With a near-unanimous roar of approval from our team, the animalistic Panthère de Cartier takes the 2025 Revolution Award for Best Jewelry Watch because of its superlative expression of jewelry and watchmaking integration — with every sparkle of precious gemstone, Cartier celebrates gem-setting and form as expressions of mechanical beauty.

Cartier Panthère de Cartier

First introduced by Cartier in the 1980s, the Panthère de Cartier watch took its name from the bracelet of the same name. Its ultra flexible structure evoked the sinewy movements of the maison’s emblematic animal. Panthère was first a bracelet, and the watch continues to place its ultra flexible, articulated structure and suppleness as central to its identity.

The newest rose gold variation takes that approach to a bold graphic, gem-laden extreme: the time-telling aspect of the watch taking a discreet second place to the all-over graphic skin, with lacquer and stone-setting that flow uninterrupted from dial to case to bracelet, deliberately abstract stripes evoking zebra or tiger markings.
The case measures 36.5mm by 26.7mm, with a thickness of 6.8mm, and is paired with a quartz movement displaying hours and minutes, an intentionally unobtrusive mechanism that leaves the surface to do all the talking. And what a sparkling conversation it is. The crown is set with a brilliant-cut diamond (0.03 carats) — a small detail, but one that keeps the jewelry display consistent right down to the point of interaction. Water resistance is rated to 30m, which, for a high-jewelry execution of this complexity, is a flex worth noting.

Cartier Panthère de Cartier

What makes this piece award-worthy is the integration of materials across moving forms. Cartier sets 145 brilliant-cut diamonds on the dial (0.38ct) and frames them with black lacquer, turning the traditional Panthère square into a field of light and shadow rather than a “dial” in the conventional sense. The case extends the composition with 83 brilliant-cut diamonds (0.38ct), 28 spessartites (0.3 ct) and lacquer work that establishes the watch’s zebra-tiger identity in two tones: black and golden brown.

Assembling the diamond

The bracelet is where the model really shines and across its links, Cartier sets 314 brilliant-cut diamonds (2.95ct) and 86 spessartites (0.95ct), using color as graphic punctuation warm, feline flashes that bring the wildness of nature to the wrist. This is gem-setting as engineering: stones laid over an articulated structure without compromising the fluidity that makes the Panthère so enduringly iconic. The result is a jewelry watch in the strictest sense and not a watch embellished with precious gems. This is a jewel that just happens to also tell the time.