Cartier Brings Back The Iconic Crash, This Time in Platinum, There Are Some Major Releases From Monta, Certina, Ming And Yema While Swatch Has A Crazy Story About The MoonSwatch

Hey friends, welcome back to It’s About Time. I just can’t get over how much of a mess Swatch is making with the MoonSwatch. But ignore me and enjoy this very packed edition.

The Hamilton giveaway was a hit. The winners have been contacted, I’ll announce their names once I get the word it’s OK to do so. Alas, here’s a new giveaway. Our last one in which we give away multiple watches. Hopefully we’ll have something new and great for next month. But for now, we’re giving away four Seiko 5 Sports SKX ‘Midi’ in a color of your choice! You know them, you live them. Invite your friends or fill out the survey to enter.

In this issue:

• Cartier Bings Back The Highly Coveted Crash, This Time In Platinum

• Monta Brings Back The Oceanking For A Third Generation In 2023

• Certina Shrinks Down The DS Action To 34.5mm, Gives It Black Or White Mother-of-Pearl Dials

• Ming Introduces The New 37.05 Moonphase Series 2 With A Truly Fantastic Glowing Night Sky

• Yema Shows Off The New Urban Traveller 2023 Collection With Affordable ’80s Flair

Today’s reading time: 8 minutes and 48 seconds

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👂What’s new

1/

Cartier Bings Back The Highly Coveted Crash, This Time In Platinum

For years, the Crash was a quirky vintage pice from Cartier. The 1967 original has found it’s way to many an auction, often getting great prices, but it was an insiders watch. If you knew, you knew. And then, some 6 or 7 years ago, Kanye West showed up at a fashion show wearing one and the world went crazy. At the time, Kanye was more of a rap icon and less a rambling antisemite, and suddenly everyone wanted a Crash. And everybody got one, driving the prices of vintage Crashes up to $1.5 million at auciton.

Cartier took notice of this sudden interest in their iconic but for years overlooked design, and did what any respectful company would do - they relaunched it in 2019 as an exclusive to their London boutique. It was a faithful recreation of the original Crash.

Now, four years later, Cartier is brining the Crash back, less as a recreation and more of a remake. The case is no longer yellow gold, but rather platinum, a material the original was never made in. It is, however, once again exclusive to the New Bond Street boutique. There are some slight modifications to the dial, as well, as well as an update to the internals. Unfortunately. They brand has replaced the Jaeger-LeCoultre with the tonneau-shaped, hand-wound cal. 1917 MC which can also be found in many recent Tank Louis Cartier and Asymétrique models.

This edition of the Cartier Tank will not be a limited edition in number, just in location where you can purchase it. And while £43,000 is a hell of a lot of money for a tiny time only watch, it is an absolute icon and there’s no doubt it will sell fantastically.

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Monta Brings Back The Oceanking For A Third Generation In 2023

This is not an old brand. Monta was founded in 2015 in St. Louis. And yet, it seems that we have been following the Monta story for much longer than that. They are a microbrand that mostly focuses on sports watches and you can see that in their lineup. But it’s most evident in the watch they started with, the Oceanking. Most people that own a Monta will tell you that these are well built watches and now they are updating their first model for the first time with the third generation of the Oceanking.

At first glance you might brush this watch off as a dupe of the Submariner. However, there are only so many ways you can build a diver. This one is 40.7mm wide, has a steel case, ceramic bezel and a splash of red text. You can imagine, then, how these specs would lead you to see a lot of Submariner in it. But it’s more than that and Monta claims that this update to the Oceanking has been two years in the making.

The 316L stainless steel case measures 40.7mm, 47.4mm and 11.7mm thick. These are similar specs to the second-gen Oceanking, but with the lug-to-lug shrunk by about 2mm. The dial has been refined, with enlarged hour markers that give it a cleaner and more legible look, with the hands also enlarged a tick. Like the previous Oceanking, there's a date window at six o'clock. There's a screw-down crown, making the Oceanking water-resistant to 300 meters.

Monta also claims that they have a huge update to the uni-directional ceramic bezel with 120 clicks. They say that they have submitted a patent method that employs three ball pushers. Inside ticks what Monta calls its M-22, but is in fact just a rebranded Selitta SW300. This is not a bad thing as the SW300 is a reliable and familiar movement that is easily servicable and gets 56 hours of power reserve.

Pre-orders for the new Monta Oceanking open on July 10, with a pre-order price of $2,225 and expected delivery in October 2023. After that, full retail will be $2,550. You can preorder on their website.

3/

Certina Shrinks Down The DS Action To 34.5mm, Gives It Black Or White Mother-of-Pearl Dials

Shrinking watches is all the rage today. For years people have complained that watches are becoming to big and bulky and, a bit surprisingly, a couple of brands listened. When those brands started selling smaller watches by the bucketload everybody paid attention and there’s a shrinking race out there now. Certina, however, might have taken it a bit too far, following the already welcomed shrink from 43mm to 38mm. They are now introducing their new line of Certina DS Action 34.5mm in five different colorways. I’m all for smaller watches to expand the number of people that can enjoy watches. But is 34.5mm too small for a diver? Maybe. Maybe not.

Despite being shrunk to 34.5mm, the DS Action Diver retains all of the characteristics of the largers models. It’s water resistant to 300 meters, has a ceramic bezel insert and is powered by the Swatch group-owned Powermatic 80. Among the five colorways are three steel and two bi-color references.

The steel versions are simple - white, blue and black dials with colour-matched ceramic bezel inserts. The dial layout is also that of a classic diver, with larger markers at the cardinal points, and circular indices elsewhere, with the exception of a date window at three o’clock. For those who are after a bit more bling, Certina’s got you covered with two PVD-coated, bi-colour designs with either black or white mother-of-pearl dials. The yellow gold highlights are plentiful, including the polished mid links, bezel, screw-down crown, hands, and dial appliques. You also get tiny diamonds in the circular markers.

You can get the Certina DS Action 34.5mm in stores now at a price of CHF 820 for the steel version and CHF 955 for the bi-colored mother-of-pearl version.

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Ming Introduces The New 37.05 Moonphase Series 2 With A Truly Fantastic Glowing Night Sky

In 2012 Ming introduced their first moonphase complication, called the 37.05. And it got the same reactions online as pretty much every Ming. It seemed to be evenly split between those who praised the watch for it’s stunning looks, while the rest panned it for being overpriced and brought up the issues we know Ming has - selling out super fast, having some mechanical issues with some models (which I believe the brand handled perfectly), their intolerance of abuse towards their employees and the fact that they are/were incredibly late with shipping out certain models.

Now, Ming is back with an update to the 37.05, which they are calling the Series 2 and have nicknamed the “Ad Astra”. They made a slew of tiny refinements, making use of their expanding proficiency with a variety of materials, and a rather ingenious use of high powered luminescent material.

The biggest change is the dial. Gone is the textured blue dial with a subtle moonphase indicator at the 6:00 position and it’s replaced by an anthracite dial with prominent brushed finishing. Star shaped holes have been added to the dial, which fill in with lume as the moonphase disc rotates underneath. The 37.05 still uses a sapphire upper dial, which is where you’ll find hour markers, the moon “mask” which is used to define the phase of the moon, as well as plenty of inlaid HyCeram lume to provide a bit of a light show when fully charged.

Like many Mings, the 37.05 Series 2 is powered by a Sellita, this one by a manually wound Sellita SW288-1, which is the same caliber used in the prior moonphase, and has been extensively reworked and decorated in the same fashion. The bridges have been skeletonized and anthracite coated for a moody, dark appearance when paired with the brushed rhodium train bridge.

The Ming 37.05 Series 2 carries a retail price of CHF 4,950, and is a limited edition of 500 pieces. Orders begin on July 11, with a 50% deposit required to secure a watch. Deliveries are expected to begin in the fourth quarter of 2023. Despite all of the hate they get, I still love Ming and this just might be my favorite moonphase at the moment. See more on their website.

5/

Yema Shows Off The New Urban Traveller 2023 Collection With Affordable ’80s Flair

The Yema Superman is a fan-favorite dive watch. The Navygraf line has some great looking GMT options and the Urban Field, as the name would suggest, is a fantastic retro take on the field watch. That’s all to say that Yema makes some very desirable watches. The same is true for the Urban collection, an everyday affordable steel watch that has been teased with two limited editions: the Wristmaster Traveller and the Wristmaster Micro-Rotor

Now the Urban Traveler is becoming a part of the permanent collection to add an accessible sporty-chic watch with an integrated bracelet to the already impressive lineup. The same case and bracelet were used the past limited editions. It’s an octagonal design that measures 39mm wide and 11.4mm thick. You get 100 meter water resistance and an alternating brushed and polished finish. It is topped by a bezel inspired by a Sous-Marine quartz model from the 1980s and is made from a single piece of stainless steel.

The Urban Traveller features textured dials. A stylised honeycomb pattern has been embossed on a plate that is available in silvery-white with darkened hands and applied markers, in light blue or in light salmon – these two feature silvered markers and hands as well as a white seconds hand. A no-date watch, the dial remains sleek and legible.

For this price point, you’ll be shocked when you find out what’s inside. It’s the YEMA2000, an in-house automatic movement made in France. The brand relies on their own creation instead of the ever present ETA and Sellita’s. Don’t expect this to mean that their movement is somehow superior to those used in other watches, but it’s still an impressive feat. The brand says it has optimised some of the parts for better accuracy, resulting in a reported accuracy of +/- 10 seconds per day. The movement beats at 4Hz and stores up to 42h of power reserve.

Now available from, the new Yema Urban Traveller collection is priced at EUR 870. If you’re shopping for an integrated bracelet sports watch in this price range, maybe look at Yema before you go for the Tissot PRX? Read more on Yema’s website.

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Swatch Has Really Lost The Plot, You’ll Want To Read Their Explanation For The New MoonSwatch Moonshine Gold Strawberry Moon Of June 

Last month, when Swatch introduced their second version of the MoonSwatch Moonshine Gold, I said I won’t be reporting on them any more, because I found it simply insane that the largest watch company in the world would make a big deal about releasing watches with a gold chrono hand based on when the moon was full. But they just topped that and went full crazy.

I like the MoonSwatch. Yes, it’s a plastic, overpriced toy, but I also believe to be it to be the best marketing move of the decade. If Swatch didn’t mess up the release so much. After more than a year and a half, the MoonSwatch is still not able to keep up with demand, they sell out quickly in stores, you can’t buy them online and if you want one, you will most likely have to fork up a premium to a reseller. Which is, arguably, completely idiotic.

So, instead of ensuring that they could make enough MoonSwatches that people actually want to make, Swatch has doubled down on the Moonshine Gold versions that they only produce and sell during a full moon. Like anybody cares… It looks like the folks at Swatch care about the moon because they named their latest model the MoonSwatch Moonshine Gold Strawberry Moon Of June. Watch names are often too long. But this is just ridiculous. If we count the preposition “of” as a word, almost 43% of the words in that name are “moon”. If we don’t count “of” as a word, 50% of the words are “moon”.

Putting aside the wacky name, this latest version comes with a Moonshine Gold chronograph hand like the previous two, but now Swatch also printed little strawberries on it as well. It looks cute and fun, but will make your head explode from frustration when you hear why it has the strawberries.

They serve as a nod to the Strawberry Moon of June, a nickname to the full moon of June. According to NASA, “The Maine Farmers’ Almanac began publishing Indian names for full Moons in the 1930s, and these names are now widely known and used. Ok, that’s bizarre enough on it’s own. The bigger problem? Swatch timed the launch of the Swatch MoonSwatch Moonshine Gold Strawberry Moon Of June… IN JULY. They try to justify that by claiming that the watch was MADE during the Strawberry Moon, but that just sounds completely insane… Someone please check on the people at Swatch. Are you ok?

🫳On hand

Our selection of the best reviews we stumble upon

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A review of the relatively new Holgar Blue & Gold Sport Automatic 44mm

2/

Spending time with the Glashütte Original SeaQ Panorama Date, a Teutonic take on a diver

3/

Hands-On with the Black DLC Citizen Promaster Mechanical Diver 200m NB6025-59H

⚙️Watch Worthy

A look at an off beat, less known watch you might actually like

Exploring the History and Durability of the Marathon TSAR

The TSAR’s tough and utilitarian vibe is evident at first glance. It’s got a 14mm thick, fully brushed, slab sided case that manages to feel heftier than it is with a very toothy 120-click bezel designed to be easy to operate even with gloves on in arctic waters. Its beefy 20mm lugs are drilled for easy strap and bracelet changes, and like the bezel, its oversized, knurled screw-down crown is designed to be very easy to use. The screw down steel caseback is etched with all sorts of information about the watch and can provide a bit of bathroom reading; otherwise there isn’t much more to say here.

⏲️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

• Today’s reading list will be all old articles, it just so happened. I hope you don’t mind. First off, three years ago the city I live in was shaken up by a fairly strong earthquake. While scary, it was fascinating to feel the earth move so much beneath your feet. That was a 5.3 quake. I can’t even imagine what a truly strong earthquake feels like. Which makes this piece on the earthquake that will destroy a sizable portion of the coastal Northwest extra scary.

• We have been promised a future in which artificial meat will be as good and as cheap as regular meat. However, splashy headlines have long overshadowed inconvenient truths about biology and economics. Now, extensive new research suggests the industry may be on a billion-dollar crash course with reality.

• Carried away by love—for risk and for each other—two of the world's best freedivers went to the limits of their sport. Only one came back.

👀Watch this

One video you have to watch today

One of the greatest modern conspiracy theories is not about UFOs, secret assassinations or shadow governments. It is, in fact, cantered around glitter. Glitter, one would think. is a huge global market. And yet, only two companies produce all the glitter in the world. Both are located in New Jersey and both are extremely secretive. They won’t ever reveal how glitter is made and they certainly won’t ever say who they sell the glitter to. With every reply, they are brining more suspicion to the question - who is buying that much glitter that their name has to be protected better than the Roswell UFO landing. This YouTube investigation attempts to uncover what’s going on and finds some shocking results.

💵Pre-loved precision

Buy and sell your watches. Think of this section like old school classifieds - i don’t guarantee anything except that a bunch of people will see your ad and I’ll put the buyer and seller in touch. Want to advertise your watch? Contact us 

• LOOKING TO BUY: One of our readers is looking to purchase three very specific watches: an Islander ISL-133 Mother of Pearl, a Sinn 556 Mother of Pearl or a Zelos 300m GMT Mosaic Mother of Pearl. If you’re selling any of these, reach out to us and we’ll put you in touch

• FOR SALE: Longines Heritage Skin Diver, box and papers. €1400. Reach out to us and we’ll put you in touch

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