By Abna Ashanti 

On April 14 at 11:30 a.m., the official inauguration of Watches and Wonders Geneva 2026 took place at Palexpo. The setting was formal, precise, and deliberate. Geneva was not simply opening a Salon. It was reaffirming its place at the center of watchmaking.

Around 300 guests were present, including political representatives from the City and Canton of Geneva, international media, and executives from the 65 exhibiting brands. The scale of the gathering reflected the position the event now holds. It is both an industry platform and a point of cultural convergence.

Watches and Wonders GENEVA, in Geneva, Switzerland, Thursday, April 16, 2026. The largest watchmaking event of the year bringing together the leading names of the industry from April 14 to April 20, 2026 at Geneva Palexpo. (WWGF/KEYSTONE/Magali Girardin)

Cyrille Vigneron, President of the Watches and Wonders Geneva Foundation, opened the ceremony. He spoke of watchmaking as a culture that must be preserved and continuously reinterpreted. He described the Salon as a space where competition and cooperation coexist, a balance that defines the structure of the industry.

Nathalie Fontanet followed. In her role overseeing Finance, Human Resources and External Affairs, she emphasized Geneva’s unique concentration of expertise and its ability to remain resilient in an uncertain global environment. She framed the Salon as a place where ideas circulate, where trends take shape, and where the industry projects itself forward.

Among those present were Alfonso Gomez, Helene Budliger Artieda, and Ana Roch, alongside representatives from Palexpo and the Watches and Wonders Geneva Foundation. The ceremony concluded with a ribbon-cutting that brought public officials and brand executives together on stage.

Stanislas Wawrinka with Norqain CEO Ben Kueffer at Watches and Wonders GENEVA, in Geneva, Switzerland, Wednesday, April 15, 2026. The largest watchmaking event of the year bringing together the leading names of the industry from April 14 to April 20, 2026 at Geneva Palexpo. (WWGF/KEYSTONE/Gabriel Monnet)

What stood out this year was not only what was introduced, but what quietly disappeared.

At Watches and Wonders Geneva 2026, Rolex confirmed the discontinuation of several long-standing references, most notably the GMT-Master II “Pepsi,” a model defined by its red and blue bezel and a lineage that traces back to the 1950s. Its removal from the catalogue was not a marginal adjustment. It marked the end of one of the most recognizable designs in modern watchmaking.

Rolex does not discontinue pieces casually. Production stops at the height of demand, not at its decline. The result is immediate scarcity, followed by a shift in perception. A watch that was once available becomes fixed in time, its value no longer defined by production but by absence.

This tension between continuity and disappearance is present throughout the Salon. New materials, new calibres, new aesthetics. At the same time, certain references are allowed to end, creating space while reinforcing the mythology of what came before.

Standing there, in the controlled light of Palexpo, it is difficult not to think about a very different relationship with time.

My grandfather’s father and his brother spent their winters restoring watches. Not as part of an industry, but as a habit. A rhythm. When the season slowed, they would sit together, open cases, and work through movements piece by piece. There was no urgency beyond the work itself.

Channel Booth of Watches and Wonders GENEVA, in Geneva, Switzerland, Thursday, April 16 2026. The largest watchmaking event of the year bringing together the leading names of the industry from April 14 to April 20, 2026 at Geneva Palexpo. (WWGF/KEYSTONE/Magali Girardin)

They were not creating new objects. They were extending the life of existing ones.

Each watch carried signs of use. Worn pivots, dust in the movement, tension lost over years. Repair meant attention. It meant understanding how something had aged, not just how it had been built. They worked without spectacle, without audience, and without the language that now surrounds watchmaking.

That memory remains precise.

It sits at a distance from the scale of Watches and Wonders Geneva 2026, but it belongs to the same continuum. The watches presented in Geneva are the result of accumulated knowledge, refined over decades and centuries. The ones restored in that winter room were part of that same lineage, just further along in their life.

What happens in Geneva each year is a projection of the future. What happened in that room was a preservation of the past.

Between the two, there is a shared understanding. Time is not only measured. It is maintained, interrupted, and sometimes brought back into motion.