Panerai Luminor Submersible 1950 Carbotech 3 Days Automatic 47mm PAM00616 (Specs & Price)
Carbon fibre - in all its composite guises – has become the material of the moment and has been used across the board, from Bvlgari's chiming marvel to faux carbon dials on TAG Heuer’s Aquaracer… Whether or not an Haute Horlogerie model like the Octo Finissimo Minute Repeater Carbon looks good in its high-tech black suit is debatable, but one thing is certain, carbon cases work especially well for a brand like Panerai. A top military secret until 1993, Officine Panerai crafted high-tech instruments for the Italian Navy’s its covert underwater operations before it surfaced and worked its magic on dry land. Panerai was the first brand to use Carbotech - a composite material based on carbon fibre – and unveiled its 47mm Luminor Submersible 1950 ref. PAM00616 model in a striking, black mottled case. Although this was back in 2015, we recently had the watch in our hands and thought a reappraisal was in order.Laboratorio di Idee: the Alchemy of MaterialsFrom the

The Petrolhead Corner: Auto Union Type 52 Schnellsportwagen
Ninety years in the making, Audi has done something extremely cool! They’ve taken a concept that was never brought to life and finally built it. It’s called the Auto Union Type 52 Schnellsportwagen, and it’s basically the wildest Autobahn cruiser you can ever imagine! It’s a bit of an exaggeration saying it was ’90 years in the making’ as they haven’t actually spent that long building the actual car. But, in reality, it has taken almost a century for the Type 52 to make it from an abandoned concept to an actual working and driving road car. The original idea for this, you ask? To create the most powerful, fastest and wildest sports car! And now, after all that time, they’ve just gone and built it!If you’re not familiar with Auto Union’s rather complex origin story, here’s a quick history lesson before we dive into this fabulous machine. Auto Union is pretty much the coming together of several other German car manufacture

TAG Heuer and Abarth partner with the Abarth 595 Competizione by TAG Heuer and a dedicated Carrera - Monochrome Watches
Abarth, the customization department of Fiat that some of you may know for the funky 1970s cars and numeral victories in rally, is about to launch a new limited edition of its fastest, funniest car, the?Abarth 595 Competition resulting here from a partnership with TAG Heuer. This?Abarth 595 Competizione by TAG Heuer features a specific matte grey wrapping, 17″ racing wheels, Brembo brakes and racing seats in Alcantara… Wait, is Monochrome-Watches turning into a car magazine?… No worries, the main point of interest here concerns what will be delivered with the car, a specific limited edition watch, the TAG Heuer Carrera Abarth 595 Competizione.Why is this partnership so cool? Usually, watches associated to cars are of two types. The first ones are made on request of the brand and sold directly by the car manufacture, like the not-so-cheap quartz Ferrari watches, sold on their own website or BMW watches sold at the car dealer. The other types are watches made by watch m

Introducing: The New Jaeger-LeCoultre Polaris Geographic
Jaeger-LeCoultre is probably not the first brand that springs to mind when it comes to sports watches. Fair enough, the Reverso was initially designed for polo players, but by today's standards, it is far closer to being a dress watch than a sports watch. To amend this situation, Jaeger-LeCoultre turned to its Memovox Polaris, an iconic dive watch of 1968 with an underwater alarm, and used it as inspiration for its sporty Polaris collection of 2018. Expanding the Polaris collection, Jaeger introduces a practical travel complication. Sporting the new contemporary ocean grey colour scheme with orange accents and the signature dial textures of this collection, the Polaris Geographic is equipped with a dual time function, a day/night indicator and a 24-city ring.The new Polaris Geographic borrows a complication previously featured in the dressier Master collection. It also made a fleeing limited-edition stint inside the Polaris collection in 2018 with dual time functions, a 24-city ring an

Pre-SIHH 2014: Introducing the Montblanc TimeWalker Extreme Chronograph DLC - Monochrome Watches
Ten years ago, in 2004, Montblanc introduced the very first timepieces of the new TimeWalker ‘family’ of watches. Immediately recognizable, with its 43mm large case, the beautifully shaped lugs, its thin bezel and the and large and clean dial, the characteristic Arabic numerals and the lancet-shaped hands. Montblanc celebrates the 10th anniversary with a pitch-black new member of TimeWalker family, the TimeWalker Extreme Chronograph DLC.What might seem like the “black sheep” of the family is actually a very well respected family member, as it features all of the above design and style elements of the TimeWalker collection. The TimeWalker Extreme Chrono DLC adds to that a the blackest DLC coating possible, named “Black 4”, and a super strong strap from Montblanc’s own leather department.The strapThe strap’s inside is made of black Vulcarbone? cautchouc (some sort of treated rubber), which gives the wristband extreme strength and flexibilit