The Vintage Corner - The Story of Aquastar Deepstar Dive Chronograph
Aquastar is a very niche brand, specialized in diver's instruments. It is also a rather young brand, in the vintage field, as it was only established in 1962. The brand started supplying watches to Jacques Cousteau's dive team in 1965, and it seems that the brand’s founder, Frederic Robert, working under the umbrella of the JeanRichards Company, was not wrong in his push to create dedicated dive watches, including today's specialized chronograph, the Aquastar Deepstar. It may not be the most practical and functional dive watch ever created, but its visual appeal can't be denied. This is why we'll take a closer look at it, in today's episode of the Vintage Corner.This Aquastar Deepstar diving chronograph was created in an era of new world of exploration. While NASA and the USSR were reaching Space and planning for a moon shot, others were using advanced technology to explore the depths of the oceans on Earth. The rush of technological development in materials, plastics and new all

Hands-On - Longines Spirit 40mm Black Dial (Specs & Price)
Introduced earlier this year as a full range of watches, the Longines Spirit is probably one of the brand’s most important new collections in recent years. Entirely new for the winged hourglass, equipped with high-end features, clearly focused on precision and reliability, the Spirit is a classic pilot’s watch that combines old-school design cues with a contemporary execution. Available in multiple editions, with several colours, sizes and movements, today we look at what could well become the bestseller: the Longines Spirit 40mm, a time-and-date watch with a black dial.?A classic conceptLongines is one of the Swiss watch brands with the richest history. Founded in 1832 in Saint-Imier in the Swiss Jura, Longines became renowned for timing sports events thanks to its early chronograph pocket watches. This reputation for reliable and precise timing instruments would become the brand’s hallmark and with the advent of military and civilian aviation, and thus the need for

Recap: The Best Dive Watches of 2023
The end of the year is near, so it's time for the MONOCHROME team to sit down and look back at everything that happened during what was objectively a rich year for new models With so many new launches, there was a lot to pick from in all categories and all price ranges. Today, we continue our series of buying guides representing our selection of what we think are the best watches in each category, with one of the industry’s most important and productive categories, one that is a must in all respectable watch collections: dive watches. Here are the Best Dive Watches of 2023, according to the MONOCHROME team.There’s no denying the continuous interest of watch enthusiasts for a good diving instrument. This year, again, we’ve published over 160 articles under the “dive watch” tag. Once again, it’s been challenging to narrow this selection to only five watches. If we look at everything the watch industry has released this year, we had to exclude watches t

Vacheron Constantin Introduces the World's Thinnest Minute Repeater caliber and Thinnest Minute Repeater Watch - Monochrome Watches
Vacheron Constantin sets two records with the introduction of the Patrimony Contemporaine Ultra-Thin Calibre 1731. It is the world’s thinnest minute repeater movement and the world’s thinnest minute repeater wrist watch. This new ultra-thin chiming watch measures just 8.09 mm in height and its movement is just a mere 3.90 mm in height. Even leaving the “world records” out of the equation, what Vacheron accomplishes here is simply magnificent. Striking complications are usually seen as the most difficult of all complications, especially when integrating it in an ultra-thin movement.For those of you who remember Piaget’s introduction earlier this year, that was also a record for the world’s thinnest minute repeater movement and minute repeater watch. With the difference that the Emperador Coussin Ultra-Thin Minute Repeater is automatically wound, while the Vacheron is a manually wound watch. The new ultra-thin caliber 1731 has been finished to the very

Hands-On - Jaeger-LeCoultre Polaris Chronograph WorldTime (Specs & Price)
A welcome addition to the collection, the Polaris is Jaeger-LeCoultre's vision of an elegant sports watch. The collection was launched at the SIHH 2018, 50 years after the original and iconic Polaris Memovox – read our introductory article here. Among a full range of timepieces, the Chronograph WT is the largest and the most technical version, offering travellers a practical world time function. Today we take a close look at this version that combines a column-wheel chronograph and a traveller's complication.On this Jaeger-LeCoultre Polaris Chronograph WT, at the periphery of the twin-register chronograph, a ring displays 24 cities representing 24 times zones and allows you to read the time simultaneously in any area. For cities switching between standard and daylight-saving time according to seasons, a white triangle highlights this one-hour difference. Ad - Scroll to continue with article