Hublot fetes Kobe Bryant, watch ambassador and soon-to-be kids' storyteller

Senior Features Writer

May 20, 2016 12:17 PM PT

Swiss luxury watch brand Hublot recently honored retired Lakers legend Kobe Bryant on Wednesday night at a private dinner in an art-filled $22 million Beverly Hills home, an evening that included an on-stage interview by sportscaster (and friend of the brand) Erin Andrews, a live snake, Dom Perignon Champagne and the unveiling of a limited-edition $20,400 timepiece with a black mamba design slithering across the face. What could possibly make the evening more memorable than that? How about Bryant’s casual reveal that his first big post-basketball project was working on a series of sports fantasy stories for the pre-tween set?

“The day of the last game,” Bryant told Andrews on stage, “I was at the office creating stories, editing stories, getting this business going. That’s what my days are like now. I love it. It’s a little obsessive.”

He said that while it was an idea he’d thought about on and off for years, it came into clearer focus after his Achilles tendon injury made him seriously contemplate what his next act would be.

“I kept drawing blanks,” he said, “until I finally asked [myself]: ‘What do you like doing?’ [And that’s] storytelling -- I like telling stories to kids, I love watching the look on their faces as their imagination starts working and they start getting the moral tale of the story. I enjoy that so I decided that’s what I’m going to do.

“It really started with the simple idea that kids don’t need to read another boring athlete biography,” Bryant said. “Where’s the fantasy? Where’s the mythology as it relates to sports? How can you teach life lessons through sports to children?”

Bryant spoke in such general terms about his recent adventures in storytelling it was hard to figure out if he was working on a traditional book, a comic book series, a graphic novel, a computer or something else altogether. “It has art” was one of the few hints he dropped during the conversation with Andrews. “It has to be something that a kid can sit and digest and process themselves, as they watch the story, as they read the story, [that’s] the way they consume it at the age of 8 or 9 or 10. Then they can go back to that same story and digest it differently when they’re 30 or 35.”

Bryant told Andrews he was working with a team of writers (“writers with weirdo backgrounds,” specifically) daily and said there was no set timetable for the project to be finished. “I’ll know when they’re ready,” he said. “That’s the one thing about storytelling [compared to] what I’ve been doing -- I don’t have to put anything out there until it’s just right.”

Andrews artfully used that comment to steer the conversation toward a Bryant-related project that was ready for its big reveal – which happened to be why some 60 Hublot brand executives, watch boutique owners, horological enthusiasts and VIP guests turned out to dine on osso bucco and toast with glasses of 2005 vintage Dom Perignon while a snake handler walked around with a black indigo snake draped around her neck – the launch of Hublot’s Classic Fusion Kobe Bryant HeroVillain timepiece.

The HeroVillain, a prototype of which adorned Bryant’s left wrist, is the third Hublot timepiece paying homage to him -- the first was the King Power Black Mamba Chronograph in 2013 and the second was the Big Bang UNICO Chronograph Retrograde Kobe “Vino” Bryant in 2015 -- and even from afar it comes across as slightly more dressy and refined than either of those.

Bryant-specific details of the 45mm black- and gold-accented ceramic watch include a black snake appliqué on the dial (a reference to his “Black Mamba” nickname), Kobe’s KOB16 logo engraved on the case back and a strap that incorporated a black python. In another nod to the man who wore No. 24 on his jersey, the production run of the watches, which are being sold exclusively at Hublot’s Beverly Hills boutique, is limited to just 24 numbered pieces, each with a $20,400 price tag.

“The hero/villain thing was something I came up with at the beginning of the year,” Bryant explained. “I was thinking about the way my career had been going and where it was and the philosophy around that – which is the hero/villain philosophy. Nothing’s black or white or this or that. We’re all both hero and villain.”

A life-lesson learned through sports, and one, we suspect, that will be revisited as Bryant transitions from storied basketball player to storyteller.

Only time will tell.

The Classic Fusion Kobe Bryant HeroVillain ($20,400) available exclusively at Hublot Beverly Hills, 9470 Brighton Way, Beverly Hills.

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