Jaeger-LeCoultre Unveils Polaris Chrono With Fantastic Lacquered Dials, Alpina Gets A Worldtimer Startimer And A Art Deco-Inspired Square Watch, New Watches From Angelus, Czapek, Chaykin, Sylvain Pinaud And Trilobe

Hey friends, welcome back to It’s About Time. Geneva Watch Days is winding down, but there’s still a bunch of weird looking and extremely expensive watches to get through, so bear with me.

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In this issue:

• Jaeger-LeCoultre Gives The Polaris Chronograph A New Movement And Great Looking Lacquered Dials

• Alpina Introduces A Worldtimer To Their Startimer Pilot Collection, Adds The Heritage Carrée Automatic 140 Years To The Permanent Collection

• Angelus Releases The Chronodate Titanium Storm Blue Edition

• Czapek & Cie Partners With German Master Watchmaker Bernhard Lederer For Complicité, A Dual-Regulator Watch with Differential

• Konstantin Chaykin Brings Together Russian Folklore, Western Pop Culture And High End Watchmaking With The Kolobok

• The Chronograph Monopoussoir Sylvain Pinaud X Massena LAB Transforms From A Piece Unique To A Super Limited Series

• Trilobe Unveils The Nuit Fantastique Brume With A Guilloché Dial

Today’s reading time: 10 minutes and 38 seconds

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👂What’s new

1/

Jaeger-LeCoultre Gives The Polaris Chronograph A New Movement And Great Looking Lacquered Dials

The revival of the Polaris model in 2018 must have been one of the best moves Jaeger-LeCoultre has done in the past few decades. With it they opened themselves up to a completely new demographic with sporty and elegant timepieces that reach deep into JLC history for inspiration. And among the Polaris models, the Chronograph seems to be the most popular. Now Jaeger-LeCoultre is revealing two updates to the model, with brand new dials and a new movements.

The core design of the watch remains unchanged. It still comes in a steel case measuring 42mm wide and 13.4mm thick. It’s a simple vintage-inspired design, with a mix of brushed and polished finishes, taut lines, a thin bezel, sharp lugs, with a large crown that is a clear homage to the old Polaris models of the 60s, and a box style crystal.

Previous versions of the Polaris Chronograph came with black and blue sunray brushed dials. This update gets two new thickly lacquered dials (35 layers of hand-applied clear lacquer alone), adding a lot of depth to the textured and sunburst sections of the dial. The high-gloss gradient lacquer dials are framed by an opaline tachymeter chapter ring. The two colors are a warm grey and a deep blue, both with a panda look with contrasting matte black-grained subdials and orange accents that lean into the sportier heritage of the Polaris.

There’s also an update on the inside. You get the automatic Jaeger-LeCoultre 761 movement with a 65-hour power reserve. Like the very similar caliber 751, you still get hours, minutes, small seconds, a chronograph with a 30-minute counter and central seconds indication, and a column wheel. It also looks fantastic through the rear sapphire crystal as well. The warm gray Polaris chronograph comes on a great looking matching textile strap or a black rubber strap, while the blue features the brushed and polished stainless steel bracelet or blue rubber strap.

The new Jaeger LeCoultre Polaris Chronographs are priced at $14,300 USD for warm gray(reference Q902843J) on straps, and $14,800 USD for blue (ref. Q902818) on steel with a rubber strap. See more on the brand’s website.

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Alpina Introduces A Worldtimer To Their Startimer Pilot Collection, Adds The Heritage Carrée Automatic 140 Years To The Permanent Collection

I’ve gone on record that I have some trouble with the Alpina watch brand, as I instantly think either skis or cars. Watches are not my first association to the word Alpina. But slowly, with every new release, they are growing on me. At Geneva Watch Days they just introduced two new models on either side of the spectrum - the Startimer Pilot Quartz Worldtimer and the Alpina Heritage Carrée Mechanical 140 Years.

Starting off with the Startimer, this is a modern, tough pilot’s watch. This is the first time that the Startimer collection gets a world time complication and what you do get is a case that measures 41mm wide and 11.5mm thick with hours, minutes, seconds, GMT, and a world timer. There’s no details on whether or not it's a caller or flyer GMT, just like there’s not much information on the AL-255 quartz movement that powers it. It comes in three colorways - an army green dial, a blue dial or a black dial with blue and red internal rings for the 24 hour time track.

Despite being quartz watches, these are priced more like a quartz Breitling than a quartz Casio. The green and blue dialed versions that come on bracelets sell for $1,095, while the black comes on a black calf leather strap with white stitching for $995.

The second addition from Alpina is the introduction of the Alpina Heritage Carrée Mechanical 140 Years to the regular lineup. Earlier this year, Alpina introduced the Art Deco inspired Heritage Carrée Mechanical 140 Years but in a run limited to 14 white and 14 black watches. The run was limited by the number of restored vintage Alpina AL-490 hand-wound movements from 1938 that they decided to install in them.

After those pieces were very well received, Alpina decided to give the watch a modern movement, their AL-530 automatic based on the Sellita SW261 calibre, give it a few tweaks and make it a permanent offering in their lineup. There are two color options, but both come with a polished stainless steel case (instead of silver you got in the vintage-powered version) that measures 32.5mm x 39 mm and 9.71 mm in height. This is slightly larger than the previous version which measured 29.5mm x 35.7mm. You get 30 meters of water resistance, an exhibition case back and a domed sapphire crystal, along with a light brown Ostrich leather strap.

The two different versions of the watch refer to the dial colors - either black or silver. The black dial has beige Arabic numerals, hour and minute hands and a railroad minute track, along with a round small seconds sub-dial at 6 o’clock. The silver dial is two-tone (sector vibe) with black Arabic numerals, hands and minute track, but also a beige rectangle surrounding the numerals and solid rectangular small seconds sub-dial at 6 o’clock. Both have Alpina’s classic font for the logo, which fits the watches perfectly.

Either version is being sold for $1,595 but the black dial will not be sold in the United States. You can see both watches on Alpina’s website.

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Angelus Releases The Chronodate Titanium Storm Blue Edition

It might not be a household name today, but Angelus has been making watches since 1891. Anglus today makes contemporary, well-made sports watches but from time to time they dip back into their rich history for inspiration. For example, the Angelus Chronodate, introduced in 2022, is a direct tribute to the 1942 Chronodate model - a bi-compax chronograph featuring a central pointer date. At this year’s Geneva Watch Days Angelus introduced a new colorway to the collection - a storm blue dial.

This watch comes in a 42.5mm wide satin-finished titanium case with carbon-composite parts. The dial is a light blue with black subdials and has large numerals painted in Super-LumiNova. Like the 1942 model, the date is printed on the inner outside flange and pointed to with a slender hand with a red tip.

Inside the watch is the brand’s Calibre A-500 movement, that plased in a container of carbon-fibre composite with an innovative attachment system characterized by an intricately open-worked cradle that seamlessly integrates the case middle and lugs into a singular visual harmony, each component fashioned from lightweight yet durable titanium. The movement has a column wheel mechanism and an oscillating weight in the form of the brand’s logo letter A with a star above it. You can get the watch on a titanium bracelet or black rubber strap.

If you go of the bracelet, it will cost you CHF 24,900, while on rubber it drops down a bit to CHF 22,900. If you want more info, go to their website.

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Czapek & Cie Partners With German Master Watchmaker Bernhard Lederer For Complicité, A Dual-Regulator Watch with Differential

German master watchmaker Bernhard Lederer is pretty well known for his Central Impulse Chronometer featuring two overlapping oscillators, and the highlighting feature of the 2023 iterations is also their unique double escapement component dating to the 1930s­. Now the legendary watchmaker has teamed up with Czapek & Cie to create two new models just unveiled at the Geneva Watch Days - the Place Vendôme Complicité in Harmony Blue and Stardust.

This watch is an iteration of Czapek & Cie’s Quai des Bergues and Place Vendôme, but instead of placing subdials at 7.30 and 4.30 , the new Complicité replaces them with independent balance wheels. The dial has a pyramidal composition, with the double escapements and a differential connecting them located at 12 o’clock.

The satin brushed flange and index ring contrasts with the matt grainé baseplate. Both iterations run on the in-house Calibre 8, visible at the caseback; manually wound to beat at 21,600vph, offering upto 72-hour power reserve. Made of 293 parts, the movement also has two sapphire bridges embedded with six rubies set in gold chatons.

Adding some linearity to the dial are the skeletal sword-shaped hour and minute hands, with the sweeping seconds hand. Colourwise, the watch comes in two variations. The Harmony Blue comes in an 18-karat rose gold case with a deep sapphire blue dial, while the Stardust has a white gold case and a grey dial. The hands and Super-LumiNova-filled hour markers match the slim bezel and the respective 41.8mm cases.

Czapek will also make a unique piece of the Place Vendôme Complicité to be auctioned at Only Watch 2023. It comes in steel, and its dial is encircled by a champlevé enamel ring in the colours of Only Watch 2023.

The Czapek Complicité comes on an alligator leather strap with a gold pin buckle. The watch is released in two limited editions of 50 pieces each. It will be priced at CHF 85,000. See more on the brand’s website.

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Konstantin Chaykin Brings Together Russian Folklore, Western Pop Culture And High End Watchmaking With The Kolobok

For years now the greatest Russian watchmaker Konstantin Chaykin has been making Wristmons, what he calls wrist monsters, watches with anthropomorphic dials. These monsters drew inspiration from pop-culture, like the Joker, from fairly tales, like the Mouse King and from holiday staples, like the Santa watch. His latest release presented at Geneva Watch Days is the Kolobok, inspired by a beloved character in Russian-speaking regions, often referred to as "the little round bun."

‍Kolobok, the chief protagonist of the Russian fairy tale, is a lively bun baked by his grandparents. He embarks on a daring journey, encountering a tricky rabbit, a cunning wolf, and a menacing bear, all aiming to devour him. Yet, Kolobok's cleverness prevails each time. The heart of the well-known Russian narrative lies in Kolobok's recurring song about eluding those who pursued him. However, the tale has a twist; a sly fox appears ultimately deceiving and consuming the brave bun.

Chaykin envisioned Kolobok as a potential ancestor of the smiley face. The watch's pupils, acting as hour and minute indicators have been enlarged and painted blue against a glossy white background. The nose resembles a dough ball and the curved dial echoes the plumpness of dough, just like the ruddy crust of warm, freshly baked bread. To achieve this effect, Chaykin has carefully crafted a gradient, with the dial turning lighter towards the centre. Mother-of-pearl dust has infused the dial with a soft radiance. The smile serves as the moonphase and the day of the week indicator.

‍The 40 mm stainless steel case of the watch holds the K.18-20 caliber, an automatic movement, based on a modified Swiss-made ETA 2892-A2, with a proprietary module. A gilded rotor, composed of 15 parts, visible through the sapphire crystal caseback, is not something you see every day. The watch comes on an alligator leather strap, featuring lively yellow details, secured by a stainless steel buckle.

‍The Konstantin Chaykin Kolobok Wristmon watch will be produced as a limited edition of 99 pieces. The price is 18,800 CHF. See more on the Chaykin website.

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The Chronograph Monopoussoir Sylvain Pinaud X Massena LAB Transforms From A Piece Unique To A Super Limited Series

William Massena of Massena LAB seems to be living the dream life of a watch enthusiast. His collaborations with the most prestigious brands in the watch world are now part of horological role and he is equally as comfortable in helping create sub $1,000 watches as he is those in the tens of thousands. Massena is also an enthusiastic collector so he will work with watchmakers to create unique pieces. This was his exact thinking when he approached legendary independent watchmaker and GPHG winner Sylvain Pinaud to create a piece unique based on Pinaud’s existing Monopoussoir Chronograph movement.

Massena wanted to place the movement into a new platform with a slightly more classically designed 42mm titanium case. However, this is obviously not a classical watch - it has a sapphire crystal ring between the polished bezel and centre case that reveals a ton of details of the openworked dial. The pusher for the chronograph is integrated into the crown and to provide a touch of contrast against the rest of the case, the lugs are grained

This watch created enough interest that Massena and Pinaud are now releasing a limited run of the same watch of just 10 pieces.

The movement, crafted by Pinaud, is hand wound, and features an integrated column wheel and horizontal clutch, which can be started, stopped, and rest all via the single button nestled discreetly within the crown at 3 o’clock. The dial plate is placed at the top portion of the dial, and is produced by Comblémine SA, the dial manufacturer owned by Kari Voutilainen. An hour and minute hand track time within this sub dial of sorts, while a large timing seconds hand is mounted at the dial’s center. The running seconds and an oversized 45 minute totalizer are placed below the centerline.

This is a highly exclusive watch in both execution and limited nature. As such, it commands a high price - CHF 130,000. But there is no doubt in my mind it will find loyal buyers. See more details on the Massena LAB website.

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Trilobe Unveils The Nuit Fantastique Brume With A Guilloché Dial

The Parisian indie Trilobe is known for their seemingly simple watches that are perfect representations of quiet luxury, the fashion trend that people at large seem to have discovered just now after watching Succession. Now Trilobe is adding another subdued model to the lineup, the Nuit Fantastique Brume a wonderfully complex watch with an incredible guilloché dial.

This new version of the Nuit Fantastique, their flagship collection, has a dial completely devoid of the Trilobe name, only keeping the graphical logo, which doubles as the hour marker. The dial plate merges two time-honored techniques — the Clous de Paris guilloché and the Grain d’Orge guilloché. These distinct, detailed patterns are expertly engraved using a manual rose engine machine.

The base of the dial shows a splendid Grain d’Orge structure, marked by its elegant interwoven curves. Within the seconds disc, the Clous de Paris pattern emerges, a refined arrangement of straight-line engravings that offers a stark contrast to the Grain d’Orge etchings. According to Trilobe, the dial’s fixed section and the hour ring carry a taupe shade, a color that “dances between gray and brown.”

The Trilobe Nuit Fantastique Brume is available in two sizes — 38.5mm and 40.5mm in diameter, with both cases being 9.2mm thick. The case is crafted from lightweight Grade 5 titanium, but you can also get the larger size in 18k rose gold.

Inside the watch is a self-winding mechanical movement with a micro-rotor, called the X-Centric caliber. The proprietary mechanism is conceptualized by Trilobe and manufactured by hand in La Chaux-de-Fonds by Le Cercle des Horlogers and it is perfectly decorated. The micro-blasted bridges and plates undergo frosting to attain a delicate grain effect in the brass, subsequently electroplated to a black finish.

Both sizes in titanium have a price of €13,000, and the 40.5mm rose gold version will sell for €25,000. For more information, visit the Trilobe website.

🫳On hand

Our selection of the best reviews we stumble upon

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A review of the Citizen Promaster Dive Automatic Fujitsubo NB6025-59H

2/

Hands on with the Casio Oceanus Manta OCW-S6000SW-2A

⚙️Watch Worthy

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

The Nordic Marine Instruments Østersøen is no ordinary diver

The first thing you notice when you take the watch out of the box is what NMI calls MØRK Finishing, which employs diamond paste to polish the metal and achieve mirror-like surfaces with minimal distortion that appear black at certain angles. As you can imagine, the light plays nicely between the polished and brushed surfaces. The case measures 40mm wide, 48mm long, and just under 12mm thick. A steel bezel gives a uniform look to the Østersøen, and it moves with firm, precise clicks. I really like the contrast of the brushed case and bracelet links with the Mørk-polished chamfers, particularly that sharp mirror flash inside the lugs.

⏲️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

• Why we fight is a bracing, powerful roundhouse kick of a personal essay that swings between a martial-arts sparring session and a fraught partnership—each brutally taxing in different ways. Spare and blunt, but all the more affecting for it.

• Esquire is slowly making their way back after a bit of a slump in quality, and one such example is this piece titled Chuck Palahniuk Is Not Who You Think He Is. It’s not the first Palahniuk piece you’ve read, but Jonathan Russell Clarks threads a nice line between profile and criticism—steeping himself in the novelist’s oeuvre before meeting with him, then using Palahniuk’s latest book to guide the conversation while also allowing space to bounce his own reads off the man.

• With smuggled cell phones and a handful of accomplices, Arthur Lee Cofield, Jr., took money from large bank accounts and bought houses, cars, clothes, and gold. This is a fantastic read.

👀Watch this

One video you have to watch today

Between 2005 and 2009 I walked every morning to 730 Broadway for classes at the Tisch School of the Arts. The building right across the street was repurposed into studios and offices. It was a great looking space and I would go up there to visit a guy I knew. I always like the atmosphere of these studios. A couple of years later, a couple of blocks south, a group of people rented very similar studio space at 368 Broadway. Turns out, these people changed what modern films look like.

💵Pre-loved precision

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