The Resilience was first launched in 2012, and in 2016 Peter Speake-Marin has introduced it with a black dial, in his signature 42 mm Piccadilly case in red gold. The black enamel dial has gold-coloured Arabic numerals and the Speake-Marin topping-tool logo above the numeral 6. The PVD gold-plated hands are in the Speake-Marin “Foundation”-style.…
The single-hand Velsheda by Speake-Marin began life in 2004 as the Shimoda, a visually striking piece with one single hand, but one in which you couldn’t tell, from the dial, that the piece was running. It returned as the Velsheda in 2014, named after a British J-Class yacht, with a central seconds wheel in the…
Company profile: Peter Speake-Marin was born in 1968 in Essex, England, studied watchmaking at Hackney Technical College in London and then at WOSTEP in Neuchâtel, Switzerland. He began working at Somlo Antiques in London, establishing its watch restoration department. Working on pieces by Arnold, Breguet, Frodsham, Nelson, Patek Philippe and other classic watchmakers enabled him…
This chronograph is part of Hamilton‘s new Broadway collection inspired by New York’s skyscrapers, and it is accompanied by the three-hand day-date model and a quartz version. The Hamilton Broadway Auto Chrono 43mm has the same elegantly curving steel case as the three-hand Day-Date version, but it looks a lot thicker. The case is in…
New for 2016, the Hamilton Broadway collection was inspired by New York’s skyscrapers, interpreted on the dial by narrow vertical ribbing. This range is a new addition, designed to fill a position somewhere between the military looks of the Khaki and the modern Jazzmaster models. An interesting feature is what looks like a slightly darker…
With its new 2016 Khaki Navy Frogman pieces, Hamilton is showing its ability to compete with brands such as Tudor and Rolex, at much lower prices, with watch types including the day-date and diver’s. In the latter category, Hamilton has some historical traditions, because it supplied the U.S. Navy Seals with diving watches, and it…
Hamilton, according to CEO Sylvain Dolla, is going great guns, in particular on its top three markets the USA, Japan and Italy, but also in many other countries, with Thailand and Turkey enjoying notable growth. Every ten years, Hamilton produces a gold watch aimed particularly at collectors, at a price well beyond the brand’s normal…
Several watch brands have experimented with transforming watches, such as Montblanc whose Metamorphosis II has a dial that morphs from a time-date format to a chronograph format by means of a mechanical transformation that takes about 15 seconds. This was a limited edition of 18 pieces, price on request so presumably a few hundred thousand…
The IW503801 by IWC is the Antoine de Saint Exupéry version of the Perpetual Calendar Top Gun IW502902 watch, with the differences being the tobacco brown dial, the display caseback, the Santoni strap with cream contrasting stitching and orange lining, and the calibre. The movement is the in-house 52610, visible through the sapphire caseback. This…
This watch by IWC Schaffhausen is almost identical to the previous 2012 version, the only difference being the embossed calfskin strap instead of the soft black textile strap. The ceramic case is 48 mm in diameter and 16 mm thick, solid caseback with Top Gun logo, and 6 bar water resistance. The dial is very…
The IW500917 is the luxury version of the Big Pilot’s Watch IW500912, IWC’s interpretation of the Type A B-Uhr watch. The 46mm case is in red gold, and likewise hands, conical crown and back. The watch is powered by the in-house 51111 calibre, running at 21,600 vibrations per hour, 3 Hertz. Power reserve is over…
The IWC IW500916 is one of the versions of the IWC Big Pilot’s Watch IW500912, the brand’s classic pilot’s watch with in-house movement. It has a double-riveted strap by Santoni, a conical screw-in crown, and a dial with the blue colour hallmarking Petit Prince models. The case size has been reduced from 48 to 46…
This is perhaps the closest (along with the Pilot’s Watch Mark XVIII) that IWC gets to the Type A B-Uhr watch in their pilot’s watch collection launched in January 2016. It has a double-riveted strap by Santoni, a conical screw-in crown, and a simple dial design with just date and power reserve subdial added to…
The IWC Pilot’s Watch Chronograph Top Gun IW389001 and the Pilot’s Watch Chronograph Top Gun Miramar IW389002 are very similar, using the same movement and having the dial arrangement with combined analogue totalizer for chronograph minutes and hours at the top of the dial. They both use the same in-house 89361 movement. They are different…