Timex Introduces Three Sub $200 Marlin Chronographs, Zenith Releases Defy Extreme Chronograph Carl Cox, Etien T02 Has A Stunning Colourful Guilloché And New Collab Between Minase And Fratello

Hey friends, welcome back to It’s About Time. Today is all about vintage-inspired watches and fantastic dials. Any favorites?

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In this issue:

• Timex Introduces Three Sweet Vintage Looking Marlin Chronographs For Less Than $200

• Zenith Works With Legendary DJ Carl Cox For A New 80s Inspired Defy Extreme Chronograph

• The Etien T02 Is A Beautiful Dress Watch With A Stunning Colourful Guilloché

• Minase Works With Fratello To Release M-3 With Fantastic Nori Green Dial

Today’s reading time: 7 minutes and 40 seconds

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Timex Introduces Three Sweet Vintage Looking Marlin Chronographs For Less Than $200

Perhaps more than any other brand, Timex has successfully tapped into its archives to revisit vintage designs. And they don’t just reach into one part of their history. From the 60s to the 80s, they take inspiration from all of the best parts of their history ranging from the more mainstream Q line to experiments like the World Time reissue. Nowhere is this more evident than in their Marlin line. Coming in a 40mm or a 34mm case, the Marlin features an instantly recognizable mid-century design and elegance that would suggest a much, much higher price tag. No wonder this watch is on every single list of must have entry pieces. Now Timex is using the 40mm Marlin to create a new Marlin Chronograph Tachymeter with the same vintage-inspired looks and even more accessible price. It also seems to draw some not-so-small inspiration from the likes of a TAG Heuer Carrera Glassbox.

The watch comes in a polished 40mm wide and a 13mm thick stainless steel case. You get a pull out crown, meaning water resistance is not fantastic, but you still get 50 meters of it. In addition to the crown, you get an additional two mushroom pushers on either side. Everything about this watch is vintage-inspired, including the sloped bezel, sloped lugs and a massively domed acrylic crystal. Unlike the regular Marlin, you don’t get a transparent caseback, but rather a solid one with an engraving of the earth and the Timex logo.

But just like the regular Marlin, all the appeal of the new Chronograph is in the dial. It comes in three different colorways - silver with black subdials to make up a panda dial, a deep blue and a very interesting green that looks almost sage in some light. All three dials get a sunburts pattern on it and the additional markings on the dial are all beautifully retro. The applied markers are shaped as simple polished batons, that match the polished baton hands and at 12, 3 and 9 o’clock you’ll find what Timex calls boxed numerals. And they are exactly that, a wonderful retro font set in a box. A date window is set at the worst possible position - 4.30.

The periphery of the dial is surrounded by a tachymeter scale and it seems that Timex has taken some inspiration from the recently introduced TAG Glassbox. With a prominently domed crystal, Timex has pushed this scale all the way to the edge, right under the curve of the crystal, which (in pictures, at least) makes it look like the scale is touching the crystal and creates an optical effect as if it were printed on the crystal itself, making it viewable from extreme angles.

Inside the watch, for the first time in a Marlin, is a quartz movement. Timex doesn’t specify which one, but it is understandable that they opted for a quartz as a mechanical chronograph movement would have brought the Marlin into another price range. With a quartz, they can afford to keep it ridiculously cheap and have likely created a huge new hit for the brand. Like the regular Marlin, the new Chronographs come with a quick-change leather strap and while the brand doesn’t reveal whether they use the same supplier as the regular Marlin, if it does it would mean that you get a leather strap from S.B. Foot Tanning Company, the main supplier for the legendary Red Wing boots. The blue and green dialed versions come on perforated dark and light brown straps respectively, while the silver dialed version comes on a solid black strap or a steel bracelet.

The watches are on sale right now and you can get them for the incredible price of $179. The steel bracelet bumps up the price to $199. This watch is a no-brainer buy for everyone. See more on the Timex website.

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Zenith Works With Legendary DJ Carl Cox For A New 80s Inspired Defy Extreme Chronograph

When you are a child, some things inexplicably become embedded memories that often pop up when you least expect them. Like, for example, the watch your father wore. Throughout my childhood, my dad wore a Citizen chronograph. At least I think it was a Citizen, I haven’t seen it in a while. It had a white dial, an almost anthracite case and bracelet along with gold colored details. It was a nice watch and I adored playing with it as a kid. But it was also a quartz watch that cost several hundred dollars. Thing is, it looked remarkably like the new Defy Extreme Carl Cox that Zenith just announced and priced at €32,400. No point to this story, just made me nostalgic.

The Defy Extreme collection was introduced in 2021 as Zenith’s Off Shore-Type to the regular high-performance Defy collection. The Extreme is tougher, more technical and more avant-garde. It’s also their collection most open to collaborations, like this one with english DJ Carl Cox. And I can’t shake the feeling that this watch fell out of the 80s, made right alongside that Citizen my dad wore.

And like the AP Off Shore, this is a big watch. 45mm wide and 15.4mm thick, it’s made out of matte microblasted steel and yellow gold accents on the 12-sided ring underneath the bezel and the shields protecting the chronograph pushers. Paying homage to Cox, the three counters on the openworked dial – 30-minute counter, running seconds, and 60-second counter – look like mini vinyl records complete with spiral grooves. If you were wondering why there’s a 60-second counter at 6 o’clock, it’s because the central hand completes one rotation per second instead of once per minute.

Inside is the El Primero 9004 movement that runs at 36,000 vibrations per hour or 5Hz and with a precision of 1/100th of a second and a frequency of 360,000 vibrations per hour or 50Hz for the chronograph. To keep up with the calibre’s speed, the movement has twin escapements and twin barrels. Power reserve is 50 hours. The watch comes on a three-link bracelet in microblasted steel and an additional rubber strap and a Velcro strap.

The Zenith Defy Extreme Chronograph Carl Cox is a limited edition of 100 pieces and retails for €32,400. For more information, check out Zenit’s website.

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The Etien T02 Is A Beautiful Dress Watch With A Stunning Colourful Guilloché

Microbrands are slowly falling in line, working pretty much the same gameplan but with a few tweaks. As a microbrand you can go in several directions - make divers, more dressier watches or try to innovate with materials and colors. You will, likely, end up with some type of Sellita movement, a sum of parts made by Chinese factories that crank stuff out by the millions and a price in the €600-1,500 range. Do not get me wrong - microbrands and indie brands are what will keep this industry alive now that everybody is moving upmarket in price, and I do not hold any grudges about how or why microbrands chose to make their watches. I love them all equally. But every now again a brand that veers of this script a bit, and everybody goes: wow.

Etien is one such brand, and their second watch, the T02 shows why it is so great. This simple dress watch has a stunning guilloché dial and a manual movement that was used in some of the greatest watches ever made. You get a 39mm wide and 8mm thick case that has contrasting brushed and polished surfaces on the sides and top and a simple round bezel.

It’s good that the case is so simple, as it’s all about the dial here. YOu get a stunning central guilloché disc, central leaf shaped hands and a peripheral hour and minute scale. The guilloché pattern shifts radially, giving you an almost vortex-type look. It comes in three colors - blue, ice blue and olive green, and all three are stunning. The color is applied using cold enamel, a material that achieves an enamel style finish with a hard surface and slight translucence.

You also get a transparent caseback, which is great as you will want to occasionally take a look at the Swiss ETA 7001 manual movement. It’s not much of a looker, but it has appeared in some notable watches from NOMOS and Longines in the past. With it you get a running rate of 21,600 vph and a power reserve of 42 hours.

These three watches will be crazy limited, with the blue being made in only 50 pieces, and the ice blue and olive green in only 10 each. I have no dobut in my mind they will sell out instantly because you can’t really get many watches that look like the T02 for just $1,450. See more on the Etien website to check if they still have any in stock.

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Minase Works With Fratello To Release M-3 With Fantastic Nori Green Dial

You will most likely know the Japanese brand Minase for their incredible cases, unlike any other in the watch industry, that have cutouts in the sides that let you see their beautiful dials made with traditional Japanese lacquering technique in a whole new light. Chances that you have seen a Minase in the flesh, on the other hand, are extremely low as they keep production to just 500 pieces per year and most of them are sold in Japan. In fact, the first time Minase’s less extravagant cushion shaped case was sold outside of Japan was last year when the brand teamed up with the cult watch blog Fratello to release the M-3 “Very Peri”. Now, Minase and Fratello are working together again to release the “Nori”, an incredible green dialed watch inspired by seaweed.

So, unlike the crazy cases Minase is known for, the M-3 comes in a cushion shaped case that is 39mm wide, 46mm lug-to-lug and 10.5mm thick, which really do sound like great dimensions. Since Minase designated the M-3 to be their more sporty offering, you get a finely matte brushed case, polished sides and a polished bezel, along with 100 meters of water resistance.

The dial is hand-finished, giving it a subtle dégradé effect. Looking at it closely you can see that it is also slightly brushed, giving it a texture that plays witht he light when painted the lovely green. The M-3 has applied and lumed hour markers at the dial’s perimeter, and just like the “Very Peri” version the “Nori” has an orange tipped seconds hand, which is an homage to Fratello’s Dutch heritage.

Inside the watch is the very well known and respected Sellita SW200 movement which has been modified to remove the date complication. You can’t see the movement because it behind a steel caseback that has MINASE X FRATELLO engraved, but we know that the movement offers automatic winding, runs at 28,800vph and has a 38-hour power reserve. The watch comes on an olive-green nubuck strap that tapers from 20mm to 16mm with a signed Minase pin buckle

The Fratello × Minase M-3 "Nori" Exclusive Edition will be a limited release but not in numbers. The watch will go on sale on September 27, and the books will be open for a full week. Anybody who places an order will be guaranteed one. The retail price is set at €2,470 which is a bit steep for a SW200 powered watch, but considering you get that fantastic dial and the opportunity to own a watch that is not often seen outside of Japan, it could be worth a consideration. See more on Fratello.

🫳On hand

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A review of the revived Vulcain Nautical

⚙️Watch Worthy

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

The Resin Watch Lab V05.0X-RIMISS offers something truly original and hand made, but not for everyone 

A flat sapphire crystal is molded directly into the resin of the upper case, while a second sapphire crystal functions as the caseback and is fitted with a gasket into the reverse side of the watch. The clear urethane resin used for the case of the V05.0X-RIMISS is what forms the foundation for the vast majority of Resin Watch Lab’s materials, and it is cast around the front crystal and compressed in a mold at 60psi before being hand-finished to provide it with it its final appearance. The brand is capable of producing either clear or matte/opaque finishes, and while Resin Watch Lab is certainly able to produce perfectly transparent components, I specifically requested one where the bezel was formed with bubbles, as I felt that it better represented the handmade nature of the product, rather than appearing like something that could have just as easily been created by an industrial machine. Read the whole review on A Blog To Watch.

⏲️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

• If you have been living under a rock for the past decade and are not familiar with Florida Man meme stop reading and go google “florida man” and spend the next hour laughing your ass off. However, local Floridians don’t want or appreciate their unofficial mascot. Third generation Floridian Kristen Arnett suggests that while it’s easy to point the finger and laugh, maybe we should be more curious about what the chaos says.

• Inspired by the Indian Premier League, a popular annual spring tournament watched by half a billion people around the world, Shoeb Davda established his own livestreamed cricket tournament from a remote village in India. But the “stadium” was fake, and the games were all fixed. Why attempt such a scheme? On the surface, the answer is easy: the tournament would attract online bettors, which would mean money for the struggling businessman. But as Sean Williams peels back layers and descends into a world of rigged games and online scams, he discovers a larger, shadowy network and money-making machine making the calls.

• Rupert Murdoch didn’t want to dump his ratings leader and favorite Fox host. But was Tucker Carlson giving him a choice? I love when New York Magazine goes behind the scenes and shows you what happened in some of our culture’s most iconic moments.

👀Watch this

One video you have to watch today

I will never get over how good YouTube videos look these days. This documentary on pirates was made by a bunch of guys at home and it’s better than anything a large network could put together - they have B-roll, animations, deep research. It’s incredible. No wonder the guy has more subscribers than most television stations have viewers.

💵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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