The L.U.C Perpetual Chrono by Chopard is a watch that the brand already had in its range, with versions in white and pink gold with dark grey dial released last year. For 2017, a new limited edition in platinum has been presented, with an on-trend blue dial. Why is blue so popular? It has dominated…
The Bell & Ross BR V2-94 Bellytanker is the brand’s second watch on the Bellytanker theme. Like the three-hand BR V1-94, it was inspired by Bell & Ross’s own reinterpretation of a hot rod created by Bill Burke in 1946, using a military surplus auxiliary fuel tank from the Mustang P-51, and later a similar…
Graham sponsor the Swiss Gurnigel Bergrennen hill race. It took place on 9-10 September 2017, with 200 cars and 50 motorbikes that drive up a 3.7 km course uphill, from the Bernese village of Dürrbach up to Gurnigelbad, a vertical distance of 314 metres at an average gradients of 8.4%, with maximum slope of 12.6%.…
Longines often releases new versions of pieces from its historical collection, as part of the Heritage range. They are often quirky watches, such as the Lindbergh Hour Angle with its complex scales, the Avigation Type A-7 with its slewed dial, and the Heritage Diver “Lazy Eye.” The Longines Avigation BigEye has the same sort of…
In 2017, Rolex introduced a new version of the classic Cosmograph Daytona in yellow gold with a champagne-colour dial and black subdials. Rolex has its own foundry and so can personalize the colour of its gold according to the proportions of metals in the alloy. The watch is 40 mm in diameter, with screw-in caseback,…
The Zenith Chronomaster El Primero Grande Date Full Open reveals the application of Jean-Claude Biver’s marketing approach as already applied at Hublot. There, a single in-house movement, the Unico, has been used for countless skeletonized Big Bang variants. At Zenith, Biver already had a legendary movement, El Primero, and so this year he opened up…
The EZM 1.1 mission timer chronograph by Sinn is the latest version of their classic EZM 1 released in 1997, 20 years ago. The EZM 1.1 also celebrates the opening, on 31 August 2017, of Sinn’s new headquarters at Wilhelm-Fay-Strasse 21, Frankfurt. At this new and larger building, Sinn make their watches, and customers can…
The Zenith Chronomaster El Primero Full Open, launched in 2017, is a direct reflection of Jean-Claude Biver’s influence on the brand that he currently directs. He specifically wanted to open up the dial completely. The Chronomaster was previously available with an entirely solid dial, and a version with a half-open dial revealing just the balance…
Torsten Nagengast’s involvement with watches began as a collector, and developed into a business based on locating stocks of old movements – often as yet unused – and casing them in new watches. His website currently includes a fascinating flyback chronograph, the Racetimer Flyback Chronograph 1960, based on a movement by Baumgartner. The price of…
The El Primero movement by Zenith is a watchmaking legend, with its rate of 36,000 vibrations per hour – 5 Hertz – that improves precision and provides an accuracy of a tenth of a second in chronograph readings. It was first introduced in 1969 and so we’re not far off 50 years. The three overlapping…
The partnership between Zenith and Land Rover began in 2016 with the El Primero Range Rover Chronograph, and this year it continues with the Chronomaster El Primero Range Rover Velar Special Edition. The new watch is even more subtle than the 2016 version: the name Range Rover that previously appeared below the Zenith logo has…
In 2017 Mühle-Glashütte presented their new Lunova collection. The name is based on the Latin words “lumen” and “nova,” light and new. The watches in this range all have cases made by Mühle-Glashütte, with a total polished finish or a high proportion of surfaces with polished finish. They also have graded dials and a pilot’s…
The 1815 Chronograph has been part of the A. Lange & Söhne collection since 2004, in a pulsometer arrangement until 2010 when a new version was release without the pulsometer scale. This year, 2017, a black-dial version has been released, once again with pulsometer dial. Case and dial The watch has a 39.5 white gold…
The Manero Fyback by Carl F. Bucherer was first presented in 2016, with three new colour variants added in 2017 and shown here. The watch could be described as a dressy chronograph, with large skeletonized hands in the same material as the case, but with no SuperLuminova, and hour indices whose shape mirrors the hands.…
The Harmony Pulsometer Chronograph, introduced by Vacheron Constantin in 2015, is what a pulsometer chronograph should look like, as least as regards the scale. The pulsometer scale at the edge of the dial is subdivided into units as far as is practical, up to a pulse rate of 80. And the chronograph seconds scale is…
This Pulsograph chronograph – with a pulsometer scale – is part of the Montblanc Meisterstück Heritage Collection, which comprises watches made using traditional watchmaking techniques, and so that incorporate the expertise of the Minerva manufacture in Villeret. Watches in this collection have certain distinguishing features such as applied hour markers, a Roman numeral XII, dauphin…
This new chronograph by Bell & Ross was introduced together with the Vintage Garde-Côtes Automatic, and it shares the same grey-orange-white colour scheme based on the equipment used by the French coastguard service. The Vintage Garde-Côtes Chronograph could be described as a “sports chronograph” with a water resistance of 100 metres with the crown and…
Audemars Piguet periodically update their Royal Oak Offshore Chronograph, which was the first Royal Oak chronograph to be introduced about 24 years ago (1992-1993). The men’s Royal Oak Offshore Summer Edition 2017, reference 26408OR.OO.A010CA.01, has a 44 pink gold case, a silvered dial with the “Méga Tapisserie” guilloche pattern (a sportier version of the original…
Many brands like to make watches that look more expensive than they actually are, in order to give purchasers the feeling of getting a good deal. Audemars Piguet makes expensive watches and in some of their recent releases have enjoyed themselves in giving them a sportier, younger, trendier appearance. The Audemars Piguet Chronograph Summer Edition…
There’s a lot of good stuff in the Tudor Heritage Black Bay Chronograph. It has a superb movement, made by Breitling, with column wheel and vertical clutch. It has an excellent waterproofness rating at 200 metres, with screw-down crown and chronograph pushers. It has the look and feel of the Black Bay family with its…