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Maurice Lacroix Updates Pontos Chronograph

Maurice Lacroix unveils the latest version of its popular Pontos Chronograph with the new  Pontos S Chronograph, a sporty-elegant duo with dominant chronograph sub-dials along the vertical axis and a slim, almost retro ceramic tachymeter bezel.

The new Maurice Lacroix Pontos S Chronograph.

With two new sandblasted white or dark blue dials, the new look is somewhat sportier than earlier editions but retains the collection’s touch of class.

You’ll now find a day-date indicator at 3 o’clock rather than the date at 6 o’clock on this new Pontos chronograph, while the small seconds sub-dial is still at 9 o’clock.

However, note the almost panda-like contrast with the newly styled chronograph indicators and the very sharp dial finishing here. Maurice Lacroix has purposefully endowed both with sandblasted sub-dial centers framed by snailed measuring tracks. A choice of faceted hour markers adds a retro feel to the dial as well.

Maurice Lacroix retains the Pontos collection’s existing design elements, namely its elongated pushers, double-stepped lugs, and a satin-brushed and polished 43mm steel case. 

On the back the wearer can spy the back of the ETA-based automatic ML112 chronograph caliber, decorated with a combination of Côtes de Genève, perlage and sun-brush finishes.

The watchmaker is supplying the new Pontos S Chronograph with a color-coordinated M-branded nylon strap lined with nubuck leather. The watch is also available with a three-row steel bracelet. Owners can also swap between the strap or bracelet without the need for tools.

Prices: $3,250 (silver-white or dark blue sandblasted dial with stainless steel bracelet.

$3,100 (nylon strap) or $3,380 (special package with steel bracelet & nylon strap).

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Alpina

Alpina Re-Sizes its Regulator

Alpina relaunches its Extreme Regulator, first seen in 2005, with a new dial and a smaller cushion-shaped case.

Alpina’s new Alpiner Extreme Regulator.

The new model, which debuts this week at Geneva Watch Days, is called the Alpiner Extreme Regulator and is now set in a more widely appealing 41mm steel case, considerably smaller than the 48mm case of the initial model and the 45mm size of more recent examples.

The Regulator was considered a flagship model when Alpina launched it as the Avalanche Extreme Regulator seventeen years ago. But even with a new size, the latest model evokes a similar assertive, modern appeal. 

Behinds its regulator display of separate hours, minutes and seconds hands, the new Alpiner Extreme Regulator maintains its adventure-focused mission with a thick screw-in crown and caseback, and a strong 200-meter water resistance rating.

Strong Dial

Likewise, the dial projects strength. Alpina’s triangle logo is employed as a grid across the dial, symbolizing Alpine peaks. The grey pattern captures light, creating a more visually compelling dial than the initial models, on which the logo decorated only the center of the dial. Alpina adds even more visual texture with the case finish, which is nicely brushed, with polished corners.

Atop the grey ‘peaks,’ Alpina places highly luminescent hands in an almost typical regulator layout, with a large central minutes hand and separate hour and seconds subdial.

The hour subdial on regulator clock dials is classically positioned along the central axis at the top or bottom. Alpina however positions the hour subdial between the 9 o’clock and 11 o’clock positions, focusing the eye more clearly toward the minutes hand.   

Inside the Alpiner Extreme Regulator Automatic Alpina retains its time-tested automatic ETA-based AL-650 caliber, the movement that powered the 2005 Regulator.

Alpina’s choice to host a regulator dial within its bedrock collection has long set the Geneva brand apart from many watchmakers offering affordably priced Swiss sports watches.

The choice to revive the regulator is equally courageous, especially given the regulator’s niche appeal among collectors, especially at this price range. But at first glance, Alpina’s update, with its appealing new case size and terrific dial design, offers more than enough well-considered change to meet that challenge. 

Alpina is limiting the Alpiner Extreme Regulator Automatic to 888 pieces. Price: $2,195.  

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The Watches

Frederique Constant’s Change of Heart

Frederique Constant unveils a new look for its Classics Heart Beat Manufacture collection, revealing a new dial, new indexes and a retro 39mm case.

The Frederique Constant Classics Heart Beat Manufacture in a 39mm steel case. The new design is also offered with a pink gold case.

Perhaps the most notable change in the new design, which debuts this week during Geneva Watch Days,  is how the Geneva-based watchmaker is exposing the watch’s escapement, or ‘Heart Beat.’

Rather than the ‘comma-shaped’ aperture at the 12 o’clock position that characterized the dial of the Heart Beat collection since 2004, the new collection erases the comma in favor of a true circle that is now positioned at the 6 o’clock position.

The first Frederique Constant Heart Beat models in 1994 quickly became a signature design for what was then a young watchmaking company. The look has been emblematic for the company in the years since, and Frederique Constant has used the design to introduce its FC-910 manual-wind manufacture caliber in 2004, as well as its FC-930, the watchmakers’ first automatic caliber, a few years later.

Original size

The aperture update is only one aspect the Heart Beat’s redesign. A 39mm case size is a return to the original dimension of the Heart Beat Manufacture models, which have been offered in larger sizes in recent years. And the 2022 collection also boasts more classical Roman numerals on the dial, paired with thinner indexes.

Frederique Constant notes that the new, subtler indexes overlay a lacquered white dial and are paired with traditional railway markers, echoing watches of the early 20th century.  Finally, Frederique Constant revives the same hand design it used in 2004, with a slender leaf shape for the minutes and “heart” hand for the hours.

The onion crown on the watch, which will be retained on the new collection, winds an automatic FC-930-3 manufacture caliber, which offers a thirty-eight hour power reserve. Frederique Constant decorates the movement with fine pearling and Côtes de Genève stripes, visible through the open caseback.

Frederique Constant is offering the new Classics Heart Beat Manufacture, in two limited series’. The first is cased in pink gold on a brown alligator strap and limited to 93 pieces ($17,995). The second is made of steel on a black alligator strap and limited to 930 pieces ($4,395).  Availability is in December 2022

 

 

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Oris

Oris Launches Divers Sixty-Five With Caliber 400

Oris fits its acclaimed Caliber 400 into a full production Divers Sixty-Five model for the first time as the independent Swiss watchmaker launches the new Divers Sixty-Five 12 Hour Calibre 400.

The new Oris Divers Sixty-Five 12 Hour Caliber 400.

Oris this week also debuts a new Aquis Date series with brightly hued mother-of-pearl dials, available on a steel bracelet. Oris debuted both nautical-themed watches during this week’s Geneva Watch Days, a late summer watch show in Geneva that runs through September 1.

Long reserve

As an in-house movement with a long power reserve, the Oris Caliber 400 series is one of the few in-house Swiss automatic movements boasting a long power reserve (five days). It’s inclusion here also means the new watch, in addition to the long power reserve, offers the caliber’s elevated levels of anti-magnetism, a ten-year warranty and ten-year recommended service intervals.

Adding a Caliber 400 series movement to models within the Divers Sixty-Five collection extends the availability of the movement’s heightened features to one of the watchmaker’s most popular collections. Oris has already placed a Caliber 400 series movement into several of its bedrock collections, including within larger Aquis Date watches and within the ProPilot X collection.

But as the name of the new watch implies, Oris has also added a 12-hour bi-directional rotating bezel, which means this new black-dialed model is also the first Divers Sixty-Five offering a second time zone indicator bezel.

The new watch also boasts a sapphire crystal case back and the choice of either a leather strap or metal bracelet. Prices: $3,500 (leather strap) and $3,700 (steel bracelet). 

A trio of additions to the Oris Aquis Date 36.5mm Collection.

New dials

Oris is also introducing a trio of new Aquis Date 36.5 mm models with colorful mother-of-pearl dials. 

The shimmering dials, in Blush Pink, Aegean Blue and Seafoam Green, are both eye-catching and apparently on trend, given the success of pastel and blue dials among many other watchmakers in recent months.

The trio also enhances the smaller-diameter offering within the Oris Aquis Date collection, which primarily offers larger-cased options.

All Aquis Date 36.5 mm models are water resistant to 300 meters and are equipped with Sellita-based automatic Oris Caliber 733.

Prices: $2,400 (steel bracelet only). 

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The Watches

TAG Heuer Launches Blue and White Aquaracer

TAG Heuer continues to update its Aquaracer Professional 300 collection with a new blue, yellow and white GMT edition that offers a hyper-clean, highly visible model to this serious dive series.

The new 43mm-steel-cased TAG Heuer Aquaracer Professional 300 GMT.

TAG Heuer says its designers opted for the ocean-hued color scheme to “represent the sky, the sun, the water and the crashing waves near the shore.” 

The dial on the new 43mm-steel-cased TAG Heuer Aquaracer Professional 300 GMT retains the collection’s signature horizontal lines, here in dark blue, which makes the white luminous hands and markers all the more visible. Yellow comes in to the picture via the rhodium-plated central seconds hand, which has a yellow lacquer tip, and a yellow GMT hand.

TAG Heuer excels with it bezels, and this model’s two-color bi-directional rotating ceramic bezel underscores that sentiment. Set with a 24-hour GMT scale, the markers are engraved into the ceramic and then filled with contrasting colors: black for day time and white for night.

Note the detail where the numerals 18 and 6 seamlessly which cross the point where the blue and white ceramic meet.

In addition to signature fluted, 12-sided Aquaracer bezel and the generous luminosity, the watch’s dive specifications echo those found in earlier Professional 300 models, namely a screwed and protected crown, 300 meters of water resistance, a sapphire crystal, and a double safety clasp.

Like other TAG Heuer Aquaracer Professional 300 GMT models, this new edition features a steel back decorated with a repeating hexagon motif and the ‘scaphander’ diving suit, first seen on the 2004 Aquaracer.Inside, TAG Heuer fits its Caliber 7 automatic movement, with a power reserve of fifty hours.

TAG Heuer will offer the new Aquaracer Professional 300 GMT on either a stainless steel metal bracelet or on a deep midnight blue rubber strap to match the dial and bezel. Both feature an ergonomic fine adjustment system. 

Prices: $3,500 (rubber strap) and $3,800 (steel bracelet).

 

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