The "Bye Bye Euro" Watch

Nov 5, 2011
Gail Mangold-Vine

The "Bye Bye Euro" Watch - Used with permission www.artya.com

A unique Swiss timepiece with a collage of shredded euros on the dial trumpets the demise of the currency.

The press release came out on November 4, 2011, with the opening line: “The creative brand ArtyA launches a tribute to the 2011 Brussels Summit to announce the end of the euro currency.”

ArtyA Luxury Artpieces SA is an upscale watch company in Geneva, Switzerland. The “Brussels Summit” is of course the “European Summit of the Heads of State and Government of the European Union” held in Brussels, Belgium on October 26, 2011.

And the official Euro Summit Statement did not wave goodbye to the currency shared by 17 members of the 27 European Union countries – on the contrary, it declared that “the euro continues to rest on solid fundamentals.” Switzerland is not a member of the European Union.

But ArtyA seems pretty convinced that regardless of what was actually said, the writing is on the wall. “Sarkozy, Berlusconi, Papandreou and Merkel,” the communiqué continues, “are invited to buy [the watch] in order to remember their dreams.”

Technical Details of the “Bye Bye Euro” Watch

A one-of-a-kind piece engraved “ArtyA 1/1 unique piece” on the back, the dial (47 mm diameter) of the “Bye Bye Euro” watch is “hand decorated with [shredded] euro bills.”

Typical of ArtyA watches is the stainless steel case which, according to the company, has been “embossed, defaced, tortured, and struck by a lightning bolt at 1,000,000 volts, shaping and coloring it in a unique way.” (The company has a video on its website showing the machine procedure used to accomplish this feat.)

The watch is powered by a “high-end Swiss automatic movement” and the strap is braided Kevlar “to better absorb shocks” – like the price, perhaps: 5,900 Swiss francs ($6,700), although in fairness this is at the very lower end of the luxury Swiss watch price scale.

ArtyA

So just who is behind this little bit of "fun" with something of a not-to-everybody’s-taste edge to it? Yvan Arpa – the Y and the A after the Art.

As CEO between 2006 and 2009 of another brand which he propelled into the limelight, Arpa created a “DNA of Famous Legends” watch collection using bits of rusted steel and coal from the Titanic. This was followed by an equally high-profile moon-themed collection using moon dust, bits of the Apollo 11 rocket and more.

Arpa has headed his own company since 2009 and continued to produce unusual designs around quirky themes and marketing ploys. The first design he launched after he opened ArtyA Luxury Artpieces was the “Black Belt” watch that only those who have a martial arts black belt may buy.

Just a Bit of Fun

But whether it’s a “Son of a Gun” watch – with six real 6mm Flobert bullets surrounding the dial, 12,900 francs ($14,600) – or one of two Halloween watches Arpa created in 2011 (3,900 francs or $4,400 each), his creativity is extravagant, canny and often irreverent in line with a new trend in luxury watchmaking – watches don’t have to be so serious all the time. They can be a bit of fun for those who can afford it.

And the “Bye Bye Euro” is in this vein – amusing to wear right now as the possibility of the euro’s ultimate demise looms in spite of on-going fancy footwork to prevent this. There is however a difference: it is one thing to joke around about Halloween, but Schadenfreude about a currency that, if it fails, can be expected to have nefarious effects on millions of people and economies both European and global is perhaps a more dubious endeavor.

That said, looking at the timepiece purely as an investment, if the currency flourishes, the watch will just be a curiosity yet likely as not hold its own if it surfaces somewhere down the line at collectors’ watch auctions traditionally held in Geneva every year by Sotheby’s, Christie’s and Antiquorum (bearing in mind that the highest prices are always for elaborately hand-crafted pieces made of precious metals). And it stands a chance of being a better, albeit still modest, investment if in fact its message turns out to be prophetic.