No products in the cart.
Best Super NEWS Watches
HODINKEE at Monterey Car Week With Rolex
One of the biggest events on the auto enthusiast calendar (if not, arguably, the biggest) is Monterey Car Week. MCW is a group of events, largely but not exclusively focused on vintage and historic automobiles, in which hundreds of cars representing hundreds of millions of dollars in value get shown by proud owners to an adoring public (which includes other proud owners). Rolex is a sponsor of the Big Three of the week: The Quail, which is held on the fairway of The Quail Lodge And Golf Club; the Rolex Monterey Motorsports Reunion, which is held at Weathertech Laguna-Seca Raceway; and the big(ger) kahuna, the Pebble Beach Concours d'Elegance. Pebble is the grandd...
Why Character Watches Need To Have Characters With Moving Arms
Today, two HODINKEE writers with very different opinions debate what makes a character watch, a character watch. In this article, Jack Forster argues that in order for a timepiece to earn the distinction of "Character Watch," it must have a character whose hands move to tell the time. In his Counterpoint, Danny Milton offers his point of view, arguing for a broader definition of the term, one that welcomes all characters even those without arms. We invite you to read both pieces, and let us know your thoughts in the comments sections. A character watch ought to be the simplest kind of watch to define. It is, at its most basic, a watch with a cartoon character o...
Matt Damon and Christian Bale Wear Heuer Watches in 'Ford v Ferrari'
Ford v Ferrari (2019) is an immersive movie experience tracking the exploits of renowned car designer Carroll Shelby (played by Matt Damon) and British racer driver Ken Miles (played by Christian Bale) as they play the yin to each other's yang while building a car fit to take on Ferrari in the 1966 24 Hours of Le Mans race. In the process, they struggle with endless bureaucracy inside the Ford Motor Company C for whom they are building a car. In line with the times, both characters wear undeniably cool Heuer watches with real racing heritage. Why We're Watching The 2021 Le Mans race is upon us this we...
Back in Time: The Drivers Who Put Heuer At The Heart Of Racing
Today marks the 89th time the 24 Hours of Le Mans race has been held in the town of Le Mans, France. Throughout the years, the race has pitted the world's best drivers against each other in a grueling, day-long, wheel-to-wheel race where a single driver may spend 14 hours in the cockpit of a race car at speeds in excess of 200mph. The event is a fan favorite, and for good reason C the cars of Le Mans are unlike any other in motorsport. They're designed to not only go fast, but go fast for the longest amount of time possible. The race started in 1923 as a way for manufacturers to test the reliability and longevity of their product...
If you travel about 45 minutes outside Krakow, in the south of Poland, you'll find a small village called Libi??. It's a beautiful town, with cobblestone streets, winding hilly roads, and a late-night sunset that kicks in around 10pm on a good summer night. Three summers ago, I visited with my wife, Kasia, who grew up there. We were there to celebrate our wedding after having officially been married stateside. And we made sure to visit everyone in the family C especially her great-grandparents. Her great-grandfather's name is Jzef Lisowski, but we call him Jzek. One afternoon we sat down with him in the living room and began talking...
Best Place To Buy A Royal Oak, A Nautilus, And All Rolex
Interested in selling a pre-owned watch? Get your quote.Want to sell your vintage watch through the HODINKEE Shop? Click here. This Week's Pre-Owned Picks Reading that title, the reaction can be a bit "lions and tigers and bears, oh my!" and that's ok. There is no way around the simple fact that these are three of the hottest watches in the pre-owned watch world. However, Royal Oaks, Nautiluses (Nautilii?), and Submariners only represent a small portion of what we have planned for HODINKEE Pre-Owned. Along with providing access to the watch world's heavy hitters, the idea here is to make the process of buying a pre-loved watch easier ...
The Best Mickey Mouse Character Watches
We couldn't have a Character Watch Week without a Mickey Watch throwdown, could we? Our team nominated 10 watches from the veritable sea of Mickeys out in the world and then we mercilessly ranked them. See which mouse came out on top, below, and tell us what we missed in the comments. 10. Disney X Gucci Grip Announced in early 2020 for the Chinese Lunar New Year (and the Year of the Rat), Gucci created two versions of their eccentric Grip watch featuring an illustration of Mickey Mouse rendered onto the brushed surface that forms the front of the watch (which doesn't have a conventional dial). Available ...
A Bulova With Rare Military Provenance
"New" vintage watches don't just come out of the woodwork these days. With the amount of visibility vintage watches have now, it's difficult to imagine any desirable old-school watch hiding in the shadows of obscurity at this point in time. The Bulova MIL-SHIPS-W-2181 Reissue challenges that notion. Honoring a 1957 series of prototypes created by Bulova for the U.S. Navy based around the ??MIL-SHIPS-W-2181 mil-spec contract for early military frogmen, the Bulova MIL-SHIPS Reissue revives a rare bird that today's Bulova organization wasn't even aware existed. It was the perseverance of a single collector, fascinated by the history of military dive watches, who bro...
Hey, Everybody! It's Character Watch Week
Bet you didn't see this one coming. After spending all summer covering new Lange dials, revisiting a certain Seiko, and contemplating the wrath of the cicadas, we've decided to end August with something breezy: A celebration of character watches, the seemingly silly timepieces that are part of many serious collections. They've been thrilling cartoon fans and watch enthusiasts alike since the turn of the last century, so they're an important part of horological history. But mostly we're celebrating these watches because their happy faces and flailing hands bring us a sense of childlike joy, which we could all use right about now. First...
The Best Watches Of NBA Summer League
The NBA Summer League wrapped up last week. Some of you might be asking, "What is the Summer League?" To that we say, "Don't worry about it, we're here to show you some cool watches." Some of the league's biggest names showed up to watch the league's newest entrants and youngest stars face off in exhibition play (I guess we did sort of explain it) under the bright lights of Las Vegas. But they didn't come alone. They brought some truly heavy-hitting watches, and we picked some of our favorites from the last two weeks to share with you. Lonzo Ball's Rolex Day-Date 40mm In Platinum View this post on Instagram A po...
Hey Hodinkee looks at date windows, hour glasses, and titanium watches.
Welcome to another installment of Hey, HODINKEE! C where you, our readers and community members, ask questions about anything and everything watch-related. Coming to you hot off the presses, if we had presses and anything came off them hot. This week, we lead off with a question so contentious that its contentiousness has become a clich all on its own. That question is the question of date windows. Do we love them? Do we hate them? Do we love to hate them? Is this a question better answered by a careful re-reading of Konrad Lorenz's On Aggression than by looking at the pros and cons of actual date windows? This and more, as Jack takes on a perennial pet peeve. ...
Character Watches Don't Need Moving Hands And Here's Why
Today, two HODINKEE writers with very different opinions debate what makes a character watch, a character watch. Jack Forster's article argues that in order for a timepiece to earn the distinction of "Character Watch," it must have a character with hands moving to tell the time. In this article, Danny Milton offers his point of view, arguing for a broader definition of the term, one that welcomes all characters even those without arms. We invite you to read both pieces, and let us know your thoughts in the comments sections. "There are no rules, that is how art is born." This quote by legendary abstract expressionist painter Helen Frankenthaler is the key to un...
Buying, Selling, & Collecting: The Grald Genta Mickey Watch
One iconic, white-gloved and yellow-shod mouse has been depicted on watches ranging from Seiko and Citizen to Apple and Ingersoll, but when it comes to distinctly high-end Mickey watches with Swiss design pedigree, it's Grald Genta that I think of first. Image courtesy Sotheby's When the original Grald Genta Mickey Watches came out in 1984 they caused a stir at that year's Montes et Bijoux C the organizers of the show deemed the cartoon creations unbefitting of a serious luxury affair such as their own. Rather than withdraw the cartoon watches as requested and hand a win to industry suits, Genta pulled out of the show altoge...
An Exploration of Watches and Anime, Manga, and Cartoons
If you look closely enough, you can spot collectable watches in anime, manga, comics, and cartoons. There's a Rolex GMT-Master-inspired watch that appears in the 2014 anime series, Zankyou no Terror. In one of the most popular modern anime and manga series, Death Note, the protagonist, Light, wears a watch that closely resembles a Speedmaster, which he received as a gift from his father. In the cartoon Archer, Archer's mother gives him a Omicron Spymaster with an engraving on the back, "To Sterling, Love Mother." Notable watches have made it into cartoons and anime, and what's perhaps even more interesting is that beloved characters from the animated world have m...
Two New Spring Drive Grand Seikos SLGA007 And SLGA008
Grand Seiko has had a very busy couple of years, to put it mildly. Since Grand Seiko was split off from Seiko to become its own brand in 2017, the company has rapidly moved its pricing at the top of its product lines into the very high end, introduced new versions of both its Hi-Beat and Spring Drive movements, and debuted a new Dual Impulse escapement, as well. One of the biggest introductions, however, wasn't in timekeeping technology; rather, it was a new design language. This is the Series 9 design, which is an evolution of the 44GS case, with a handset featuring a sharply truncated hour hand, as well as very elaborate indexes on the dial. The Series 9 design...
The New Habring2 Erwin-LAB03 For Massena LAB
Its only been a few years since William Massena launched Massena LAB in 2018, but the brand has already developed a following of fans who appreciate its unique take on small-scale watchmaking, unusual dials, and highly executed vintage details. While the Massena LAB Uni-Racer remains a strong contender for anyone seeking a midcentury-inspired chronograph for under $5k, its the limited-edition collabs with brands like MB&F, Ming, and Unimatic where Massena LAB really lets loose creatively. The new Habring2 x Massena LAB ERWIN LAB03, a vintage-inspired steel dress watch with a beautifully hand-finished dial, an in-house caliber, and a chronometer certification from the Horological Societ...
A history of the character watch
The character watch is simple enough to define (although Danny Milton and I had a good time arguing over it, earlier this week). It's simply nothing more, nor less, than a watch with a cartoon or other character on the dial, and although I can't look at any character watch that doesn't have moving character hands without feeling disappointed, the truth is that there are millions of character watches that have conventional watch hands. As a matter of fact, the very first documented character watch, which had the comic strip character Buster Brown on the dial, was such a watch Canimated? character watches, which have characters with moving character hands, didn't show up until 1933, when the f...
In the last few years, Grand Seiko has released a new Hi-Beat?escapement, opened a Paris Flagship in a global seat of luxury, Place Vend?me, and presented a number of pieces with higher five-figure price tags. All of these point to a brand on a sharp upmarket trajectory. So much so that we even had a whole episode of HODINKEE Radio in which Jack, Stephen, and I discussed the topic. But one critical, not-to-be overlooked point is that Grand Seiko hasn't shown any sign of leaving many of the fan-favorite affordable pieces behind. If you want an SBGM221 like mine, you can have it, and it will still ...
Nostalgia comes for us all, and in the last 40 years, it has hit the world of toys and video gaming particularly hard. One-time 80s and 90s children now look back on fleeting memories of Friday nights where the biggest concern was what the rental store would have on the shelf, if there was enough Sprite for you and your best friend, and whether or not one could indeed manage to avoid The Noid. Such memories have fueled a nearly endless amount of interest in collecting the toys and games of the 8-bit era. From original still-in-the-box trinkets to referential collectibles far too costly for any modern child and even seven-figure...
New Vintage Watches In The HODINKEE Shop
To view the entire current selection of vintage watches available in the HODINKEE Shop, click here.?Questions? Send us a note, or let us know in the comments. Want to sell your vintage watch through the HODINKEE Shop? Click here. Want to sell your pre-owned watch through Crown & Caliber? Click here. This Week's Vintage Watches Hey look, it takes a real character to rock a solid yellow gold Rolex Day-Date C that's about the closest we can get to Character Watch Week here on the vintage team. Our collection is more what you have come to know and love rather than an Audemars Piguet Black Panther or Omega Speedmaster Ultraman. If you ...