Horological Meandering

Genta's merits are more basic ...

 

.... since he was practically the first industrial designers focussing on watches as an object of aesthetic, complete design. Let me quote some lines from Paul Guillfoyle's 2009 script on Genta's role with Omega:

"Before Gérald Genta, watch design was a relatively unsophisticated
and ad hoc affair. Customarily, the design of cases, bracelets and
dials was the preserve of those who manufactured them. The watch
companies would ask their contract ors for ideas, say, for case and
dial options for a new calibre of movement they planned to produce,
and through a type of committee process components would be mixed
and matched to create the desired aesthetics.

This in no small way explains the rather austere and uninspired nature
of most of the watch styles to have emerged after Art Deco and
modernist design was extinguished by World War Two. It wasn’t until
the mid 1950s that watch design (if one could call it that) began to
move away from the utilitarianism of the previous two decades and
become more of a fusion of function and aesthetics. Gérald Genta
was in no small way responsible for this trend."

( users.tpg.com.au )

I think this offers a good glimpse on Genta's real importance for the industry and why his designs are considered classics. Aside from that, if you compare The Royal Oak, the Pasha by Cartier, the Riviera by Baume & Mercier, you see a lot of differences, while his "signature" is still present.

Marcus