If you or someone close to you has a passion for luxury timepieces and premium cigars, Hublot has a watch for you. Earlier this week in Dubai, watchmaker Hublot and cigar brand Arturo Fuente unveiled their latest collaboration, and it’s a cigar aficionado’s dream.
Hublot CEO Ricardo Guadalupe and Carlos Fuente Jr., grandson of Arturo Fuente, the founder of the legendary cigar company, traveled to Dubai for an exclusive event that introduced major watch collectors and cigar connoisseurs to a unique new timepiece that is sure to appeal to both groups. The Old Havana-themed party allowed guests to enjoy Cuban-flavored music and cuisine while admiring the newest collaboration from Hublot and Fuente—the Arturo Fuente ForbiddenX watch.
Named after the prestigious Arturo Fuente ForbiddenX cigar, the watch sports genuine tobacco leaves in the dial, the same leaves used to craft the premium smoke. The leaves are sent straight from the Fuente Estate in the Dominican Republic to the Hublot manufacturing site in Switzerland, where they are treated with an epoxy resin that makes them rigid before being inserted into the dials.
The 45mm Arturo Fuente ForbiddenX has a brown ceramic bezel in shades that echo the tobacco leaves on the dial. The watch will be made in four versions including titanium, black ceramic, Hublot’s trademark King Gold and a limited edition with a tourbillon movement.
Only 30 pieces of the exclusive tourbillon edition will be available, each individually numbered. The cigar leaf making up the dial reveals the HUB6011 tourbillon movement with a five-day power reserve and 155 components. The watch is finished with a tobacco-colored calf strap bearing the symbol of the ForbiddenX cigar.
The resulting Arturo Fuente ForbiddenX watch is packaged into a wooden humidor cigar box, an impressive treasure chest that makes this fine timepiece a fabulous gift. Inside the box is a hygrometer specially developed by Hublot to keep the cigars fresh and at the proper level of humidity.
The ForbiddenX is the second watch that Hublot and Fuente have partnered to produce. Two years ago, the limited edition King Power Arturo Fuente made its debut at a gala event in the Dominican Republic, home of Fuente Cigars. The occasion also commemorated the cigar maker’s centennial in 2012. This watch was created to pay tribute to the Fuente Fuente OpusX cigar.
The 48mm King Power Arturo Fuente sports a handsome tobacco brown dial with accents of red and black plus the Fuente Fuente OpusX logo at 6 o’clock. An image of Carlos Fuente Sr. and Carlos Fuente Jr., along with the dates 1912-2012, appears on the watch’s caseback. Just 100 pieces of the King Gold version were produced, each with a price tag of $44,700. 200 pieces of the black ceramic model were made, each selling for $24,000.
Both were presented in a luxurious Macassar ebony and carbon humidor decorated with the Fuente Fuente OpusX ring combined with the Hublot logo and filled with special edition cigars.
The Arturo Fuente ForbiddenX timepiece sounds even more impressive and would make a truly decadent gift for the fancier of fine cigars and even finer watches.
