Gosling, Pitt, Nadal and More - Watch Brands and Their Celebrity Ambassadors

As a watch collector and blogger I am always interested in seeing the timepieces different celebrities wear. Indeed, there are many social media accounts dedicated only to watch-spotting the rich and famous. Celebrities such as John Mayer, Mark Wahlberg, Ryan Seacrest, and Lionel Messi are super watch collectors, and can always be spotted with the newest and most desirable pieces.

While that is interesting, I thought it would also be interesting to take a look at which celebrities have current partnerships with brands.

Tag Heuer and Ryan Gosling

Tag Heuer has multiple celebrity partnerships, including many tennis ambassadors (with Naomi Osaka being the most recognizable). Just a few weeks ago, while unveiling their new three-handed Carrera model, Tag Heuer announced their new brand ambassador Ryan Gosling. Gosling is best known for movies such as La La Land, The Big Short, Drive, and The Notebook. Gosling’s partnership with Tag Heuer is his first watch brand partnership.

IWC and Tom Brady

Tom Brady is not new to watch sponsorships. Earlier in his career, Tom Brady was Tag Heuer athlete. However, in 2019 Brady became the global brand ambassador for IWC. Brady has been seen during many momentous career events wearing an IWC, including when he signed with the Tampa Bay Buccaneers and during the Super Bowl LV celebration. You can read more about Tom Brady’s watches throughout his career here.

Richard Mille and Rafael Nadal

While Richard Mille watches represent some of the most expensive watches in the industry, they are often seen on professional athletes while they are performing. Bubba Watson wears a Richard Mille while golfing. Rafael Nadal, the 20 Grand Slam title winner, had always refused to wear a watch while playing tennis before meeting Richard Mille in 2008. It took some convincing and 2 years before Nadal would become a brand ambassador for Richard Mille. But Nadal’s collaboration went further than just wearing Richard Mille’s watches. He helped develop the world’s lightest tourbillon at the time. It makes sense. A tennis player wants to wear a watch that is as light as possible while playing matches.

Richard Mille watches also have some of the best shock resistance of any watches available (great for sports!). The RM 27-04 “Nadal” has the greatest shock resistance of any Richard Mille at about 12,000g. The RM 27-04 was released in 2020 to celebrate the 10 years of the partnership between Nadal and Richard Mille. The 27-04 is extremely light and has a dial that resembles the strings on a tennis racket. This piece will set you back $1,000,000 USD (if you can even find it at retail).

Rolex and Roger Federer

Roger Federer is another all-time tennis great. Like Nadal, Federer has won 20 Grand Slam titles. While Rolex is not typically associated with brand ambassadors (what’s the need?), Federer has been sponsored by the brand since 2006 (his initial deal expired in 2016 but Rolex and Federer renewed the partnership at around $9,000,000 USD a year).

Federer has been seeing wearing a breadth of different Rolex models, including this Rolex GMT Master II Batman. A Swiss legend of a tennis player partnering with a Swiss legend of a watch brand seems only appropriate.

Hublot and Novak Djokovic

We cannot discuss the all time great tennis players without discussing Novak Djokovic. The Serbian tennis great is currently the number 1 ranked tennis player and has also won 20 Grand Slam titles (he is tied with Nadal and Federer for the record). For a long time, the Djoker did not have a watch sponsorship. That changed in August, 2021 when Hublot announced that Djokovic would become a brand ambassador.

The partnership makes sense, as Hublot has partnerships with many sports greats, including Usain Bolt, Pelé, Kylian Mbappé and Dustin Johnson. Dojokovic wore a Hublot Big Bang Meca-10 ceramic blue off-court at the U.S. Open in September. Apparently, he will be working with Hublot to design a limited edition piece that he will wear while playing.

Breitling and Brad Pitt

Brad Pitt has been spotted over his career wearing anything from Cartier to Rolex to Patek Philippe (read about Brad Pitt’s watches). However, in 2019 Pitt was introduced as an ambassador for Breitling. In addition to Pitt, Charlize Theron and Adam Driver are also ambassadors for the brand. As to Pitt, one of the pieces he has been seen wearing most often is the Breitling Premier B01 Chronograph 42 Norton.

Omega and Daniel Craig

When one thinks of Omega they think James Bond. While Rolexes have appeared in James Bond films, the Omega Seamaster has been Bond’s watch of choice since the 1995 film Goldeneye (Rolex watches were worn in much earlier Bond films).

Thus it makes too much sense that Daniel Craig would represent Omega. Indeed, Craig even helped design the watch worn by 007 in the most recent installment (and Craig’s final film as Bond) No Time To Die.

Cartier and Rami Malek

Cartier is the only brand on this list that offers something other than watches. The brand was founded by Louis-François Cartier in Paris in 1847 and remained under family control until 1964. Richemont, which now owns the brand, bought the company in 1998 (Richemont also owns brands such as IWC, Jaeger-LeCoultre, Montblanc, Panerai, Piaget, Roger Dubuis and Vacheron Constantin).

Cartier tapped Rami Malek, the star of Bohemian Rhapsody (for which he won the Academy Award for Best Actor), to become an ambassador or “Unique Personality” as Cartier put it. He joined Troye Sivan, Willow Smith, Maisie Williams and Jackson Wan in representing the brand.

Audemars Piguet and Abraham Ancer

I’m not going to lie, before writing this article I had no idea who Abraham Ancer is. I am not a golf fan, so my knowledge of the sport does not extend much past Tiger Woods, Bubba Watson (because of Richard Mille), Rory McIlroy, Jordan Spieth and Brooks Koepka. With that said, Audemars Piguet has a fairly large roster of golf ambassadors that also includes Adri Arnaus, Wesley Bryan, Darren Clarke, Viktor Hovland and Vijay Singh, among others.

Patek Philippe and Nobody

Well what did you expect? Did you seriously expect Patek Philippe to pay someone to wear their watches? You have understand that in addition to it being painfully difficult to get some of their less expensive (relatively) pieces, Patek Philippe employs an application process for some of their really high end, complicated watches. You will have to answer questions like “what is the greatest accomplishment you achieved while wearing a Patek Philippe?” So hopefully you climbed Everest or won the Tour de France while wearing that Nautilus!

Joking aside (though the application process is 100% real as is the question), Patek Philippe might believe that paying anyone to wear their watches cheapens the brand. Why does a watch brand that has notoriously long waits for their pieces need to pay anyone to wear them? No need to pay John Mayer, Mark Wahlberg, or even the Queen to wear a Patek Philippe, because they already wear them.