973 original than recent generations of the collection have managed.
Each model features an octagonal stainless steel crown carrying the brand’s Phi logo, a detail that reinforces the geometric character of the design. On the case back, an engraving of “73” sits against vertical lines meant to evoke a boat deck, set in a typeface drawn from the 1970s, a restrained but deliberate nod to the collection’s origins.
Differentiated by dial colour and strap choice, the three models each carry a distinct personality. The M0A10844 features a blue sun-textured dial with a wave pattern, open-worked rhodium-plated hands and indexes, and an integrated three-row steel bracelet with a triple folding clasp fitted with security push-pieces. The M0A10845 uses a white opaline dial with a wave design, ruthenium-toned indexes and hands, paired with the same integrated steel bracelet, making it the most versatile of the three.
The M0A10846 shares the blue dial of the M0A10844 but is paired with a midnight blue leather strap finished with contrasting light blue stitching and a polished steel pin buckle, giving it a more relaxed character. All three carry a date display at 3 o’clock, scratch-resistant anti-glare sapphire crystal, and water resistance to 50 metres.
Baume & Mercier’s second launch for 2026 is an entirely new collection called Joia de Baume & Mercier, and its origins stretch back further than the design itself. In 1918, the aesthete Paul Mercier joined forces with the pragmatic William Baume, and together they observed something significant happening around them. Women were becoming more independent, more expressive, and increasingly interested in watches as a form of personal identity rather than simply a practical tool.
The brand began creating women’s timepieces that were as much jewellery as they were watches, and by 1920 those designs were featured in the Davoine General Indicator of Watchmaking, a leading publication of the time that praised what it called the “haute Fantaisie pour Dames,” meaning high fantasy for women.
The brand’s commitment to portraying women on their own terms continued into the 1950s, when a Baume & Mercier advertisement notably depicted a woman as a doctor, a progressive choice for the era. The 1970s through 1990s brought sculptural gold cuff watches set with mother-of-pearl, onyx, lapis lazuli, and turquoise. The Joia collection draws on that lineage directly, with a design language that is feminine, refined, and contemporary while remaining firmly connected to the brand’s historical design codes.
Consistent across all four models, the Joia line features a 28 mm round case without lugs, measuring 7.2 mm thick. The absence of lugs, the small extensions that typically connect a watch case to its strap, gives each piece a softer, more jewellery-like presence on the wrist. A black agate stone sits in the domed crown of each model, adding a subtle point of distinction. The solid case backs can be engraved, a detail that positions these watches as natural candidates for gifting on meaningful occasions. Leather straps in various colours are available across all three base models and can be swapped between them, offering flexibility in how each watch is worn.
Three of the four Joia models are presented together. The M0A10847 carries a silvery sun-textured dial with 4N gold-plated Roman numerals and matching leaf hands, paired with a midnight blue leather strap and a polished steel pin buckle. The M0A10848 uses the same silvery dial and 4N gold-plated details but pairs them with an integrated steel bracelet made up of three rows of H-shaped links, secured with a triple folding clasp in satin-finished steel, giving it a more structured and contemporary look.
The M0A10849 takes a different direction entirely, with a 4N PVD gold-toned case and bezel, a silvery dial carrying black Roman numeral transfers, ruthenium leaf hands, and a black leather strap with a matching 4N PVD gold-toned pin buckle. All three are powered by a Ronda 751 quartz movement with a five-year battery life, display hours and minutes only, and offer water resistance to 50 metres. Straps across all models can be changed without tools.
Produced in limited numbers, the fourth model, the M0A10850, takes direct inspiration from a Baume & Mercier jewellery watch originally produced in the 1980s, a period when the brand was creating some of its most ambitious pieces for women. Its polished stainless steel bezel carries 40 brilliant-cut diamonds totalling 0.81 carats, graded Top Wesselton at VS quality for both colour and clarity. The silvery dial features a criss-crossed satin-brushed finish that visually mirrors the embossed flattened link decoration of the steel bracelet, secured by a triple folding clasp in polished stainless steel. Ruthenium leaf hands and black Roman numeral transfers complete the dial, while a black agate stone sits in the domed crown.
Both the Riviera 73 series and the Joia de Baume & Mercier collections have an ease to them, making them perfect for the upcoming vacation season. Exceptional design marries subtlety and sophistication in these watches.
