For many years, Casio has been exclusively known for its quartz and digital watches. Indeed, in over 50 years of watchmaking, Casio has never produced a mechanical watch… Until last year, with the introduction of a game-changing collection, the...
Founded in 2025, Kiwame Tokyo is a young Japanese watchmaking brand based in Asakusa. It focuses on classically styled, well-finished watches with accessible pricing and design details rooted in Japanese culture. Following the inaugural Kurotsuki and...
It’s time to dig in for the fall auction season, and with over 1225 lots, I must admit I've delayed this out of sheer overwhelming anxiety about the amount of work to do. Also, aside from a small preview of watches held by Phillips in New York a...
When thinking about indie brand H. Moser & Cie., you might have either the integrated Streamliner, the sporty Pioneer or the elegant Endeavour collections in mind. There is, however, another range that should be mentioned: a more discreet range w...
One of the brands we don’t talk about all that often here is Arnold & Son. It’s a brand that offers an interesting heritage story—Swiss watchmaking with English roots, as the brand proudly headlines on its website in homage to eighteenth-cent...
Minase is a Japanese microbrand specialising in complex watch cases with superlative handmade finishing. Based in Akita, Minase was founded in 2005 as a spin-off of Kyowa, a specialist manufacturer of watchmaking tools. Its portfolio of complex, mult...
Not too long ago, just before summer, in fact, I lined up a series of new and rather impressive independent watchmakers for you to discover. A recurring topic, it remains at our very core, and because of this, we’re always on the lookout for ne...
The miniaturisation of clock towers to portable time wasn’t a Swiss innovation – it all started in Germany thanks to locksmith and clockmaker Peter Henlein in Nuremberg at the start of the 16th century. These first “pocket watches”...
What do you do when a car manufacturer doesn’t build the car you want? For just about anyone of us, it means moving to another brand or hoping your preferred manufacturer introduces something that scratches your itch down the line. However, if...
De Bethune is, without a doubt, one of my favourite independent watchmakers. And I’m not the only one on the MONO team who feels this way. I love the bold, futuristic design paired with incredible refinement, the almost philosophical approach o...
When Baudouin van Es set out to establish Tad Kozh, the goal was not simply to produce another limited-edition luxury timepiece. Instead, it was conceived as an incubator for heritage craftsmanship and a springboard for the next generation of indepen...
Newport was always an enigma to me. For years, I heard tales of beautiful mansions, streets of opulence, centuries of history, a very endearing grass tennis court, a music festival, and, well, sailing. Yet despite living in New York City for over...
While O&HoraPictor might be a young brand we only discovered recently, our first experience with one of their watches left us very content with what they have to offer. The brand takes the centuries-old tradition of enamelling and gives it a new...
Happy Halloween to everyone, and welcome to another Friday. I know there's big, important events going on all over the world—protests in France, elections in Serbia, Brazil, and Israel (and, next week, the US)—but I'm writing this before the outc...
Geneva Watch Days is always a treat, but 2026 held two collaboration surprises for the MONOCHROME team, both involving maverick French watchmaker Vianney Halter. Bulgari’s collaboration with Vianney Halter produced a bold Antiqua-inspired Octo Finiss...
What We KnowSteampunk and industrial-inspired watches are definitely seeing an uptick in certain collecting circles right now. Look no further than the dramatic rise in, and recent secondary-market sale prices for, Ōtsuka Lōtec pieces from Japan....
With its Series 8 collection of mechanical watches, Citizen has been delivering rather impressive models over the years, with the GMT collection being possibly the most appealing of them. Not only is it powered by a true GMT automatic movement (somet...
Our friends at SJX, the Singapore-based watch magazine founded by journalist Su Jiaxian, are back at it with yet another collaboration watch with Habring², the Austrian independent watchmaker (and one of the best-kept secrets on the indie scene). And...
When Seiko introduced its first dedicated sports watch, the Laurel Alpinist, in 1959, it was designed to provide reliable, legible timekeeping for outdoor enthusiasts amid Japan's postwar boom in activities such as hiking and skiing. The name "La...
At just 45 grams in weight, strap included, the Wild ONE Skeleton X-Lite is Norqain’s most advanced sports watch to date. It weighs next to nothing, but it is also built to withstand a proverbial beating if needed. The Norteq case, as well as t...