Vacheron Releases Steel 222 To Mark 270 Years; Oris Has A Pretty Wild Miss Piggy Watch; Seagull Intorduces Cheapest Rattraprante; Toledano & Chan Updates The b/1; Peater Speake's New Project

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Hey friends, welcome back to It’s About Time. We’re back! 2024 was a wild year and I needed and extra week off, I hope you don’t mind. Now it’s a straight shot to Christmas of non-stop watch releases. Can’t wait to see what we’ll see next year. Just a note: since I’ve been away for three weeks, you might expect to see some watches that came out a week or two ago, I just want to cover everything. Bear with me for a few days of catching up.

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In this issue:

• Vacheron Constantin Releases Steel 222 To Celebrate 270 Years Of Watchmaking

• Oris Continues Muppets Collaboration With Pretty Wild Miss Piggy Release

• Seagull Introduces The Split Second Chronograph, What Has To Be The Cheapest Rattrapante In The World

• Toledano & Chan Updates The b/1 With A New Faceted Crystal And MOP Dial

• Peter Speake’s New Watch Project Show Their First Models, And They’re Just As Cool As You Would Imagine

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👂What’s new

1/

Vacheron Constantin Releases Steel 222 To Celebrate 270 Years Of Watchmaking

The holy trinity of watchmakers — Patek Philippe, Audemars Piguet and Vacheron Constantin — each have their iconic watches that have established themselves as the holy trinity of (luxury sports) watches. Patek has the Nautilus, AP has the Royal Oak, both designed by the legend Gérald Genta, but the VC watch that made the holy trinity is not as engrained into popular culture outside of watch nerds. It’s the 222, introduced in 1977 to celebrate the 222 anniversary of the company. Designed by Jorg Hysek, the 222 was an instant classic, made in steel with a ultra-thin barrel-shaped case and integrated bracelet. The watch saw many iterations before being a bit neglected only to be brought back in a huge way in 2022 when VC re-released the 222 in solid gold. It was an instant hit. It was also quite pricy at €80,000. It’s been a long couple of years, but we’ve known this was coming — a more affordable steel version of the Vacheron Constantin Historiques 222.

The gold 222 introduced in 2022 was a near exact recreation of the case of the original from 1977, and the new steel version continues on with very similar proportions. It measures in at 37mm wide and 7.95mm thick, which is just a hair thicker than gold version, attributed to the fact that it has a sapphire caseback. On top is the recognizable notched bezel and at the bottom right corner of the case is the recognizable Maltese Cross hallmark that’s made out of 18k yellow gold. There’s one downside to the steel version — the inclusion of the sapphire caseback meant that they had to ditch the monoblock construction, which, in turn, dropped the water resistance from 120 meters to 50 meters.

Then, there’s the dial, which traces its lineage straight back to the original 222, but now comes in a very nice shade of matte blue. It has gold hour markers and baton hands, both filled with stripes of lume. It has no seconds hand, just a date aperture at 3 and applied gold Maltese cross as well as historic logos and fonts.

Inside is the in-house calibre 2455/2, which is identical to the gold 222 movement. It beats at 4Hz, has a 40 hour power reserve, has a solid gold 222-engraved central rotor and is certified by the Hallmark of Geneva. The watch comes on an integrated stainless steel bracelet which has been completely reworked from the gold version for more comfort. The bracelet opens by a concealed butterfly clasp which has no micro-adjustment.

This release is part of Vacheron Constantin’s celebration of the 270th anniversary, with more releases surely to come, part of the regular collection and not limited. While the gold 222 is priced at €80,000, the steel version will be a bit more accessible at €35,000. See more on the Vacheron Constantin website.

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Oris Continues Muppets Collaboration With Pretty Wild Miss Piggy Release

Oris is best known for their middle-of-the-road sports watches. This is not a bad thing, not at all. If you’re in need of a starter watch in the €1,000+ price range, look no further than Oris. They have you covered. And they don’t rock the boat. Sure, they had a few different releases, but none like the 2023 ProPilot X Kermit Edition. With a bright lime-green dial and the image of Kermit on the date wheel, it was an instantly polarizing watch. I loved it. A lot. What I love even more is their follow-up to the Kermit — the brand new, even wilder, ProPilot X Miss Piggy with a hot-pink dial.

The watch is based on the Oris ProPilot X case, which is a highly angular, very futuristic take on a pilot’s watch, with a very aggressive knurled bezel on top. The ProPilot X comes in 44mm and 39mm (which the Kermit used) titanium cases. But this new Miss Piggy version uses a new 34mm case which, while keeping the same design cues, is no longer made out of titanium. Instead, it uses stainless steel with a mostly brushed finish and a few polished details. Water resistance is 100 meters. On the back is a small opening on the mirror-polished caseback which reveals a picture of Miss Piggy’s face that appears and disappears with the rotations of the lilac rotor.

The dial takes on the same look as the Kermit, but with a more Miss Piggy-colorway. The matte dial has a hot-pink color with purple markers and a lab-grown baguette-cut diamond at noon. Due to the smaller size there is no date window, but the hands are the same as on the larger models. I freaking love it.

Inside is the Oris 531 movement, which is based on the automatic Sellita SW100. It beats at 4Hz and has a 42 hour power reserve. The watch comes on an integrated steel bracelet with brushed central links and polished external links. The watch closes with a folding clasp.

The new ProPilot X Miss Piggy Edition is priced at CHF 2,800 and it would easily find its place on my next-buy list, right at the very top. If only it were just a bit bigger. But I get this sizing and I love the watch! See more on the Oris website.

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Seagull Introduces The Split Second Chronograph, What Has To Be The Cheapest Rattrapante In The World

A split-second, or rattrapante, chronograph allows the wearer to time two events that start together, but end at different times. When the timer is activated, both seconds hands move together superimposed, but one stops when a pusher is hit while the other continues. This is quite a rare complication, mostly because split-second movements are difficult to make and are fragile. That’s also why they are extremely expensive. Well, they were, until the genius Richard Habring found a way to simplify the split-second and mate it to the ubiquitous Valjoux 7750 as a module, which allowed Harbing² to sell their rattrapantes at €10,000, by far the lowest price on the market. Or, at least, it was the lowest, because the Chinese powerhouse Seagull just introduced the Split-Second Chronograph Limited which brings the price down hard to €3,500.

Seagull has had quite the year in 2024. They were a very popular supplier of very affordable off-the-shelf movements, but last year they decided that they would up their minimum order quantities to 10,000 — essentially pricing out their smaller clients — so that they can focus on higher-end watchmaking. Nobody knew in 2024 what that meant. But now we see the direction. It’s cool.

The watch they placed this movement in is largely unremarkable. It comes on a 42.5mm wide and 16mm thick titanium case with brushed and polished surfaces. On top is a double-domed sapphire crystal, surrounded by a sloping thin bezel. Like other split-second chronographs, this one also gets three pushers — the standard pushers at 2 and 4 o’clock which start, stop and reset the chronograph, as well as a rattrapante pusher at 10 o’clock which activates the split-seconds function. The dial has a silver base with a sunray-brushed finish, a raised inner flange with a tachymeter scale, a bi-compax layour and applied Arabic numerals. The hands are leaf shaped and heat blued, while the seconds hands come in both silver and blue.

Inside is Seagull’s movement that makes all of this so very affordable. They call it the calibre ST1961 and it’s based on the calibre ST1901 which is a continuation of the legendary Venus 175. The base is a hand-wound, column-wheel and horizontal clutch chronograph which gets a module very similar to the Habring one. It beats at 21,600vph and has a 45 hour power reserve. The watch comes on a black alligator strap which measures an unfortunate 22mm wide.

The new Seagull Split-Second Chronograph is limited to 500 pieces and priced at $3,499. While I don’t doubt that they will easily sell out the watch, what’s more important is whether they will make this movement available to outside customers. I see a lot of potential here. See more about the watch here.

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Toledano & Chan Updates The b/1 With A New Faceted Crystal And MOP Dial

One of the most talked-about watches in 2024 was surely the Toledano & Chan b/1 created by artist Phillip Toledano and watch designer Alfred Chan. It was a rough and brutalist take on a watch, a style that was all the rage last year (and I assume will be even more popular this year on more affordable watches). I liked the watch, but I didn’t deeply fall in love with it. No matter, because Toledano & Chan are now releasing the b/1.2 which comes with two tiny updates that make all the difference.

The case remains exactly the same. It measures 33.5mm wide brushed stainless steel case, with a thickness of between 10.4mm – 9.1mm. The variation in thickness comes from the fact that it’s an angled case. And while in the previous iteration the flat crystal followed the slope of the case, the updated version comes with a new faceted crystal that’s in line on one side and stands out from the case on the other, giving you a flat surface on top. This tiny change completely changes the attitude of the watch. All of a sudden, it’s so much more interesting. I love it.

The other update comes underneath the faceted crystal — instead of the nice original lapis lazuli dial, the new Mother-of-Pearl dial gives the watch just so much more character. There’s a sea of greys, greens and blues in this dial and I’m sure they look awesome in hand. Again, there are no hour markers, just super sharp minute and hour hands.

Inside, you’ll find the same SW100 automatic movement as the original release. The movement beats at 4Hz and has a 42 hour power reserve. Also unchanged is the integrated brushed steel bracelet that has a crazy geometry to it which is almost impossible to describe.

The Toledano & Chan b/1.2 goes on sale in March at a price of $5,700, which is a significant hike up in price from the original $4,000. But knowing how expensive faceted sapphire crystals are, this is to be expected. Keep an eye out on the Toledano & Chan website for more.

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Peter Speake’s New Watch Project Show Their First Models, And They’re Just As Cool As You Would Imagine

Speake Marin was quite the darling of the independent world. Owned and operated by watchmaking prodigy Peter Speake, it quickly became a cult favorite. But Speake sold the company in 2017 and while the Speake Marin watches are still very nice, people have been asking what’s up with Peter Speake. Especially since he founded a new watch company, PS Horology, back in 2024. It’s only now that we see the debut watches from the brand — the Tsuba Blue and Tsuba Dong Son editions — and they’re super cool.

The name of the model instantly brought me back to my days of obsession with Japanese swords and a second glance at the images really did show the connection. The tsuba is the hand guard on a katana, and the traditional shape is reflected in the shape of the watch. It has a cushion-like shape with wonderfully scalloped corners. The case measures 38.3mm wide and a comfortable 8.91mm thick, it has a satin finish with polished details. On top is a domed sapphire crystal and on the side are very intentional crown guards. Water resistance is 30 meters.

There are two variations of the dial. First, there’s the Blue which, surprisingly, doesn’t come with a blue dial. Instead It has a white base that features details that make it look like a tower clock, which are rendered in blue. Around the perimeter is a blue anodized metal base, you get blued hands and blue chapter rings and indices. At 6 o’clock is a small seconds display.

On the other hand, the Dong Son edition has a similar layout with a radically different look. It’s inspired by the Dong Son culture that existed between 1,000 BC and 1 AD in Vietnam, and includes many mythological motifs. You can get this hand-finished, gold-crafted dial in either ultramarine or slate, with blued dagger-shaped hands.

Inside you’ll find the Vaucher Manufacture calibre 5401 micro-rotor automatic movement. It beats at 21,600vph and has a 48 hour power reserve. The tungsten rotor is finished in blue and features the PS Horology symbol. The Blue comes on an integrated bracelet, while the Dong Son comes on a synthetic and humid-resistant strap.

The PS Horology Tsuba Blue is limited to 100 pieces and priced at CHF 19,500 (without taxes), while the Dong Son edition is limited to 80 pieces and the price is still not revealed. See more on the PS Horology 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

• The cops were stumped. How did the bandit knock over two banks… at the same time? Andrew Dubbins delivers a riveting, rip-roaring read.

• In recent years, the “Romantasy” genre has taken the book world by storm. Combining the worlds of romance and fantasy, books such as Sarah J. Maas’s novel “A Court of Thorns and Roses,” about a nineteen-year-old girl who falls in love with a fae high lord, have sold in their milllions. It’s a formula that works, but is it one that can be copyrighted? Katy Waldman explores a world full of tropes and subgenres in her investigation of Lynne Freeman’s case against Tracy Wolff’s “Crave” series, which she claims stole ideas from her manuscript “Blue Moon Rising.”

• Cars weren’t always built to protect the driver, as the experiences Sara Mitchell and her father make clear. They had similar accidents, decades apart, with very different outcomes. Yet, it’s the many events that happened in between that give this essay its heft and impact. A thoughtful, affecting piece.

👀Watch this

One video you have to watch today

This video has been all over the watch world for the past several days, but it’s not one to be missed. The Slow Mo Guys, cool enough as they are with their super slow motion footage, took their cameras to the insides of a very cool Omega Speedmaster. And it completely shifts your view on watches.

Thanks for reading,
Vuk