ADDING SHINE: Cartier is expanding its young-talent awards, turning its watchmaking competition into a two-discipline prize.

Previously the Cartier Watchmaking Prize for Talents of Tomorrow, the award founded in 1995 will now be known as the Cartier Talents of Tomorrow Prize and include a gong for jewelers. From this year, the program will recognize three winners in each discipline for technical skill and creative daring.

Applications open Thursday and close Nov. 30. Eligible watchmaking students and apprentices may apply from Switzerland, France, Belgium, Germany and, as of this edition, Sweden, Denmark and Finland. Jewelry applicants must be studying in France, Italy or Switzerland and have completed at least two years of jewelry-focused training.

This year’s theme, “Cartier’s Wild Fauna,” nods to animal imagery long embedded in the house’s designs, from panthers and tigers to crocodiles. Watchmaking entrants will reinterpret the in-house self-winding automatic 1847 MC movement through that lens, while jewelry candidates are invited to translate an animal’s presence into a brooch.

The eight finalists in each category will receive three months and up to 80 hours to develop projects, with individual guidance from a mentor outside Cartier. They will submit finished work alongside a logbook of sketches, photographs and development milestones.

The watchmaking jury will include independent master watchmaker Kari Voutilainen; Pascal Ravessoud, vice president of the Fondation de la Haute Horlogerie; Nathalie Marielloni, curator at the Musée International d’Horlogerie; vintage-watch expert Roy Davidoff, and Pascale Lepeu, director of the Cartier Collection.

Jewelers will be presenting their projects to Alexa Abitbol, director of the Cartier high jewelry manufacture; François Curiel, chairman of Christie’s Europe; Mathieu Rousset-Perrier, heritage curator at the Musée des Arts Décoratifs; Laurent Laroche, chief executive officer of the Cristofol high jewelry atelier, and jewelry journalist Hervé Dewintre.

The winners of the first minted Cartier Talents of Tomorrow Prize will be revealed at ceremonies next spring, hosted by presenter and watchmaking expert Eléonor Picciotto.