At first, you may think that an Apple Watch is unnecessary. If you have a MacBook, an iPhone, AirPods, and maybe even an iPad, what’s the point of adding another gadget to the mix, considering the absolute last thing you probably need is more time spent staring at a screen? But the thing about the Apple Watch that converts know all too well is this: once you get one, you’ll actually spend less time on your phone. And if it comes with a custom band and watch face designed by Hermès? Suddenly you don’t just want an Apple Watch—you need one.
This month, Apple unveiled the Apple Watch Series 10, which boasts both the biggest, most advanced display yet, while also managing to be the thinnest watch the tech giant has ever made. Available in both aluminum and titanium, it comes in several different finishes depending on your taste: there’s gold, for the millennial gold ladies out there, and slate, for those who prefer silver. In addition to all the traditional features that Apple Watch enthusiasts have come to love—activity tracking, workout logging, easy texting—new offerings include lightning-speed charging and sleep apnea notifications, so you can finally have statistical proof that your partner’s snoring is not just annoying, but abnormal.
“It’s incredible the amount of work that’s been done even in the past year to get to a size that is a millimeter thinner [while] retaining the same all-day battery life, which is obviously so important,” Alan Dye, head of human interface design at Apple, tells ELLE. “At the same time, we’re doing so much more with things like the Always-On display, which was a very big deal for us.”
With the introduction of the Series 10, Apple has also teamed up with Hermès to create a new collection of custom bands and watch faces that give the device a chic, dare we say, Parisian touch. This new iteration of the collaboration, which has been ongoing between the brands since 2015, was inspired by the sea, and ties into the nautical codes of the French fashion house. Bands in deep hues of blue and red made from water-proof textured knit materials were manufactured in the same ateliers as other Hermès creations. Custom watch faces designed specifically for the Apple Watch Hermès Ultra 2 translate the numerals from traditional Hermès Cape Cod watches into digital fonts, with slight animations.
The assortment also features the first metal band of the collaboration, stamped of course with a subtle Hermès “H” in the chainlink. It’s the most traditional watch-like style of the group, and is easy to picture on the wrists of guys in finance as well as the downtown fashion set with a penchant for oversized wrist stacks.
The Hermès watch faces of course also reflect the equestrian theme: in one, an orange cartoon horse stamped with the house logo sleeps and wakes up depending on if you’re looking at the watch face or not, introducing a bit of surprise and delight into the design.
“It’s very whimsical,” says Molly Anderson, Apple’s head of industrial design. “That’s something that’s really special to us about the collaboration. Obviously, Hermès has a rich history in watchmaking, but they also allow [us] to be playful.”
“To make the link between this type of object that is not at all Hermès, and this band that is Hermès…and make it become something Hermès [while] accompanying this level of technology was very interesting,” adds Pierre Hardy, the creative director of the Apple Watch Hermès collection, shoe and jewelry collections, and beauty objects at Hermès. “I never thought of design this way….Fashion is just for one season. And this is much, much different.”
Jessica Roy is the former Digital Director of ELLE.com. Prior to that, she worked as the News Editor of The Cut. She likes baking, running, and Instagrams of your dog.
