New Longines DolceVita Collection Makes A Case for Elegance

By Victoria Townsend | June 16, 2015

Just one week after the finals of the 2015 French Open tennis tournament and the Paris Longines Future Aces 2015 for which the Swiss watch brand is respectively official timekeeper and organiser, Longines welcomed guests to the most important Filly race in the world : the annual Prix de Diane Longines, held at the famous Chantilly racetrack.

The 2015 edition featured 9 races in total, with 45,000 horse-racing fans showing the most enthusiasm for the eagerly awaited Prix de Diane Longines. Under a blue sky, the only thunder to be heard was produced by four-legged beauties racing for the finish line.

Ladies enter the site only if wearing a hat, making for a mostly chic and colourful crowd, and enabling the ‘most elegant’ to be awarded with the Official Watch of the year. “Look at the surroundings here,” enthused Longines President Walter van Känel (pictured above, with Aishwarya RaiBachnan). “Look at the elegant crowd ! This is the ideal place for Longines where ‘Elegance is an attitude’ !”

Longines ambassador of elegance for ten years, ex Miss World and actress Aishwarya Rai Bachchan (pictured above) was in Chantilly for the week-end with Longines, where she presented at a garden party on the domain the night before the races the new Official Watch, a steel and diamonds version from the new Longines DolceVita collection.

The new collection, equipped with a Longines L176 quartz movement with functions of hours, minutes and small seconds at 6 o’clock, comes in four sizes of steel cases with or without diamond setting, and a choice of dials from black lacquered or white mother-of-pearl with diamonds, to a silver-coloured « flinqué » dial with painted Roman numerals, all complemented with rhodium-plated or blued-steel hands. Leather straps in black, white, grey or red , or a more imposing stainless steel bracelet, provide a wide choice of colours and styles. The most noticeable characteristic is the new curved case, still rectangular in shape but softened, elongated and arched for a more contemporary look with additional comfort, femininity and elegance. The new collection will be in the markets end September / early October.

Far from the noise of city life and roaring engine motors, 38 kilometers north of the French capital, the Chantilly racecourse is part of a magnificent estate composed of castle, museum, stables and racetrack over 78 km² of gentle forest land that is all being completely restored by His Highness Prince Karim Aga Khan IV, multi-millionaire, philanthropist and spiritual leader, with a renowned passion for horse breeding. Thousands of thoroughbreds train on the site every year.

The estate is so peaceful, so majestic, that late US President Richard Nixon reportedly exlaimed, when visiting it in 1968, “Why did they take me to Versailles seven times and never once here?” Years later, Aishwarya Rai Bachchan and Longines proved why Chantilly is indeed the perfect venue.