I should have already guessed she was a face-up person, judging from her very chic Chronomat Automatic 36 Victoria Beckham Collection for Breitling, limited to just 1,500 pieces and offered in either stainless steel or yellow gold. The faces of her watches are rendered in a color palette—a dark mint green, midnight blue, dove gray, and a parchment-like beige—inspired by her Spring 2024 collection. Who would ever want to hide all that (especially since those particular colors are a first for the 140-year-old Breitling)? Beyond that, each face will discreetly bear her initials, and an indication of the limits of each issue—One of 400 for the stainless steel versions; One of 100 for the gold.
Of course, there are more questions: How about the weight? (Don’t know about you, but my ideal is a timepiece that feels weighty enough to be noticeable, but not so heavy that it impedes lifting a coffee cup—let alone a suitcase off an airport carousel.) Beckham was looking for a heft that allows it to be worn almost like a bracelet—loosely fastened, so it ever-so-slightly slides down toward the hand. “I like a watch to feel strong, yet effortless—nothing too complicated,” she says. “There’s definitely a bit of a masculine feel to the collaboration, just as there’s always a menswear feel to my collections. You want a watch to feel easy, natural—never obvious.”
She’s quick to point out that this was her first time at designing watches, with the artisan makers coming from Breitling’s La Chaux-de-Fonds ateliers to London to work with her. “I didn’t have the know-how to do this before I started working with them,” Beckham says, “and I learned so much. Breitling has always pushed boundaries with their master watchmaking.” She may not have had the technical aspects before she started, but she has long felt the love for a good watch: She has been collecting them for years, ever since husband David bought her a vintage timepiece when she was awarded her OBE by Queen Elizabeth II in 2017. (She treasures that first watch—“Just as I do,” she says, “my wedding ring.”) Others have followed since—all of them functional, all deeply sentimental.
Victoria Beckham wearing one of her Breitling collaboration watches.Photo: Craig McDean/Courtesy of Breitling
Lastly, and a bit cheekily, I ask about her key times for any given day for her. Here’s a typical Victoria Beckham timetabled: “Yesterday, I got up at 6:50,” Beckham says. “I am usually up at 7, but Harper [her daughter, age 12] needed some extra time as she was trying a new half-up/half-down hairstyle for school.” By 7:45 she’s at the gym, then showers, so she was able to get to a 10:30 design meeting with her team. When 3pm rolled around, “I was on a Zoom call with my New York beauty team, to discuss fragrance.” (Beckham released a series of signature scents last year.) At 6:30, she’s sitting down to dinner with David and Harper—and by 10pm, she says, “I am in bed, meditating and wearing an LED mask for half an hour.” And at that point, it’s safe to assume that one of those gorgeous watches is sitting by her—face up—on her bedside table.