Frederique Constant Releases Best Looking Worldtimer; Bremont Gives Terra Nova A Bronze Case; Junghans' 1972 Chronoscope Sports; Seiko Launches Prospex Ladies Marine Sports; A Stunning Sarpaneva

Hey friends, welcome back to It’s About Time. You remember how I told you that there are heaps of releases that I’m still fighting to get through? Well, the heap has evaporated. We have a kind of a slow day today, but still not bad. Especially that Sarpaneva.

In this issue:

• Frederique Constant Teams Up With Watch Angels For Their Best Looking Worldtimer To Date

• Bremont Gives The Controversial Terra Nova A Warmer Bronze Case

• Junghans Doubles Down On Their 1970s Heritage With The 1972 Chronoscope Sports Edition 2025 Collection

• Seiko Launches New Prospex Ladies Marine Sports Collection

• Sarpaneva Teams Up With Cult Finnish Children’s Book, The Moomins, And Continues With Lume Artistry

👂What’s new

1/

Frederique Constant Teams Up With Watch Angels For Their Best Looking Worldtimer To Date

Frederique Constant isn’t a household name. Which is an incredible shame. Because for years, they have been able to offer a luxury experience and true in-house movements at a fraction of a price you would pay at so many other watch brands. Their approach to watchmaking is the complete opposite of everything that other brands are doing, and I love them for it. The best example of FC’s dedication to doing things their own way is Pim Koeslag, known for his legendary run as Technical Director at the company. While he has left FC and is now the majority owner of Christiaan van der Klaauw, while at FC he created 30 in-house calibers in 20 years. That’s impressive. And perhaps their most impressive watch for more than 10 years, since its introduction in 2012, has been the Classics Worldtimer Manufacture. Now, Frederique Constant has teamed up with Watch Angels, a community-driven, crown-funded manufacturer, to create a completely different take on the Worldtimer, one I really, really like.

The new Watch Angels x Frederique Constant Worldtimer Manufacture comes in a new case that shrinks down from the original. Instead of 42mm wide, the stainless steel case of the new watch measures 40.5mm wide and 13.4mm thick. On top is a domed sapphire crystal that seems to extend to the edges of the brushed and polished rounded case to give you a beautiful look inside. Water resistance is not great, but more than you would expect from such a non-sporty world timer — 50 meters.

The original Worldtimer Manufacture had a very disctinct dial, with a ring of cities on the periphery, a 24 hour disc and a painted map of the world in the centre. The original also has a hand-pointed date sub-dial at 6. This was a cool setup, with a lot of dimension and gravitas, but it also blocked any cities between 5 and 7 o’clock, which make it kind of hard to use. The new version gets rid of this issue, by ditching the date function. The dial is combination of stunning sunburst-finished centre and circular-grained blue elements. Also, the central disc features a slightly dramatic crosshairs. The original 24-hour disc is segmented into day and night, and they do the same here but without the use of two colors. Instead, they apply a gold-coloured sun and a silvered moon to the disc.

Inside, a very familiar movement — the same automatic calibre FC-718 that’s used in the regular Worldtimer. The only difference is that it doesn’t have a date function any more. It beats at 4Hz and has a 38 hour power reserve. You can see the movement through the caseback and check out the Côtes de Genève, blued screws and perlage. The watch comes on a black handmade calf leather strap closed with a folding buckle.

The new Watch Angels x Frederique Constant Worldtimer Manufacture is available now and limited to 718 pieces. Price is set at CHF 4,490, which is the same as the regular FC Worldtimer. See more on the Watch Angles website.

2/

Bremont Gives The Controversial Terra Nova A Warmer Bronze Case

Man, you have to give it Bremont for fighting. They’ve had a few rough years, to say the least. At one point, just two or three years ago, Bremont was the darling of the watch industry. They created clearly British watches that had an identity and an almost cult following. Then, last year and under a lot of influence from venture capital, they underwent a major shit. The founders left the company, they brought in a superstar CEO, completely rebranded the company, gave up on developing their in-house movement and came out with a bunch of new models that got a mild response to say the least. And it would be kind to say that they’ve been struggling a bit since the rebrand, trying to save what can be saved. One such attempt is this new collection of Terra Nova watches — the Terra Nova 40.5mm Date, the Terra Nova 42.5mm Chronograph, and the Terra Nova 40.5mm Turning Bezel Power Reserve — all in new bronze cases with bronze bracelets.

Actually, all three watches don’t get bronze cases, but rather cupro-aluminium cases, which are a alloy that has the same soft golden tone as bronze, but patinas in a more even manner unlike traditional bronze, which tends to oxidize unevenly with green and black splotches. Starting with the most basic of the three watches, we have the Date which measures 40.5mm wide, 11.11mm thick and has a 47mm lug-to-lug. On top is a domed sapphire crystal with a fixed bezel. Water resistance is 100 meters. Moving up, we have the Chronograph which measures 42.5mm wide and a solidly chunky 14.8mm thick. On top is once again a domed sapphire crystal that’s surrounded by a serrated bezel that has a black polished ceramic insert with an engraved compass. Last is the Turning Bezel Power Reserve which measures 40.5mm x 11.91mm and has a fully cupro-aluminium bi-directional bezel with a compass scale.

The dials also share a couple of details, including the new logo which hasn’t exactly been well recieved, and the large retro styled numerals. The date has a green gradient dial with a railway style minute track on the periphery. The numerals are made out of blocks of lume, an dmore lume can be found on the rose gold colored hour and minute hands. There’s also a date wheel at 3 o’clock. The Chronograph also features the same gradient dial, the same blume-block numerals and hands, only now you also get two sub-dials at 3 and 9 o’clock, with the date at 6. Last, the Turning Bezel Power Reserve has a brown gradient dial, with the same numerals and hands, while having a unique small seconds dial at 9 and a reserve indicator above 6 o’clock.

They all differ in movements, of course. The Date has the BE-36AE, which is a slightly modified Sellita SW220-1, which means that it beats at 4Hz and has a 38 hour power reserve. The Chronograph has the BE-50AV, which is the Sellita SW510BH a, beating at 4Hz and with a 56 hour power reserve. And last, the Turning Bezel Power Reserve has the BE-79AL, which is the Sellita SW279 which beats at 4Hz and has a 41 hour power reserve. All three watches can be had on matching bronze bracelets, or a selection of nubuck leather straps and NATO options.

The new Bremont Terra Nova Bronze collection is available now at a range of prices — the Date is priced at €3,900 on straps and €4,300 on the bracelet; the Chronograph at €6,400 on the straps and €6,850 on bracelets; and the Turning Bezel Power Reserve, which is limited to 100 pieces and comes only on the bronze bracelet, at €5,350. See more on the Bremont website.

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Junghans Doubles Down On Their 1970s Heritage With The 1972 Chronoscope Sports Edition 2025 Collection

Junghans is, perhaps, best known for their Max Bill line of super-minimalist watches. Or, perhaps, their slightly less minimalist oversized pilot’s chronographs. But one thing I like them for, is their line of sports watches that draw inspiration from the best of decades, the Seventies. As it turns out, Junghans was the Official Timekeeper for the 1972 Summer Olympic Games in Munich, and they still pay homage to the event with their 1972 Chronoscope collection. Now, we’re getting three new Chronoscopes for 2025, with a slight racing twist to the sports watch.

All three of the new watches feature the same case, cushion shaped and made out of brushed steel. The case measures 43.3mm wide and a comfortable 11.3mm thick. The width sounds huge, but look at those lugs. They are super short and sharply angled, which you know means this will be an easy carry due to the short lug-to-lug. Unfortunately, I couldn’t find the exact measurement for this watch, but I assume it’s 46mm based on other reviews I’ve seen. On top is a sapphire crystal, surrounded by a unidirectional bezel and water resistance is expected for a sports watch — 100 meters.

There are three version of the watch, all of them with a tri-compax setup. The base colors you can choose from are grey, white and blue, and they all feature a double racing stripe — either gold, orange or white — from 12 to 6. Speaking of 6, the numeral at 6 is oversized and placed into a circle, just like it would be if it were painted onto a side of a race car. You get two oval sub-dials at 3 and 9 o’clock and a simple running seconds hand with no background at 6. They include a date window at 4:30, but it’s so well integrated I didn’t even notice it until starting to write about the dial.

Inside, you’ll find why these chronographs are so unusually thin. That’s because it’s powered by the J645.83, a quartz movement produced by ETA. All three come on color matched rally-style perforated straps.

The new Junghans 1972 Chronoscope collection is limited to 200 pieces each and are priced at somewhere around €900. I say somewhere around because the watches are still not on the Junghans website, but the number is in line with previous and existing editions. See more on the Junghans website.

4/

Seiko Launches New Prospex Ladies Marine Sports Collection

If you can keep up with all the Seiko collections and sub-lines, you are much better at this game than me. But I get it, Seiko makes millions of watches and they cover the entire world. So, naturally, they will have a huge catalogue. The latest addition to ti is an interesting trio they call the Prospex Ladies Marine Sports. And the name is self explanatory — a sports watch with a naval theme aimed at women. But thanks to the lack of unnecessary precious stones, which one might expect from a “ladies” watch, this could work for anybody that’s looking for a very small watch.

The case of the Seiko Prospex Ladies Marine Sports sounds very good. It’s stainless steel with a LOT of brushed surfaces. It also measures 34mm wide, just 8.9mm thick and has a 40.8mm lug-to-lug. Like I said, very good. There’s also a two-tone option for a case which comes with a gold colored bezel and gold colored mid-links on the bracelet. On top is a curved sapphire crystal, surrounded by a plain polished bezel and water resistance is very good at 200 meters.

There are three colors you can choose for the dial. They are all mother-or-pearl dials, two which are white (one of which is paired with the two tone, meaning you also get gold colored hardware on the dial and hands), and one that has a blue tone. The applied hour markers are faceted, while the hands are filled with LumiBrite.

Inside is the in-house 6N01 quartz calibre, which has an accuracy rating of 15 seconds per month and a battery life of 3 days. The watches come on three-link steel bracelets that are closed with a three-fold clasp.

The new Prospex Ladies Marine Sports goes on sale in March. The price hasn’t been given for all territories yet, but we know that the price in the UK will be £640. See more on the Seiko website.

5/

Sarpaneva Teams Up With Cult Finnish Children’s Book, The Moomins, And Continues With Lume Artistry

For some kind of unknown reason to me, the Finnish book series Moomins became somewhat popular in Croatia as I was growing up. I don’t think they are still big here, but I distinctly remember having a lot of those books in kindergarten. The Moomins were black and white hippo characters that lived in a very colorful world, so the instant I saw that Finnish watchmaker Stepan Sarpaneva and his eponymous brand were collaborating with the Moomins, I knew the photos would be spectacular. And I wasn’t wrong. I knew it was going to be cool because Sarpaneva is best known for creating incredible shades of lume to paint pictures on dials in the dark. This is the new Sarpaneva Moomin 80, here to celebrate the 80th anniversary of the Moomins.

The watch comes in a case made out of high-grade Outokumpu stainless steel from Finland, and it measures 42mm wide, 11.4mm thick, with a very comfortable 46mm lug-to-lug measurement. You get that short l2l thanks to the super-stubby lugs, that look like organic continuations of the 6-sided case that almost looks like a cog. The case gets a combination of brushed and polished finishes and on top is a domed sapphire crystal. The crown is moved to 4 o’clock and water resistance is 100 meters.

There are two dial options available — a monochromatic and a colored one. While both are plenty colorful in the dark, as Sarpaneva uses ten different Super-LumiNova colours to illuminate the artwork, in the daylight one is fully black and white, while the other has a few great points of color. The dial is actually a beautiful recreation of an illustration from the 1946 book Comet in Moominland, with the Moomins sleeping beneath the night sky full of comets. The time is told simply — the hours are displayed on a crawling discs at 12 o’clock and the minutes are shown with a centrally-mounted hand.

All of this is powered by the relatively simple automatic Soprod A10 which beats at 4Hz, has a 42 hour power reserve and is modified to display the hours with a rotating disc. It’s also nice to look at with rhodium plating and a skeletonized steel winding mass with white gold weights featuring Sarpaneva’s signature Moonface. The watches can be had on a range of colored leather straps.

The Sarpaneva Moomin 80 is limited to 60 pieces (kind of a missed chance to go for the 80), 30 in each color. Price is set at €13,500, without tax. See more on the Sarpaneva website.

⏲️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

• One of the movies I enjoyed last year was Saturday Night, which tells the story of the few hours ahead of the first airing of the legendary Saturday Night Live in 1975. So I also enjoyed this article that explores what happens when Lorne Michaels, the visionary producer behind the show who is now 80, retires.

• I’m not an audiophile. Not by a long shot. And I’m glad I’m not because I know how expensive that can get. But I still like to have at least a decent pair of speakers to listen to music to. I also seem to be in the minority, as more and more people are quite content with listening to music on tinny bluetooth speakers. The Atlantic is going hard against BT speakers and even claims that they are ruining music.

• The Harvard Business Review is famous for publishing their case studies which break down complex businesses so that they are easily understandable. And they often pluck cases from popular culture to make the studies even more approachable. Of course, it was only a matter of time before they did a case study on Taylor Swift.

👀Watch this

One video you have to watch today

Haven’t seen a Brad Leone video in a while, and I forget how much I love his style. Also, those sandwiches look awesome.

Thanks for reading,
Vuk