Louis Vuitton sharpens its haute horlogerie credentials with the Escale Minute Repeater, a chiming complication paired with a jump hour and retrograde minutes display. Built around La Fabrique du Temps’s proven minute repeater calibre, the watch trades the previous Escale minute repeater’s world time function for a cleaner, more focused dial dominated by grey flammé guilloché.

The result puts Louis Vuitton in direct competition with established players in complicated watchmaking, and comes complete with a discreet repeater slide hidden within the signature trunk-inspired lugs.

Initial thoughts

On the back of a strong 2025, Louis Vuittion doubles down on haute horlogerie, now in a more traditional case than last year’s Tambour. While the brand still offers the quartz Tambour Street Diver for just a few thousand dollars, Louis Vuittion’s ambitions clearly lie in the high-end. After years of strategic acquisitions and investments, the brand has the industrial base to compete and the know-how to do things its own way.

The Escale Minute Repeater is the embodiment of Louis Vuitton’s ambitions, and is competitive with other minute repeaters from established haute horlogerie brands thanks to its modern movement and tasteful details. In short, it shows the brand understands the tastes of the day, and, more importantly, how to deliver a compelling package that leans into Louis Vuitton’s unique legacy and brand DNA.

Furthermore, the minute repeater is something of a shortcut to credibility, since chiming watches are generally considered the peak of complicated watchmaking. Unlike the tourbillon, which can be found at ever-lower price points, the minute repeater remains untouched by mass production.

Even better, Louis Vuitton has the home-field advantage as La Fabrique du Temps (LFT) is among the leaders in the field. That said, the movement was developed by LFT for the Gérald Genta brand, and is little-changed in the Escale, which diminishes the accomplishment somewhat.

A trunk for the wrist

Louis Vuitton’s Escale line takes after the hardware found on the Parisian malletier‘s famous trunks; the world ‘escale’ means stopover in French. The skeuomorphic lugs are subtle enough to be tasteful, and break up the otherwise slab sided case band.

Louis Vuitton and its sister brands seem to have a knack for hiding repeater slides. Hublot’s Big Bang Minute Repeater integrates the slide into the left winglet, and Bulgari, once upon a time, ingeniously disguised the slide as the lower left lug. The Escale Minute repeater puts its own stamp on this idea, with one of its faux brackets pulling double duty as a covert repeater slide. The Escale Worldtime Minute Repeater from 2015 took the same approach, but it was less subtle as the slide ran in an open channel in the caseband.

Note the grooved repeater slide hiding in plain sight.

Even better, the slide is also water resistant to 50 m, making it ready for the rigours of travel. While some brands like Patek Philippe and Vacheron Constantin prefer to leave their repeaters unsealed for maximum auditory pleasure, most modern minute repeaters can survive brief water immersion, but they’re rarely rated beyond 30 m — many only manage 20 or 10 m. While 50 m of resistance isn’t strictly necessary in a watch like this, some owners will appreciate the added security it provides.

Grey and gold

The trunk-bracket motif continues on the dial, with gold rivets capping both ends of the minutes arc. Inside is a flammé guilloché centre dial cut on a manually-operated rose engine the old-fashioned way. The frame around the hour aperture is a separate piece that is mirror polished and slightly concave to draw the eye. Naturally, the minutes hand and matching dial furniture are made from solid rose gold, not just plated base metal.

The jump hour mechanism, borrowed from the Gérald Genta Mickey Mouse minute repeater made for Only Watch, is more sophisticated than most as it also features a retrograde minutes hand. A common pitfall of jump hours is the minute hand covering the hour aperture during the jump as both are often placed at 12 0’clock.

This can be avoided by moving the hour window or moving the 60-minute demarcation. Louis Vuitton did both, and the retrograde display means the minutes hand will never block the hours window.

Genta DNA

The base movement is La Fabrique du Temps’s tried-and-true LFT SO13.01 minute repeater calibre. It is constructed and decorated in the tradition of Genevan fine watchmaking, comparable to minute repeaters from Patek Philippe and Vacheron Constantin. Though not submitted for certification, several fine details, such as the screw visible on the balance cock used to lock the Geneva-style stud carrier in place, are required by the Poinçon de Genève except in extra-flat movements.

The LFT SO13.01 is a modern and technically competent calibre with a weight-saving skeletonised escapement, free-sprung balance, quiet centrifugal strike governor, and comfortable 80-hour power reserve. Additionally, it is handsomely designed and well-finished movement, if not quite as lavishly adorned as the Escale pocket watches. Made alongside Gérald Genta minute repeaters in Geneva, the movement features an identical bridge layout, down to the brand’s signature octagonal frame for the strike governor.

Key specs and price

Louis Vuitton Escale Minute Repeater
Ref. W3PGA0

Diameter: 40 mm
Height: 12.3 mm
Material: 18k rose gold
Crystal: Sapphire
Water resistance: 50 m

Movement: LFT SO13.01
Features: Jump hours, retrograde minutes, minute repeater.
Frequency: 21,600 beats per hour (3 Hz)
Winding: Manual
Power reserve: 80 hours

Strap: Beige calf leather, 18k rose gold folding buckle

Limited edition: No
Availability: At Louis Vuitton boutiques
Price: Approximately €350,000 excluding taxes

For more, visit Louisvuitton.com.