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- Longines Introduces New Five-Star Spirit Flyback; Breitling Rolls Out TEN New Watches; Ressence Makes Another Beautiful Watch
Longines Introduces New Five-Star Spirit Flyback; Breitling Rolls Out TEN New Watches; Ressence Makes Another Beautiful Watch
Things are heating up before Watches and Wonders with a whole lot of retro
It's About Time
March 22, 2023
Hey friends, welcome to a new edition of It’s About Time, where we always have a timely joke up our sleeve.
In this issue:
Longines gives itself five stars
Breitling doubles down on classic car nostalgia
Breitling doubles down on Breitling nostalgia
Ressence makes another great watch
MB&F runs out of new metals, goes basic with steel
And… invite your friends to win a Tiffany PRX
Today’s reading time: 6 minutes and 28 seconds
We’re starting off with a bang! We’re giving away TWO of this year’s hottest watches:
THE TIFFANY PRX!
This is the PRX Powermatic 80 we’re giving away. Not this one obviously. But one just like it.
All you have to do is click the button below and have five of your friends subscribe. Both you and one of your friends will be eligible to win one of the watches
👂What’s new
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Longines’ Spirit line has been a reliable source of handsome and heritage-inspired pilot's watches. New to the line is today's Flyback Chronograph, an evolution of the chrono released in 2020. The watch is still 42mm with large Arabic numerals and 100m of water resistance but from there everything changes. The most obvious update is the flyback functionality which allows the user to instantly reset the chronograph seconds hand to zero, streamlining the stop, start, reset function of a regular chronograph.
The new Flyback Chronograph loses a subdial and date from the non-flyback model. There's a bidirectional rotating bezel with a ceramic insert and the watch comes in either a blue or black sunray dial. The Super-LumiNova gives a nice lume on the numerals on both the dial and bezel. Strap options include brown leather, blue fabric, and beige NATO or a stainless steel bracelet. Inside there's the new COSC-certified L791.4 movement (with silicon balance spring) which is on full display thanks to the transparent sapphire caseback.
Pricing is actually really great for all the functionalities is gives - $4,450. If they could just remove the five star review they gave themselves on the dial, this would be a top 10 watch to have.
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Collaborations between watch brands and car makers often end up on the wrong side of tacky. Aston Martin and Bentley make gorgeous cars but most of the watches they lent their name to were horrible. Do we even have to mention what Ferrari did with Hublot? However, every now and again we get a collaboration that’s not only perfect, but could be one of the best watches in the brand’s lineup.
And that’s exactly the case with the Breitling Top Time Classic Cars Editions. In 2021 the brand unveiled three new Top Time models connected to American sports cars from the ’60s - the Corvette, Cobra and Mustang. The watches had stood a huge chance of becoming horrible homages, but ended up being colorful chronos with bold design and a hit for the company.
Now, 18 months later, Breitling announces they are adding a new model inspired by the Ford Thunderbird and all four models of the Top Time Classic Cars Editions are getting their in-house chronograph movement.
Each of the available colorways represents a specific link to one of four well-known classic cars – the Chevrolet Corvette (red), the Ford Thunderbird (white), the Shelby Cobra (blue), and the Ford Mustang (green). These new models are 41mm wide (down from 42mm) and all four are fitted with a Breitling B01 automatic chronograph movement. All four don’t have a date and the Mustang, Corvette, and Thunderbird models all have three subdials providing a 12-hour maximum measure and 1/4th of a second resolution. The Shelby Cobra model uses two subdials for the chronograph and has a maximum measure of 30 minutes.
Pricing starts at $8,000 on a leather strap or $8,440 on a steel mesh bracelet. Love it!
Also, A Blog To Watch had the opportunity to go hands on with the new Thunderbird model, so head on over there for more details of the new model and a deeper dive.
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The Breitling Premier Chronograph line gets a refresh in a 42mm, B01-powered form. This is a historically important collection to Breitling as it represents the shift the brand made in the 1940s from core utilitarian tool-watches to something with a bit more panache. In 2021, the brand released the 40mm Breitling Premier Heritage Chrono, a 40mm model which directly played on the, well, heritage of the model range. That watch was powered by the brand's B09 movement.
Now, for 2023 there are updates to the model. At a quick glance, the six new Breitling Premier B01 Chronograph 42 watches almost seem like models that should already exist somewhere in the brand’s catalog. The new stainless steel watches now feature applied Arabic numerals instead of baton markers, syringe-style hands, a new sub-register layout, and new dial text that reads "Chronograph Premier," instead of "Chronometer Premier." This model also gets the in-house B01 chronograph movement, which has COSC certification.
The Premier premieres today with a bracelet and a new set of dial colors. In all, there are five new dial options of black, blue, salmon, green, or cream. There is even an 18k red gold model, also on a strap or bracelet. The stainless steel models will cost $9,100 on the strap and $9,500 on a bracelet. The 18k gold model will cost $20,200 on the strap and $39,700 on a bracelet.
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I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again - Ressence is my favorite watchmaker and the oil-filled Type 3 is my grail. So know they can do nothing wrong in my book. Of course I love their update of the Type 1 model with the new essential Round version.
The Type 1 is basically the backbone of the collection, an evolution of the Zero Series which introduced their unique way of displaying time using gears and discs. We’ve seen gradual evolutions, first by removing the crown, then by changing the case design. First came the Type 1 Square, and then the Type 1 Slim.
The Ressence TYPE 1° Round, this is nothing more than a modernized take on the brand’s signature watch, slightly redesigned to remain coherent with other creations currently available. The grade 5 titanium case measures 42.7mm in diameter, with a compact 11mm height. Some work has been done to the dial too, but not so much about the emblematic display. Available in a classic black edition too, it’s mostly the circular brushed blue model that is there to catch the attention. The discs have now a sunray-brushed surface, adding depth to the whole assembly, while the dial has been graphically simplified with indexes every 10 minutes and a weekday dial that subtly unites the 2 non-working days of the week with a touch of colour. Also, the seconds and weekdays hands are larger for improved reading.
The Ressence TYPE 1° Round will be available worldwide in two finishes – Black and Night Blue – from June 2023 as part of the permanent collection, and priced at CHF 16,800 (excl. taxes).
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Say what you will, but MB&F makes some very interesting watches. While their Horological Machines line might be a bit out there, the Legacy Machine line, while still not a practical daily beater, is an acceptable exploration of what’s possible in horology.
And since its launch in 2015, MB&F's Legacy Machine (LM) Perpetual has come in a lot of metals. red gold, platinum, white gold, titanium, yellow gold, and palladium... But there’s one metal they never made - steel. That’s why they announced today that they are launching the LM Perpetual in stainless steel, with a tasty salmon dial to boot.
Everything else remains pretty much the same - the fully integrated 581-component caliber, the 44mm wide and 17.5mm thick case… The price also remains eye-watering at $180,000. Good news for everyone who can afford it, it won’t be a limited edition.
🫳On hand
Our selection of the best reviews we stumble upon
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⚙️Watch Worthy
A look at an off beat, less known watch you might actually like
After eight years, the inaugural Ferdinand Berthoud calibre FB-T.FC that debuted in the FB1 has reached the end of the road. When the FB1 was launched in 2015, it represented one of the most earnest exercises in recreating a marine chronometer for the wrist. The calibre FB-T.FC is an appealingly anachronistic, tourbillon movement with a pillar construction, Maltese cross stopwork and a chain-and-fusée mechanism. But more than a portable museum of 18th century technical solutions, it was also finished to a remarkable degree. Today, the brand is giving a curtain call to the calibre FB-T.FC with the Chronomètre FB 2T.
⏲️Wait a minute
A bunch of links that might or might not have something to do with watches. One thing’s for sure - they’re interesting
As watch lovers, we learn to live with the fact that mechanical watches are imperfect objects and we cope with the fact that we will be losing seconds per day. But what is a second? This piece in Harper’s looks at the complicated science of a perfect second.
Watches and Wonders is starting in a few days so it’s always a good idea to remind ourselves what the watch brands introduced last year
A bit of a throwback, but I like sharing this article with friends who are looking to get into collecting watches and what mistakes to avoid
👀Watch this
One video you have to watch today
Deep down, we all know a Casio is our grail watch. How about you get one of these ten right now
💵Pre-loved precision
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We’re starting off with a bang! We’re giving away TWO of this year’s hottest watches:
THE TIFFANY PRX!
This is the PRX Powermatic 80 we’re giving away. Not this one obviously. But one just like it.