Jingle bell, jingle bell, jingle bell Swatch
MANILA, Philippines – The Swatch Christmas event was a perfectly planned party! Guests were welcomed with a Christmas cocktail that had blinking ice cubes and The Gallery @ Greenbelt 5 was converted into a little Manhattan Skyline with 21-foot-high towering Swatch pillars featuring the new colors of Swatch and the colors of Christmas.
This is the 21st year of Swatch in the Philippines and the annual Christmas events have become truly legendary; something people look forward to.
The guests were what newly appointed Swatch VP Charles Bletry, sporting a Red Rebel from the Swatch New Gent Collection, described as “really cool and classy people, all wearing a Swatch.”
Swatch watches spotted among the guests were Jaime Zobel with the Cory Aquino Swatch; Italian Ambassador Luca Fornari and Silvana Fornari wearing matching Cory Aquino Swatch watches black-faced for the ambassador and yellow-faced for his wife; Socorro Ramos in an apple green Paul Cabral and a red Full Blooded Swatch; Tessa Prieto-Valdes wearing three watches from different collections; and the ICA ladies proudly showing off their completely-sold-out ICA watch by Swatch.
Hosting tandem Billy Crawford and Luis Manzano set the right mood for Christmas. Designers presented a Christmas symbol-inspired collection with their muses modeling to the fun beat of different Christmas songs like Frosty the Snowman, Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer and Scrooge.
The new Anne-Flore and the Chrono Black Swatch Collection was a standout with Cecile Van Straten’s styling and Dr. Michael Young’s jazz sounds on his saxophone. Black may have set the tone for the combination of these two collections, but the play of bold colors and rugged textures set them apart.
Anne-Flore could ski before she could walk. This provocative and passionate snowboarder, who does her own thing no matter what people think, has provided the perfect combination of rugged, sporty and assertively colorful in the Anne-Flore Marxer Swatch Collection.
The Chrono Black Swatch Collection, on the other hand, is a dramatic and powerful timepiece marked by its black stainless steel case, textured black rubber strap as well as its black dial and bezel that are contrasted by subtle but striking variations executed in vibrant colors on the dials and the hands.
Then the show focused on what hosts Tessa and Tim Yap called “the best part” presenting long-time Swatch endorser Inno Sotto and one of the latest to join the Swatch Family, Heart Evangelista.
After going through all the bold Swatch colors, it was time to launch the Christmas colors of the Holidays gold and silver in a specially produced silver screen reel starring Swatch endorsers and idols of the cinema the awesome actor John Lloyd Cruz and the gorgeous Anne Curtis by Swatch creative director Rowell Santiago.
The reel was beautiful and the guests enjoyed reenacting the scenes from the film at the specially designed vignette setups by the very talented Gino Gonzales. It was party time as Swatch Philippines’ Virgie Ramos thanked everyone, especially the schools Ateneo de Manila University, De La Salle University, St. Scholastica’s College Manila, Assumption College, Immaculate Conception Academy, University of the Philippines and University of Sto. Tomas for inviting Swatch to participate in their respective celebrations and worthy causes.
Virgie Ramos then asked Jaime Zobel to lead the Christmas champagne toast. The blinking goblets, Margarita Fores’ Christmas centerpieces inspired by the idea of Swatch as gifts, gold confetti and gold lucky pigs signaled that, at last, it’s truly time for Christmas.
