HANDS-ON: The Glashütte Original Vintage Sixties – the ultimate green dial of 2018?
Now a third year into the Sixties series of watches — one that started with a limited production of five colourways of the watch seen here in 2016, and a similar set of colours in a square chronograph for 2017 — Glashütte Original have opted to cut choice out of the equation for Baselworld 2018. A beautifully textured green dial, stamped using vintage dies from the brand’s archives, will be available from boutiques and retailers for a one-year period (rather than being limited to a specific volume of watches). We’ve been seeing green making the rounds of luxury watch brands for a good couple of years now, but with the combination of colour choice, unique texture, and the generally funky ’60s-era vibe to this piece, I can’t help but lock it in as my favourite green dial to date. Now I know a lot of you will want to have my head for not picking the new green-dialled H. Moser Pioneer, but rest assured, it’s a mighty tight race between the two. Vital statistics Depending on the variant, as the new Sixties model is available as either a no-date or Panorama Date configuration, buyers have the option of either a svelte…
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There’s something I feel you should know about our personal ‘top 10’ videos: Andrew and I don’t share what’s on our lists with each other. Sure, we drop broad hints, but this video is genuinely the first time Andrew’s hearing my list in full. The surprise, and the guesses, are real. And even though it’s a little surprising that Andrew didn’t guess my choices — I mean, I went to absolutely zero effort to hide my unashamed love for that Rolex Daytona, for example — the real surprise was that we had only one duplicate watch in the whole 10. You know what else is real about this video? The extreme fatigue that comes on the last day of Baselworld. We filmed this just prior to our final day of appointments, and I was coming off a week of roughly four hours a night sleep, so things started getting a little silly. And aside from the general watch-induced mania (particular apologies to Nomos), there’s a few symptoms of this fatigue, namely Marcus and my shared obsession with 1982’s finest film, and one of the greatest soundtracks of all time. Not sure what I’m on about (not that I blame you)? Well, here’s a hint:…
Longines and Time+Tide bring you an exclusive opportunity Longines is the official Watch and Timekeeper of the XXI Commonwealth Games to be held on the Gold Coast, Australia from April 4th, 2018. To commemorate this event, Longines have released the Conquest V.H.P. (Very High Precision) Gold Coast 2018 Commonwealth Games edition and, with it officially sold out from HQ, and only a handful remaining in Australian retailers, we are offering 10 for sale. Longines and Time+Tide bring you a limited opportunity to not only secure the watch, but also attend an intimate collectors’ event on the Gold Coast during the games, with accommodation on the night included. What you get 1 x Longines Conquest VHP Gold Coast 2018 Commonwealth Games Limited Edition Watch This watch is ‘Very High Precision’ by name and by nature – it promises accuracy of +/-5 seconds a year, compared to the +/- 15 seconds per month of standard quartz watches, as well as a longer than average battery life. It also has a gear position detection system that allows the watch to reset its hands after an impact or exposure to a magnetic field. 1 x Ticket to the Watch Appreciation Dinner on the 6th of April at…
There’s been a lot of big colour surfacing at Baselworld 2018, but little that stop traffic in the same fashion as the Hublot Big Bang Red Magic. Though we can’t be surprised that Hublot would deliver something as loud and in-your-face as this new release, certain colours of ceramic have long been known as very challenging to produce, and red in particular has long been avoided for exactly that reason. Being heavily invested in materials innovation, Hublot have forged ahead to deliver the first red ceramic watch on the market and, boy, is it ever red … Vital statistics At its core, the Big Bang Unico Red Magic is identical to the other Big Bang chronographs in the line. The HUB1242 self-winding column wheel flyback chronograph caliber is good for a power reserve of 72 hours, and still features a 30-minute chronograph register alongside its running seconds. A partially skeletonised dial with floating indices is also part of the usual equation. The bold red case has a fairly significant sheen to it, contrasted by matte black composite resin accents, a rubberised crown, black ceramic pushers, and a matching black ceramic clasp for its colour-matched rubber strap. As with all things…
Named after the Carrera Panamericana, a legendarily dangerous car racing event of the early 1950s that took place across the open roads of Mexico and was cancelled after resulting in too many fatalities. The TAG Heuer Carrera is an icon of the motorsport-inspired watch world. And this year it celebrates 55 years since its release with a stable of new releases, like this pair of heritage-inspired Carrera Calibre 16 Chronographs, released at Baselworld 2018. Vital statistics There are two colours available, a black dial and a blue. Both with contrasting white subdials and highlights of red and orange. The top subdial measuring the chronograph minutes, while the bottom does hours, and a running small seconds takes the position at 9 o’clock. Ceramic bezels are embedded with a tachymeter scale and sit atop 100m water-resistant steel cases that measure 41mm wide and house the TAG Heuer Calibre 16, which is either a Valjoux 7750 or Sellita SW-500 movement. And a stainless-steel bracelet will come on the blue dial version, while the black dial gets a black perforated leather strap with red stitching. On the wrist They’ve definitely captured the look of many of the Carreras of days gone by. However, the…
We all love a birthday. And watch brands love them as much as anyone – an excuse to celebrate, a hook for a new collection. At Baselworld 2018 Omega have marked the 25th anniversary of the Seamaster Professional Diver 300M (aka the James Bond watch) with a revamp. It was the SMP that kicked off Omega’s relationship with the Bond franchise, becoming something of a late-1990s icon as Pierce Brosnan wore a series of tricked-out, weaponised versions of the watch over the course of four movies. Vital statistics With 14 new variations – six in stainless steel and eight in steel-gold combos, three dial colours and a choice of rubber strap or steel bracelet – Omega’s revamp of the Seamaster Professional Diver 300M is about updated materials and mechanics rather than a major redesign. The case diameter has increased from 41mm to 42mm and the Seamaster’s distinctive cone-shaped crown for the helium escape valve sits at the 10 o’clock position. For the first time on a Seamaster Diver 300M, the case-back is sapphire crystal. The movement is Omega’s well-proven co-axial chronometer calibre 8800 (introduced in 2016), which is METAS-certified for magnetic resistance to more than 15,000 gauss and has a…
You’ve either been sleeping or taking a break from social media to have missed the news on this one. As part of their new Baselworld 2018 releases, Rolex have released for the very first time a ‘Pepsi’ GMT-Master II in ‘Oystersteel’ (which is the new Rolex terminology for their 904L steel). Yes, a two-colour red and blue Cerachrom bezel insert, WITH a Jubilee bracelet. Vital statistics The five-link Jubilee bracelet is also made from Oystersteel and features an ‘Oysterclasp’, which allows for 5mm of adjustment. It’s also worth noting that this is the first time we’ve seen a Jubilee bracelet on a sports Rolex in modern times. The Oystercase also received some changes and has been redesigned. It’s noticeably different in comparison to the GMT-Master II BLNR (Batman), which is also still in production. Aesthetics aside, the new Pepsi GMT also features an entirely new generation movement — the 3285 calibre, which features a beefed-up 70-hour power reserve. Another small, yet noteworthy, detail is the additional Rolex crown on the dial, which you’ll notice at six o’clock, between ‘Swiss’ and ‘Made’. This appears to be on all new 2018 models. It’s small touches like these that help collectors distinguish between different…
In many ways, you could say that few people have had as significant an impact on the watch industry from a design standpoint in recent years than George Bamford. Beloved by many, despised by a good few at least, Bamford is single-handedly the reason why watch customisation is now so prevalent in offerings directly from watch manufacturers. After many years on his own, his recent collaborations with LVMH, selling brand-authorised custom offerings from the TAG Heuer, Zenith, and Bulgari catalogues, further legitimised his efforts, but this new release, unveiled at Baselworld 2018, kicks things up a healthy few notches. You’re looking at the TAG Heuer Monaco Bamford — the first piece co-designed directly from TAG HQ in a carbon fibre case. Vital statistics Past conversations with George Bamford had already led us to believe that something “bigger” was coming down the pipeline from this flourishing partnership, and given his love for vintage Heuer at a personal level, this new Monaco makes sense. The original 39mm case proportions and Calibre 11 self-winding movement are maintained, whereas its carbon fibre case and jet-black dial with contrasting baby blue indices are distinctly custom and a significant departure from any Monaco ever produced by…
At the heart of many Grand Seiko watches beats the mighty 9S calibre, which is celebrating its 20th birthday, and the location of the party is Baselworld 2018. There’s a swathe of new offerings on the table, including this deliciously dialled number, the Grand Seiko SBGR311. Vital statistics Excuse me if I rush through the key stats, because, really, I want to talk about that dial. The SBGR311 is 42mm across, steel, with that characteristic mix of exceptional polish and brushed finishes that define Grand Seiko’s zaratsu-polished cases. From behind there’s the 9S68 (obvs), visible behind a sapphire caseback with a Grand Seiko lion and gilt 20th anniversary text. Now, that dial. Have you ever seen a brown dial quite so wondrous? It’s as mercurial as the brand’s best, glistening like hot chocolate when the light hits it just right. But beyond the colour and finish, there’s that pattern, a radial explosion of tessellating shapes, each marked with either the gothic G, S or historic Daini Seikosha mark. On top of that the applied, polished hours seem to float, as do those very pointy-looking dauphine hands. The choice of a gold seconds hand and ‘GS’ marker provides just the right…
The Longines Legend Diver Watch, a reimagined version of a diving watch from the 1960s, had a dramatic reintroduction in 2017, care of the Milanese bracelet addition — perhaps the best strap hack of the year, period — and now it’s going to set pulses racing even faster with a new version in black PVD. Vital Statistics Apart from the PVD, the Legend Diver remains true to the bold styling that made the original timepiece something of an icon in the Longines canon. It houses Longines’ L888 caliber. In terms of design, the lines of the original watch have been preserved, including the boxed glass (but in sapphire crystal) and the bidirectional internal turning diving bezel. While upholding the 1960s spirit of this legendary timepiece, Longines have also equipped it with contemporary and high-performance technical characteristics, including a black PVD coating for a resolutely modern design, a sapphire crystal, two crowns and a screw-down back to guarantee water-resistance to 30 bar. The bezel is activated and stopped by the crown located at 2 o’clock, allowing the wearer to determine the remaining dive time. The steel 42mm case is coated with a layer of black PVD and has an illustration of a diver…