There’s people camping outside stores. Social media is swamped. The collaboration that nobody predicted has changed the game.
Audemars Piguet and Swatch is the collaboration that nobody saw coming until it landed. It was teased through shock newspaper and social media ads that stoked up watch heads, hypebeasts, and just about anyone with a loose interest in horology. People are already queuing outside stores ahead of its release on May 16th. Instagram and TikTok feeds are flooded with dodgy mockups and rumours have been storming in the run-up to the official product reveal. The parallels to a hyped sneaker drop are uncanny, right?
The teaser revealed the words “Royal Pop” in the same overlapping letters (this time seen with the ‘O’ and ‘P’ of ‘Pop’) found on the caseback of a Royal Oak. This was the watch world’s equivalent to bill-posting before a hyped streetwear drop – pouring petrol onto the fire. Some eager beavers thought we were set for a Swatch and AP Royal Oak (CC the slew of AI-generated predictions of what that might look like: colourful, and octagonal). But a Royal Oak wristwatch isn’t what’s happening on Saturday. This week, it was revealed that this is a watch destined for anywhere but your wrist. What we’re actually getting is a celebration of the Royal Oak through the lens of the Swatch Pop (a 47mm watch unveiled in the 1980s, that could be attached to clothing and bags, free from the wrist).
The Royal Pop offering consists of eight Swiss-made bioceramic watches, in playful colour combinations like Otto Rosso (pink and cherry red); Huit Blanc (white with colourful screws); Green Eight; Blaue Acht (lime green and blue); Orange Hachi (navy and orange); Lan Ba (light blue and dark blue); Ocho Negro (black and white); and Otg Roz (pink, yellow, and turquoise). They’re powered by Swatch’s SISTEM51 movement – newly introduced in a hand-wound version and packing in 90 hours of power reserve. The dial features the ‘Petite Tapisserie’ pattern that is a defining feature of the Royal Oak. Also carried over, is the octagonal bezel and hexagonal screws that have become instantly recognisable hallmarks of AP’s juggernaut. Each comes with a lanyard to be worn wherever the heck you like. And even with the hopes of a sub-£500 Royal Oak crushed, the hype, memes, and queues persist.
Courtesy of Swatch
Not many watches get the mass blood pumping like this – it’s more akin to the hype of March’s Supreme x Maison Margiela MM6 collaboration, or the recently cancelled Palace x Nike Air Max 95 line in New York, which was cut off before release last month because it got too rowdy. People go wild for these collaborations because they bridge the gap between brands, and reconsider products through a new lens, pulling from the different worlds both parties occupy.
In Supreme and MM6’s case, you got Maison Margiela’s avant-garde reconstruction applied to Supreme’s skate rat garb, like paint splatter box logo hoodies seen for the first time with a zip through the branding, which resulted in frenzy and sell-out gear. Audemars Piguet and Swatch turbocharged the watch collaboration in a similar way. Here you’ve got Swatch, a powerhouse known for its accessible, quartz-powered, and playful timepieces linking up with Audemars Piguet, considered among the ‘Holy Trinity’ of watch Maisons, practicality defining what a luxury sports timepiece could be with the Royal Oak in 1972. We’ve seen Swatch collaborations with stalwart Omega amp up the hype with a boatload of buzzy releases since 2022 (and a 2023 link-up with Blancpain which is also under the Swatch group). But Swatch and AP – an independent brand with a cultural pull spanning from the top end of the C-suite to world-famous musicians and fashion designers (including Issey Miyake, Mark Ronson, and Raye) – takes things to another dimension.
Courtesy of Swatch
And that’s part of the fun. The project taps into the Royal Oak’s hype, without detracting from the original’s uber-luxury status. AP x Swatch have dug into their archives to create something new. Swatch has brought its 1980s wear-anywhere POP into 2026. And AP has looked to the pocket Watch-ified Royal Oak, an uber rare novelty released in 1979; it was 44mm and supposedly only 116 were produced between 1980 and 1982. In many ways, it’s like Supreme and MM6, but with the shock value of the launch, it has managed to obliterate the internet in a way that feels different to clothing collaborations. How? By opening up the world of Audemars Piguet, an ultra-premium Maison commanding extremely high prices, often well above £30,000, to a broader audience while bullet-proofing Swatch’s ultra-collectable cachet in the process.
Swatch and Audemars Piguet have come together to rain down in hyped, horological fire. And ladies and gentlemen, the anticipation is real.
