The New Nomos Club Sport Neomatik Worldtimers Are Perfectly Colorful; Montblanc Makes A Great Showing At Watches And Wonders; Baume & Mercier Expands The Riviera Chronograph Range; Ulysse Nardin Makes The Lightest Diver

Hey friends, welcome back to It’s About Time. While the watch shows in Geneva are over, I’m still not home. I had to take care of some business in Munich, so I’m writing these newsletters on trains and tiny cafe tables. Please bear with me for the next few days, as they might be a bit shorter than usual. Also, there are still dozens of releases to cover from Watches and Wonders, so the issues for the next week or so will be a combination of the regular writeups you are used to and the bulletpointed approach I used during the shows as that allows me to cram much more information into the articles. I hope you all are doing good.

In this issue:

• The New Nomos Club Sport Neomatik Worldtimers Are Exactly What You Would Expect From Them

• Montblanc Makes The 1858 Geosphere In Resin, Shrinks Down The Iced Sea And Makes Beautiful Annual Calendar

• Baume & Mercier Expands The Riviera Chronograph Range With Flyback Option And Panda Dial

• Ulysse Nardin Releases The Diver (Air), The World's Lightest Mechanical Dive Watch

👂What’s new

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The New Nomos Club Sport Neomatik Worldtimers Are Exactly What You Would Expect From Them

Every time I write about Farer watches, I note how they are very likely the best company in the world when it comes to using color in watches. And every time I publish that, it takes me a while to remember that Nomos is just as good with color use. That was perhaps most evident last year at Watches and Wonders when they introduced a 31 colors for their Tangente model. This year, they something completely different, but still plenty colorful. This year, something even better. While the brand has a world timer in the very elegant Zürich model, this new release brings color to the complication. This is the new Nomos Club Sport Neomatik Worldtimer.

I do realize I am in the minority here, but the Club collection, in any of its many iterations, so it’s nice to see that this watch that adds a significant complication keeps the same format — it comes in a fully polished stainless steel case that measures 40mm wide and 9.9mm thick. Nomos is known for their extra long lugs, but on the Club, they aren’t as intense, so the watch measures 48mm from lug to lug. On top is a slightly domed sapphire crystal and water resistance is 100 meters.

The dial also keeps the most recognizable part of the dial — the combination of thick Arabic numerals and baton indices. There’s a small seconds sub-dial like on other Club watches, but this is where similarities stop. Around the periphery of the dial is a ring that displays a mix of airport codes and abbreviations of city names, with a red marking at 12 indicating which time zone is displayed, and there’s a new sub-dial at 3 o’clock which shows you your home time. The way the flyer-style GMT movement moves is just cool. Press the pusher at 2 o’clock and you advance the city ring, as well as the main hour hand of the watch, to tell the time around the world. Your local time remains fixed on the small sub-dial and you advance that by either adjusting the time through the crown or with a small inset pusher at 8 o’clock to jump just the hours. Very cool.

There are eight colors for this new watch, six of which are, so unfortunately, limited. The two regular production come in blue and silver, with sunburst textures on the dial. The blue is really all dark blue, with just a hint of light blue on the 24-hour sub dial, while the silver gets a quite pleasing combination of light blue and red. Then, there are the six editions in color, many of which we’ve seen last year, that bear the names: Canyon, Dune, Glacier, Jungle, Magma, and Volcano. And they are just delightful.

Despite Nomos already having a world timer complication in the Zürich, this gets a brand new in-house movement, the DUW 3202. And it’s super thin, especially for an automatic, at 4.8mm. You get 42 hours of power reserve and the movement is decorated with Glashütte ribbing, perlage, and sunburst finishes, as well as a golden globe on the rotor. The watches come on brushed and polished three-link stainless steel bracelets.

The two Nomos Club neomatik Worldtimer in blue and silver are regular additions to the collection, while the ones with the great colors are limited to 175 pieces each. I assume those will go quick. Price is set at €3,940 for all versions. See more on the Nomos website.

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Montblanc Makes The 1858 Geosphere In Resin, Shrinks Down The Iced Sea And Makes Beautiful Annual Calendar

I love it when Mont Blanc reminds us that they actually make really cool watches. And it’s easy to forget because they don’t have that many new releases per year. But when they do come out with something, it’s something pretty sweet. Take, for example, all of the releases they showed at Watches and Wonders last week. Whether it’s a sports watch or a complicated elegant thing, they are on top of the game.

• My personal favorite is easily the new 1858 Geosphere 0 Oxygen Mount Vinson Limited Edition. Not only does it honor Reinhold Messner, easily one of my favorite mountaineers, it also marks his ascent of Mount Vinson, the tallest mountain in Antarctica. But that’s not the coolest part. The coolest part is the 43.5mm wide and 13mm thick case that has it’s mid case made out of a composite blend of quartz fibres, aluminised basalt fibres, CaCO₃ and light blue resin, which actually looks like the glacial ice of Antarctica. And to nail down the swagger, the left side of the case as an outline of Mount Vinson etched into the case and then filled with lume. I told you it’s cool. The rest is very familiar, with a grey anodized aluminium insert on the bezel, which matches the colors on the dial which has a glacier pattern with shades of blue and grey. Like all other Geosphere models, it has two luminescent domed globes at 12 and 6 that rotate in opposite directions over 24 hours, representing the northern and southern hemispheres. Around them is a day/night scale with 24 time zones. Inside is the Calibre MB 29.25, which is in essence the Sellita SW 300-1 with Montblanc’s in-house world time module. The watch comes on a blue-green rubber strap with a rope pattern, is limited to 986 pieces and priced at €9,200. See it here.

• These Montblanc sports watches really are charming. I loved the Iced Sea diver collection, but understood that it might have been too large for many people. Well, Montblanc thought the same, so they released a new version in a 38mm wide and 12.3mm thick stainless steel case. But the rest remains the same, with the Zero Oxygen case, which supposedly doesn’t allow any oxygen in the case during construction to prevent fogging. Both new dials are decorated using a piece of wood to scratch the surface (gratté boisé), making it look like ice crystals, with the white dial getting a white ceramic bezel and the blue dial getting a two-tone anodised aluminium insert. Inside, you’ll find the MB 24.17, which is just a Sellita SW200. The watch comes on a steel bracelet with a double-folding clasp and micro adjust or on color matched rubber. Priced at €3,400 on rubber and €3,600 on steel. See them here.

• But what makes Montblanc an extra special watchmaker is the acquisition of the fabled Minerva watch brand, whose cases and movements live through modern Montblanc watches. The latest such watch is the new 1858 Geosphere Annual Calendar. It comes in either a Lime Gold or a stainless steel case that measures 42mm wide and 13.3mm thick. The case has Minerva’s signature fixed fluted bezel. Around the periphery of the two-tone silver dials is a rotating a ring with months on it (July is replaced by “Minerva,” commemorating the registration of the Minerva trademark in July 1887) and a red arrow at 12 pointing to the curren month. At 12 is a big date display and at 6 is a hand-painted sapphire crystal rotating globe with your choice of the northern or southern hemispheres. The watch is powered by the hand wound MB M14.58 movement, inspired by the historic Minerva “Pythagore” calibre 48, designed by André Frey in 1943. It beats at 18,000vph and has a 65 hour power reserve. Both watches come on a blue calf leather strap with an alligator print. The Lime Gold version is limited to 30 pieces and priced at around €54,000, while the stainless steel version is limited to 100 pieces and priced at about €41,500. It’s still not up on the Montblanc website.

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Baume & Mercier Expands The Riviera Chronograph Range With Flyback Option And Panda Dial

Baume & Mercier seems to have focused this year on mostly one range, the Riviera collection. And more specifically, the chronograph versions. It looks like the whole range has caught the eye of buyers and BM is doubling down it. Good for them!

• This is not the first time that the Baume & Mercier gets a flyback chrono. But it might be the best looking one. The complication is back after years and years, in a 42mm wide and 14.34mm thick stainless steel case with a super-retro gilded telemeter and tachymeter dial. Inside is the La Joux-Perret 8147 and the watch is limited to 73 pieces. Price is set at €8,200. See it here.

• While we saw the flyback on the Riviera before, this is a brand new setup for the model. It’s a regular Riviera Chronograph in a 42mm wide and 13.94 thick stainless steel case, but now with a new white dial with a laser engraved wave pattern and snailed sub-dials for a panda setup. It’s powered by the very familiar Valjoux 7753 and priced at €4,200. See more of it here.

• This is a great update to the Riviera Chronograph Day-Date. Pretty much everything remains the same, other than the size. It’s cut down the diameter from 43mm to 41mm and 13.94mm thick. Inside is the same Valjoux 7750. Priced at €4,200. See it here.

• It’s not all about the Riviera from Baume & Mercier. They Also updated the Clifton collection with some much appreciated cool dials and a revised case. The stainless steel models measure 39mm wide and 11.2mm thick, with the pink gold version measuring just a hair thicker at 11.54mm. All four new versions come with a crosshair dial (with a choice of colors: grained off-white, opaline salmon and a dark blue lacquered fumé), applied indices and a 12 Arabic numeral. Prices are set at €3,550 for the steel versions on straps, €3,700 on the steel strap and €7,700 for the gold version.

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Ulysse Nardin Releases The Diver (Air), The World's Lightest Mechanical Dive Watch

It’s almost as if there are two distinct Ulysse Nardin brands running under the same name. One is dedicated to keeping the tradition of a 150 year old company alive by making elegant timepieces. The other is all about pushing the envelope forward, seeing what’s possible. That’s why have the classical Marine collection and the super modern Diver collection. The brand took a step forward this year at Watches and Wonders with their new Ulysse Nardin Diver (Air), the lightest mechanical dive watch in the world, weighing in at just 52 grams. That’s including the strap.

Nobody NEEDS a skeletonized super-light dive watch to go diving. But then again, nobody really needs a watch to do it at all. So why not push what’s possible. And UN did exactly that. It’s based on the Diver X Skeleton, which was already light at 105 grams, and everything is dedicated to weight loss. It has the same 44mm wide case that has now been cut down a bit to 14.7mm thick, and the materials used are nearly all recycled. And light. They are most certainly light — low-density carbon fibre for the outside and a midcase made out of titanium to give you 200 meters of water resistance. On top is a notched carbon fibre bezel with a dive scale. There’s not much of a dial here, other than a flange over the movement that holds the indices, and a central position for the three hands.

Thanks to the watch being skeletonized, you can see how radical the cutting down on weight was and it mostly happened on the movement. They took the existing automatic UN-372 and turned it into the UN-374 with hollowed-out bridges forming the X, a much smaller mass of the top bridge of the mainspring barrel (while retaining 90 hours of power reserve) and using a bunch of titanium for the bridges and mainplate. Despite removing as much material as humanely possible, the movement is still an automatic, with the heavy winding mechanism, because an automatic winding movement is one of the official standards for a dive watch. It’s also super tough, supposedly capable of withstanding impacts of 5,000g. The watch comes with tow straps — an orange and a white elastic fabric strap with a velcro closure.

The new Ulysse Nardin Diver (Air) is priced at €38,400. See more on the Ulysse Nardin 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

• Ashley and James Schwalm had what seemed like a fairy tale life—two wonderful children, fulfilling careers and a gorgeous home close to the private ski club where they’d fallen in love. Then Ashley’s remains turned up in a burned-out car at the bottom of a ditch, and all signs pointed to her husband

• It took decades to unravel Nixon’s sabotage of Vietnam peace talks. Now, the full story can be told.

• When a prosecutor began chasing an accused serial rapist, she lost her job but unravelled a scandal. Why were the police refusing to investigate Sean Williams? The New Yorker investigates how police let one of America’s most prolific predators get away.

👀Watch this

One video you have to watch today

I’ve always appreciated the madness of people who drive actual race cars on the street. This is one such person.

Thanks for reading,
Vuk