• It's About Time
  • Posts
  • TAG Makes Beautiful Glassbox With Bizarre Movement, Panerai Expands SEALs Collection, Breitling Shrinks Navitimer To 36mm, Seiko's New Presage Sharp Edged Is Stunning And Laco's New Quartz

TAG Makes Beautiful Glassbox With Bizarre Movement, Panerai Expands SEALs Collection, Breitling Shrinks Navitimer To 36mm, Seiko's New Presage Sharp Edged Is Stunning And Laco's New Quartz

What an incredible lineup of heavy hitter watches from major watchmakers

Hey friends, welcome back to It’s About Time. We get a day’s rest from the Blancpain X Swatch today. Yesterday was one of the best read days for this newsletter, which tells me that we could expect huge lines tomorrow when they go on sale. Until then, here’s some new watches from TAG Heuer, Panerai, Breitling, Seiko and Laco. What a lineup.

Want to win the Seiko Prospex Diver GMT? Invite your friends or fill out the survey to enter right now as the giveaway ends today (for real).

In this issue:

  • TAG Heuer Teams Up With With Porsche To Turn The Glassbox Into One Of The Best Looking Modern Carreras With The Weirdest Movement

  • Panerai Expands Their Navy SEALs Collection With Five New Models And Starts Selling Them Internationally

  • Breitling Releases 36mm And 32mm Versions Of The Legendary Navitimer

  • Seiko Introduce Presage ‘Laurel’ 110th Anniversary Limited Edition Collection

  • Laco Introduces the Atacama Quartz UTC, A More Affordable GMT Toll Watch

Today’s reading time: 8 minutes and 01 seconds

BROUGHT TO YOU BY MEDIAARM AGENCY Imagine being able to talk directly with your customers and they actually want to listen to what you have to say? Way more powerful than a random ad on Facebook. Stop relying on paid ads and start a media arm for your business. MediaArm can help you get there, so get in touch with them now.

Interested in sponsoring It’s About Time? Just reply to this email and we’ll put you in front of thousands of watch enthusiasts, including industry professionals from brands like Rolex, Omega and IWC.

You people LOVE our giveaways. So here’s a new one - we’re giving away a Seiko Prospex Diver GMT! We have a ticketing system, and here are the ways you can enter:

  • You will get a ticker if you are a current subscriber

  • A ticket goes to whoever fills out this poll so I know what you think about the newsletter

  • A ticket will be awarded to whoever refers a new subscriber. So, invite as many friends as you want. Just click this button:

👂What’s new

1/

For years TAG, Heuer and Porsche have had intertwined stories, without much actual crossover. Both the owners of Heuer and Porsche were enamoured by the Carrera Panemericana race, leading to them naming their iconic cars and watches the Carrera, Steve McQueen wore a Heuer Monaco while driving a Porche 917K in Le Mans, and TAG built the legendary TAG-Porsche Turbo engine for the McLaren F1 car. I might be wrong on this, and please do but it wasn’t until 2021 that the two brands actually came together to build a watch. And that was the TAG Heuer Carrera Porsche Chronograph.

That watch, it seems to me, was one of the last watches of the TAG Heuer downturn. For years, the brand struggled with uninspired designs and, according to industry reports, a falling marketshare. But it looks like 2023 will be the year when they turn it around, with a number of fantastic looking vintage-inspired limited editions and a completely new Carrera model called the Glassbox which turned the boring Carrera into one of the best looking watches on the market. Now TAG Heuer is continuing the collaboration with Porsche to make the TAG Heuer Carrera Chronosprint x Porsche, a collaborative chronograph great looks and a brand-new movement with an unexpected twist.

At the base of the watch is the Glassbox Carrera, a 42mm wide and 14.9mm thick watch with an incredible domed sapphire crystal. The crystal has a double anti-reflective treatment which helps the domed part become almost a magnifier of the track at the edge of the watch which is pressed all the way up to the crystal. Think of it as having a Ressence Type 3 oil-filled look, but just at the edges. The watch comes in 18k rose gold with a beige dial or steel with a silver dial. Both have rhodium-plated hour and minute hands, while the indices and the chronograph hand match the tone of the case. There are silver accents around the subdials and date window at 6:00. The subdials display the running seconds, a 30-minute chronograph counter, and a 12-hour counter for the chronograph.

Then, there’s the outer track and the movement, which is equally the best looking part of the watch and the most puzzling one. The flange has a line that runs from the 12 o’clock position all the way to 9.1 on the outer track, in reference to the 9.1 seconds that it took the original Porsche 911 to get to 100 km/h. But the 9.1 marking does not align with where you would expect 9.1 seconds to be on a 60 second counter, but rather goes up to 20 seconds. That’s where the new and puzzling TH20-08 movement comes in.

So what’s going on here? In a act of complete madness, the TH20-80 starts off super fast, covering the third of the dial in 9.1 seconds and then slows down as it circles the dial, getting slower and slower until it reaches the top of the dial and starts again at a fast speed. Not only is there no need for the chronograph to do this, it is 100% impractical as you can’t really time anything with it. But is it a bit hilarious? Sure is! They even have an interactive model on their website where you can use the chronograph and see it in action. It’s completely bizzare.

These two new TAG Heuer’s will set you back 9,000 CHF for the steel version and 23,000 CHF for the 18k rose gold version. This is a significant markup from the regular steel Glassbox that costs 6,300 CHF (there are no gold versions of the Glassbox). You can see the watch for yourself on the TAG Heuer website.

2/

Ever since the inception of the company, Panerai has been linked to military service. The original models were developed for Italian military divers and over the years they have been linked with numerous military organisations. Their latest is with the US Navy SEALs. To honour that connection, Panerai is releasing a collection branded in conjunction with the SEALs. Following its U.S.-exclusive release, Panerai is now making this limited-edition collection available internationally. The lineup includes two Luminor Chrono models, one Luminor Marina reference, and also a Submersible Chrono Experience Edition timepiece.

Starting off with the most conservative one of the bunch - the Luminor Marina PAM01412, a 44mm watch in what Panerai calls “Brunito” steel. This case material is stainless steel with a deliberately weathered PVD coating. The watch has a green vignette sandwich dial and a solid Brunito case back with the Navy SEALs logo. Water resistance is 300 meters, and it comes with a black rubber strap on a pin buckle as well as a bi-material strap. Inside, this watch uses the P9010, a three-day automatic caliber with a date function. This version is limited to 862 pieces and will set you back Pricing is set at $9,800.

Next up is the PAM01409 44mm Luminor Chronograph in Brunito steel, with a very nice shaded black sandwich dial and has two sub-dials with a target motif and 100 meters of water resistance. Here, the watch uses the P.9200 automatic caliber, which has a 42-hour power reserve. This model comes with both black rubber and bi-material straps. Limited to 562 pieces and will retail for $11,000 at boutiques. A variation of the PAM01409 is the PAM01419, almost the same watch but it comes in a Carbotech case. Carbotech is Panerai’s name for carbon fiber that has been pressed at controlled temperatures under high pressure. 462 units will be made and will cost $17,900.

There’s also the Panerai PAM01323, a 44mm wide, anthracite gradient-dialed GMT watch. It is powered by the dual time P.900/GMT calibre with 3 days of power reserve and rated to 300 meters of water resistance. This re-release of the original SEALs Panerai is limited to 500 pieces and 62 are reserved for active and retired Navy SEALs at a special price, while he standard retail price will be $10,600.

The last watch is the model that comes with the Special Ops experience. It’s the 47mm PAM01402 Brunito steel watch with a green and anthracite colorway. The P.9100/R movement is inside and has a three-day power reserve. It contains a flyback function, a countdown “time to target” timer, and a 60-minute counter. It also has a unidirectional dive bezel made of titanium and olive ceramic. As far as the experience, owners will attend a rigorous tactical training course as well as an in-person history of the Navy SEALs unit. The brand will produce just 50 of these watches, and they will not be inexpensive - $61,700.

3/

The Navitimer is perhaps the most recognisable watches that Breitling makes. But it has one glaring issue - it’s humongous. The most popular version come in either 43 or 46mm, making it unwearable for everyone but the largest of wrists. You can get one or two models at 41mm, but that’s it. Now, Breitling is releasing a collection of smaller Navitimers in both 36mm with an automatic movement and 32mm with a quartz movement. While Breilting says these are aimed at women, we’re not fan of gendered watches, right? While the 32mm will certainly fit more slender wrists and come with very light colors and lab-grown diamonds, the three 36mm versions are certainly unisex and actually great.

The new 36mm size Navitimer is time only and comes in a trio of metallic dial colors - a fantastic mint green, great silver, and perhaps the best anthracite - with baton indexes, or with a white mother-of-pearl dial set with round-cut lab grown diamonds. Interestingly, you’ll notice something off with the dial instantly. There’s no chronograph, obviously, but you still get the circular slide rule. Interesting choice.

One version features a steel build with an 18k red gold bezel, while the other is attired in a full 18k red gold composition. Both versions are accompanied by either a two-tone metal bracelet or a brown alligator strap. As for movement, the Navitimer 36 runs on the in-house and COSC-certified caliber 17, complete with 38 hours of power reserve

Likewise, the 32mm Navitimer series also features the mother-of-pearl dials set with diamonds. In addition, the full stainless versions offer three mother-of-pearl dial options, from pink, and white to light blue. All versions and colorways run on the Breitling Caliber 77, a thermo-compensated SuperQuartz™ with a battery life of around three to four years.

The watches are available now, at a wide variety of prices: $5,000 for steel and leather, $5,300 for full steel, $7,250 for two-tone and leather, $9,650 for full two-tone, $12,950 for gold and leather, and $33,000 for full gold. I’m pretty sure these are prices for the 36mm model, but I couldn’t find the 32mm ones. See more on the Breitling website.

4/

I love how Seiko confuses me. Like I said just yesterday, they have had something like 6 different releases, every other day, over the past two weeks. Not only could they have made it easier on everyone by bundling up a couple of these releases, they could have done a better job at their press releases. Case in point, the Presage Laurel collection. I featured one part of that collection in yesterday’s edition, the Presage Style 60s ‘Laurel’ GMT Limited Edition, without even knowing that this is part of a trio of watches from the Laurel collection. So, let’s look at those.

First up is the absolutely stunning Presage Sharp Edged ‘Laurel’ Limited Edition 110th Seiko Wristwatchmaking Anniversary SPB413J1 in the title photo. The Sharp Edged comes with a sleek case, facetted hour markers and hyper intricate dial. The dial is more known for darker colors like black, blue and even a great brown, but here it comes in a stark white with red details and a blue seconds hand. The SPB413J1 comes in a width of 40.2mm and houses the 6R55 movement that has a 72-hour power reserve. It’s limited to 2,000 pieces and is priced at €950 without VAT.

Then there’s the SPB401J1, with the most traditional of the three designs. It has Laurel numerals and a subdial at 6 o’clock inspired by the 1913 original. However, unlike the original, the subdial is no longer a small seconds, but rather a date complication, with a power reserve indicator at 9 o’clock. Despite it’s small change, it still looks like the original Laurel, with Takumi style enamelling, white dial and red 12 o’clock marker.

It comes in a round stainless steel case that’s also 40.2mm wide. Inside is the Calibre 6R27 with 45-hour power reserve. The watch is limited to 1,500 pieces and will cost €1,156.

5/

You might know Laco as the German maker of some pretty solid pilot’s watches. What you may have missed is that they had some great success with their tool watch, the Atacama.2. Now they’re banking on that success and introducing the Atacama Quartz UTC, a more affordable, more durable version of the Atacama.2 which adds the much desired GMT function.

The quartz version of the Atacama.2 still has the PVD-coated finish, rubber strap, unidirectional bezel, and matte dial. The new watch is 46mm wide, but the Ronda 515 GMT quartz movement inside has slimmed the watch down to 10.5mm. Like any great tool watch it has generous amounts of lume on the hands, dial, and bezel. The crown at twelve o-clock is integrated into and protected by the articulating lugs. Down from 500 meters on the Atacama.2, the UTC still remains water resistant to 200 meters.

The new Laco Atacama Quarz UTC is available now for presale from Laco and authorized dealers for $640, and delivery is expected in mid-October. Learn more at laco-watches.com.

🫳On hand

Our selection of the best reviews we stumble upon

1/

2/

⚙️Watch Worthy

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

What Arpa does particularly well is merge visual artistic interest with technical functionality. Arpa can certainly push the envelope, and his designs can verge more into the expressive (versus functional) realms, but with the Son of Sea diver-style watches, Arpa has really restrained himself and chosen to first make a competent sports watch, then second giving them an artistic twist. More so, unlike the sapphire crystal diver-style watches ArtyA produces, the Son of Sea collection are legitimate diver’s watches with properly rotating uni-directional bezels and cases that offer 300 meters of water resistance.

⏲️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

  • Mountain habits in Tibet are being decimated to collect caterpillars that, when infected with a parasite, produce a particular fungus. However, trying to create this fungus in a factory setting is not working—and the fungus has never been proven to have any benefits anyway. An essay on ruining nature for a whole lot of pointless other than greed. Too often the case.

  • In 2021, Clover Hope wrote The Motherlode to chronicle women’s immeasurable contributions to hip-hop; now, she looks at the culture’s lady-baiting history through the hormone-fogged eyes of her teenage self. From Whodini’s leather-clad sweet nothings to Method Man’s wild-boy appeal (and now his 52-year-old gym selfies), rap has always seasoned its masculinity with a heavy dash of sex, and Hope is the perfect guide through the recipe.

  • A wild piece from Esquire - they examine what they call “the plague on the book industry”, the broken blurb system of the publishing system. Do authors actually like the books they endorse—or even read them? Writers, literary agents, and publishing workers take Esquire inside the story of a problematic favor economy.

👀Watch this

One video you have to watch today

This week is unusually car heavy. Must be the mood I’m in. But I couldn’t not share this video on here. Restomods are all the rage, but they are usually reserved for rare, expensive and coveted sports cars of days past. What I’ve been awaiting for is for some crazy person to start restomodding hot hatches from the ‘80s. And they have!

💵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 

Want to sell your watch to a community of passionate horologists? Reach out to us and we’ll put your ad up. $15 per listing without photos, $25 with photos. 10 available slots per day, discounts for multiple slots.

You people LOVE our giveaways. So here’s a new one - we’re giving away a Seiko Prospex Diver GMT! We have a ticketing system, and here are the ways you can enter:

  • You will get a ticker if you are a current subscriber

  • A ticket goes to whoever fills out this poll so I know what you think about the newsletter

  • A ticket will be awarded to whoever refers a new subscriber. So, invite as many friends as you want. Just click this button:

Winner will be drawn by chance, the only other condition to win is to live somewhere were I can buy the Longines online so we can ship it to you and avoid issues with customs and shipping from Croatia.

Want to let us know what you think about the newsletter? Go to our survey and fill it out.

Reply

or to participate.