Auction Report: Sixteen Lots To Watch At Tomorrow’s Phillips ‘Styled’ Auction
From vintage Rolex to modern Patek and more, there’s a lot to explore.
Introducing – H2O Watch Kalmar 10 Miles (and 10 Miles refers to the Water-Resistance)
OceanicTime, a blog dedicated to diver’s watches, is celebrating its 10thanniversary by partnering with H2O Watch to reinforce their existing Kalmar 2 dive watch to reach a STAGGERING water resistance of 10 miles. OceanicTime was founded by British dive watch enthusiast, Lex Martine, in 2008. Best known for its daily blogs, the site also works on collaborative projects to modify existing dive watches into special editions. They’ve partnered with H2O Watch, a German tool-watch brand founded in 2010 that specializes in deepwater resistance, to create the Kalmar 2x OceanicTime 10 Miles edition. For a little context, the deepest part of the ocean is the Challenger Deep, located in the western Pacific Ocean with a depth of approximately 6.9 miles. A scuba diver can descend to a maximum depth of 1,090 feet (record set by Ahmed Gabr) and only a few specialized submersibles have ever reached the Challenger Deep. Why does a watch need such an unattainable depth rating? Well, why not? Let’s take a closer look at this groundbreaking achievement.
In Partnership – Ten Years Of Adventures With Oris Watches
Tools for the mountains, the sea, the sky, and more.
H10: My Favorite HODINKEE Story: Jon Bues
That sidewalk clock on a street corner in lower Manhattan.
Introducing – Frederique Constant Classics Index Automatic & Heart Beat, Face-Lifted but Still Accessible
Frederique Constant enlarges its Classics Index Automatic collection with three newcomers and revisits the Heart Beat in two iterations. True to its mantra of ‘accessible luxury’, the watches feature restrained proportions, classic styling, a touch of high-end guilloché-like, automatic calibres, and, here’s the catch, a price tag that sets them in a different league from most respected Swiss watchmakers. FC’s message that quality is not symptomatic with prices that compete with your mortgage is getting louder and clearer by the day.
Hands-on – Fortis B-42 Official Cosmonauts Chronograph
Fortis was founded in 1912 by Walter Vogt. Vogt’s idea was to design watches of outstanding qualities that would deserve the name Fortis or strong in Latin. Since then, the brand is known for its rugged, functional watches and for its long-lasting connection with aviation and space exploration. In particular, Fortis watches became part of the standard equipment for Cosmonauts, cooperating with Roscosmos, the Russian Space Agency (Editor’s note, the word Cosmonaut itself is used by the Russian Space Agency whereas, for NASA, one would use Astronaut). The first Fortis Cosmonaut watch flew into space in 1994 as Russia was operating the MIR space station. A second version – again for Roscosmos, specifically as the ISS followed MIR – was designed some 10 years later. Since then, several versions have been produced including the steel B-42 we are reviewing here.
INTRODUCING: The Seiko Astron Novak Djokovic Limited Edition SSE174J
Tennis great Novak Djokovic and Japanese watch manufacturer Seiko began their (doubles) partnership at the beginning of 2014. Just a few months later, Djokovic regained his position as world number one – a ranking he then held for 28 months straight. Coincidence? Perhaps, but whether it’s causation or correlation, the fact remains that the partnership has been an exceptional one for all involved. Especially us, with Seiko releasing a slew of stellar limited editions that celebrate the tennis legend’s achievements over the years since. The latest ace to be rocketed over the net is Seiko’s brand-new Astron SSE174J, and keen-eyed tennis and watch fans may have already spotted it on the champion’s wrist this year, as the comeback kid lifted his trophies and achieved the impossible by clawing his way back from a ranking low of world No. 22 in May to ending the season as world No. 1. Like all other Astrons, whenever the dial of the Novak Djokovic Limited Edition SSE174J is exposed to direct sunlight, it’s simply adjusted to the precise local time at the touch of a button– via GPS signals that it receives through an under-the-dial ring antenna. Not only does this exposure to bright…
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Just Because: The Unique Watches Of Vacheron Constantin’s Les Cabinotiers ‘Mécaniques Sauvages’ Collection
Eagles, rhinos, and tourbillons – oh my.
HODINKEE Radio: Episode 22: Stephanie Bednarek
An exciting career in the business of outer space and a love for mechanical watches go hand in hand for this week’s guest.
Value Proposition – Review of Seiko 5 SNK809 – A Lot of a Mechanical Watch for Less than $100
A few years ago, we published a story named “The Cheapest High-End Watch“. We searched for the most affordable high-end watch, comprising a mechanical movement, in-house manufactured of course, from a brand with an undisputed pedigree, preferably family-owned, and the watch should be (relatively) small and elegant. And guess who won the title… not Patek, not Vacheron, not even Rolex or Omega. It was a Seiko 5! While pretty much everyone thinks of Switzerland when we’re talking about high-end watches, we felt that one specific brand was often missing in the discussion… Today that’s changing already and certainly since Grand Seiko has been positioned as a separate brand, this Japanese giant is taken very seriously. Japanese movement are gaining traction in general, and despite being cheap (the word affordable doesn’t even work anymore), Seiko 5 watches are true mechanical, bang-for-the-buck “high-end” pieces. Time to demonstrate this, with the not-even-100-dollar Seiko 5 Military SNK809.