His & Hers: 4 of the best couples watches money can buy, including Audemars Piguet, Omega and TAG Heuer
Recently, a reader from the Land of the Free dropped us a line asking if we could help with a conundrum he’d been having. You see, this lovely fellow and his wife are soon to celebrate their 20th wedding anniversary, and he wants to purchase a matching his and hers set of timepieces to mark the occasion. Trouble is, there are so many options to choose from; he doesn’t know where to start. So, we thought we’d lend a hand. Alex, these are four of the watches you should be keeping an eye out for. Rolex Datejust Perhaps the most important Rolex ever created, the Datejust is a true icon of horology, and pretty much every wristwatch you see today owes the humble DJ a debt of gratitude. Why? Well, when the iconic moniker was unveiled way back in 1945, it was the first wristwatch in the world to come equipped with a self-changing date complication. That may not sound profound by today’s standards, but at the time, it was a huge leap forward, and it’s a characteristic that can be found on almost all timepieces today. History lesson aside, the Datejust is just a plain brilliant watch –…
The post His & Hers: 4 of the best couples watches money can buy, including Audemars Piguet, Omega and TAG Heuer appeared first on Time and Tide Watches.
Editor’s note: When people talk about the Grand Seiko Snowflake as being one watch, they are in fact forgoing the many and varied shades of snow that Grand Seiko has showered us with since the OG became almost a pillar in itself. Here, we choose a Snowflake for every season, to show the nuance and subtle colourings that distinguish each model and show its versatility. By the end of this detailed article, you should know which particular type of snowflake is right for you. For many, Grand Seiko is synonymous with Snowflake, and for years there was only one Grand Seiko Snowflake to choose. Now, as the prestigious Japanese brand becomes better known in the world, that landscape is changing, with more of those delicate, gorgeous dials making their way across the world. And, in the manner of Vivaldi’s most famous work, we’re breaking it down, four seasons-style. Spring – Grand Seiko Snowflake SBGA259 Spring is brought to us courtesy of the SBGA259, which doesn’t deviate too much from the original, but adds a few blossoming buds of colour in the form of gold-tone hands and dial markers. In a contrast that only seems to make the white of the dial…
You’re washing your hands multiple times a day. You’re trying to social distance wherever possible. You’re taking such precautions in order to minimise the potential spread of COVID-19. But what are you doing about your watch? Think about it for a second. Your watch accompanies you practically everywhere, it’s in direct physical contact with your body and the outside world and you rarely wash it (if ever). It’s therefore never going to be an entirely sterile object. That was emphatically demonstrated by a February study when the Department of Biological Sciences at Florida Atlantic University swabbed 20 watches for germs. Four of the watches were found to have E. coli on them while nine watches harboured staph. None of which is particularly savoury. But in the middle of a global pandemic the stakes have got significantly higher. After all, research published in The New England Journal of Medicine found that microbes of coronavirus can linger for up to 72 hours on stainless steel surfaces. So could the watch that’s glinting on your wrist right now potentially be carrying the virus? That’s the question Time+Tide put to Dr Lotti Tajouri, Associate Professor of Biomedical Sciences at Bond University and one of…
So, remember how TAG Heuer pretty much stopped the show at LVMH’s Dubai Watch Week at the start of this year with their stunning Carrera 160 Years Silver? Remember how much you, and pretty much every other person in our community, immediately wanted one, only to be told that all 1860 examples were sold out? Well, turns out, they weren’t. In fact, TAG Heuer’s three best limited edition releases of this year thus far – the aforementioned Carrera 160 Years Silver, the ultra funky Carrera 160 Years Montreal and the fresh to death Fragment Design Chronograph – are available for online pre-order (depending on your location, though most are reportedly covered), and we’ve got the links. This is very handy for people who are unable to get to a boutique to place an order, which is many of us in the pandemic-stricken age. But first, patience my dears, let’s remind ourselves of a little bit about each of these great chronos. TAG Heuer Carrera 160 Years Silver T+T founder Andrew McUtchen said the Carrera 160 Years Silver “might be the perfect watch”, and that sentiment is very, very accurate. Just look at it: it’s simple, elegant, restrained and timeless – it is…
This week on Micro Mondays, we are looking at a brand that is a little older than most of the watch manufacturers we feature in this column — Ollech & Wajs. And what a story the company has … This might be one of the best-kept secrets in the watch industry, with the Zurich-based company being founded in 1956 and specialising in tool watches for a number of different armed forces around the world. The brand saw its peak during the Vietnam War when they were sold to soldiers on US military bases in the 1960s, before slowly retreating from popularity over the following decades. It was only recently, in 2017, that the brand entered a new phase, when one of the original founders, Albert Wajs, sold the company to a passionate collector, who has since relaunched the brand. In the few years since, Ollech & Wajs has released a number of exciting watches that return to the tool watch roots of the company. With the brand ethos firmly planted in the styles of pilot, military and diving watches, the combination of authentic history and honestly sourced vintage cues are seeing the brand rise once again with the current surge…
Sure to be one of the highlights of 2020, the new James Bond film, No Time to Die, is coming. And just as we have with every new Bond film for the last 25 years, we get a brand new Bond watch. This year, we say hello to the Omega Seamaster Diver 300M 007 Edition, an interesting watch for a number of reasons beyond the fact that Daniel Craig is sporting it in his last outing as the world’s most famous spy. The Omega Seamaster Diver 300M 007 Edition is based on the regular production Seamaster Diver 300M, however it has been tweaked to be more suitable for the wrist of an intelligence officer. The 42mm case is a darker metal than the typically used steel and is actually titanium, the same lightweight material that the Milanese bracelet and folding clasp are made from. The bezel is the same matte black as the dial, and is made from similarly lightweight aluminium. As for the rest of the dial, we are treated to a terracotta-tone lume for the hour plots, hands and 60-minute bezel markings. This tanned lume adds a significant amount to the overall impression of the watch, fitting in very…
Longines has had quite the 2020. First came the excellent Khaki Green addition to the HydroConquest collection, and then we scored an entirely new and very exciting collection in the Longines Spirit. And now, to round out something new and something updated, comes something from the past – but, we think you’ll agree, very much fit for these times, even if Luke from the team considers that the times they are a changin’. Called the Classic Tuxedo and Tuxedo Chronograph, these two timepieces are faithful re-creations of two Longines wristwatches that were made a long, long time ago. With enough Art Deco flair to make Jay Gatsby blush, these could well be the nicest-looking wristwatches the legacy watchmaker has dropped this year, and now that we’ve spent some time with each of them, we can tell you what they’re like on the wrist. We’ll start with the stainless steel cases. For the three-hander Ref.L2.330.4.93.0 Classic Tuxedo, Longines has gone with an archetypally styled, highly versatile 38.5mm case that sits wonderfully on the wrist and cuts a lovely visage. Thanks to elongated, subtly curved lugs, the watch also wears slightly larger than you might expect, meaning it’s going to appear nigh…
Well, one of 2020’s worst-kept secrets is out of the bag – Tudor has gone and released a brand new iteration of the best watch it makes. Ladies and gents, introducing the Tudor Black Bay Fifty-Eight Ref.M79030b-0001. Now, we’ll skip all the conjecture and polarisation that this watch has already managed to conjure up in the community, because there’s a question that needs answering – just what kind of blue is the new Tudor Black Bay Fifty-Eight? That may seem like a silly question. I mean, there’s myriad renders and press photos floating about. But for anyone who’s ever seen a watch online and then been shocked at just how different it looks in the metal, you’ll get why this is such a burning curiosity for us. Is it really navy? Is it royal blue? Or tinges of teal? Or, to quote a local legend, is it Electric Blue? (See the YouTube clip for some background music to the post…) We’ve sourced some very telling side-by-side comparison photos, with the new kid on the block up against some other popular blue-dialled watches from both inside and outside the family. Tudor Black Bay Fifty-Eight Ref.M79030b-0001 Vs. Tudor Pelagos Ref.M25600TB-0001 As you…