The French are efficient to the same extent that Germans are famed for riding down the street on a bicycle with a baguette under one arm, chainsmoking and being rude to foreigners; which is to say they’re generally not efficient at all. Nonetheless, our man from Marseille had the idea...

We all know 90% dark chocolate is best. Anything less is for children. Anything more is for people who want to prove to you how much they like chocolate, it’s overpowering. This, I know, is the same reductive argument than anyone driving more slowly than you must be an idiot...

The Cintrée (French for curved) case could arguably be called the first ergonomic wristwatch, curved to adopt the wrist rather than built around a movement and given lugs. That’s fairly substantial historically. The last time I wrote about one, I compared it to the Herman Miller chair I now own...

I’m as fond of a good metaphor for communicating my views on any given watch as China are of polluting oceans. The Day-Date, more than almost any other watch, lends itself to a particular analogy: drink. There are endless variants, each quite personally expressive, and they all get you to...

It’s pretty brazen to name a collection, ‘The Six Materpieces’. That’s like McLaren naming their track car the Senna. Or a restaurant I once visited in San Diego that had a Cioppino called ‘The Bourdain’. Generally speaking, it’s best practice to let someone else declare your work a masterpiece. And...

The 1019 Milgauss is the sole watch where I prefer a non-luminous dial to tanned tritium, because it signifies something really rather special historically. It is said that science advances in irregular leaps and bounds rather than consistent steps. Perhaps not by coincidence, the same could be said about Rolex....

Last year, I had the chance to have a short chat with one of Czapek’s three founders. Straight away, I asked him the query I always do when I don’t really understand a brand, ‘Can you tell me a little about this effort, why it needs to exist, and what...

This unassuming diver is one of Schaffhausen’s best kept secrets. If I told you today that IWC were about to release a fully integrated titanium diver that could go down to 2000m, was going to be issued to the German military, had an antimagnetic cage, tritium, and with a design...

This is a Royal Oak in the same way that Yoko Ono is a member of The Beatles . . .which is to say this isn’t a Royal Oak. Despite the bracelet and design language similarities, AP never called the 6005 Jumbo a Royal Oak, it went simply by the...

There is only one watch that has combined Zenith’s A386-style tricolor subs with an A3818 Cover Girl case. It fact, it’s really the only other watch Zenith made in period besides the A386 to sport the grey-dark grey-blue. It even brought the famous ‘sharks tooth’ chronograph seconds track from the...

This is not an Oysterquartz. Many of you will be unfamiliar with the 1530; this is easily forgiven. The reference is not on John Mayers wrist, Hodinkee haven’t done a reference points covering it, and its story is one which requires a deep understanding of Rolex. If you’ve always lusted...

Seeing the Germans at Lange get this playful is like paging through your grandfather’s record collection and finding a vinyl of DJ Tiesto or Daft Punk, or finding out Giorgia Meloni is always wearing stockings under her power suit (actually, Italian, maybe that’s not a stretch). The point is this:...

In the 70s and 80s, the Tudor Sub went through way, way more evolution than Rolex’s. Tudor couldn’t decide on a formula: snowflake hands or mercedes, square plots or round, shield logo or rose, PCG or SCG or NCG? This is all not even to mention the RCNs or Marine...

‘A creative adult is a child who survived.’ The origins of this line are debated, thought to be first penned by Robin W. Winks, but in any case MB&F describe this tenet as central to their creative process. Their use was the first time I’d ever come across the quote,...

This 345.0022 is like finding out Dame Helen Mirren loved acting in the Fast and Furious and sought out the role deliberately, which is true. Or learning that Chinese takeout boxes unfold into a neat plate with the ball of noodle at its center. Or learning that David Attenborough makes...

Patek didn’t make the first neo-vintage era perpetual calendar, in fact they were late, a full 7 years. But they might’ve done it best. These are fighting words, I know, but to me the earlier 5548 and 43031 are scaled up, modernized versions of first AP 5516, incredible in their...

Amongst the kind of people that read Hairspring, the original 222 occupies quite a different mindshare compared to the 5402 or 3700. This, because where the Royal Oak and Nautilus have been in continuous production since introduction, the 222 was a blip in Vacheron history, a supernova that dazzled and...

There aren’t many chronographs which can be described honestly as on par with a Paul Newman. This one can be, and it’s an order of magnitude less dear as well. It’s not just that it’s a Valjoux 72, hundreds of references were powered by one. It’s a Singer-made dial. It’s...