Dark times are looming the experts tell us, and it appears that the watch makers agree. Certainly there is a growing trend to create black time-pieces. We look at some of the best and the worst of black watches.
In April 2008 Bell and Ross released the Phantom an all-black version of their well-known square watches. At 46mm the watch is big, and the the DLC (Diamond Like Coatning) makes it virtually scratch proof and certainly very masculine bordering on menacing. The famous B&R square "Instrument" housing stirs mixed emotions in me - it's a little clumsy but about as masculine as it gets. I especially like the true all-black colour sceme working with subtle difference in surface texture and degrees of matte.
Panerai has release a couple of black watches before all using PVD coating to achieve the black finish which were about as hard as stainless steel. This meant that in time they would scratch. In 1997 Panerai released the Black Seal PAM292 which was coated in the ceramic Zirconium Oxide making it six times more durable than 316L steel. It's black and it's hard. The design is the usual rounded square shame with the strange Panerai swirly lettering. The huge 46mm case houses a hand wound mechanism with a 55 hour reserve. Classic black Panerai, only harder.
The Hublot Big Bang All Black features a big 44.5 mm case, crafted entirely in black ceramic with alternating brushed and polished finishes. With a black ceramic bezel, black titanium screws, black titanium back, black nickel numbering on a matte black dial it is a study in black. A nice touch is the black natural rubber bracelet that seems to pass straight through the watch due to a black composite resin insert in the side of the watch.
With the B-42 may just have taken tech design a bit too far. The sheer quantity of lines numbers and indicators make the design a little too cluttered to be neither elegant nor functional. Nevertheless it does hold some boy appeal with it's truly masculine design. Wheather the International Space Station Logo on the back adds or detracts credibility I am still undecided on.
Porsche Design was one of the first Watch companies to release a black watch in the 1970ies. Like the Fortis B-42 the Dashboard borders on too much. Here the multitude of dials, numbers and lines are tempered by a clean simple casing. If only those red lines, logo and second hand would have been, ehhh, black.
When I first bought the x9Mi as an upgrade to a previous Suunto watch I was thrilled about the black case black dial design with the red will-not-ruin-your-night-vision backlight. The M in in x9Mi stands for military and it turned out that you need a military grade night vision to read this GPS fitted carbon beast that reads altitude, speed, temperature air pressure and lots of other useful things for a person like me who works in an office most of the time. Speaking of time... it is really hard to read the time on this watch even in good light conditions and since the buttons are placed to that they can be activated by your wrist when you finally make out what the display reads it may well read 1021 Hecto Pascal when all you want to know is the time. Not my best watch buy, but still a watch with GPS, Altimeter, Barometer, Thermometer and a half-inch thick manual cannot help but fascinate the kid in the man.
My favourite wach company who created the beautiful Portoguese has jumped on the bandwagon and released a black tech-inspired pilot's watch. The design and typography is more restrained and functional in pre white with only the secondary dial permanent second hand finished in red. The self winding mechanical chronograph mechanism is housed in a milled ceramic case and features dual split seconds mechanism. While it has not got got the elegance of other IWC watches it is big beautiful and it is IWC.
It's not the squarish technical design, nor the shock-absorbing case that got the watch through the Dakar Rally (and you know I love the Dakar Rally) it's the material that it is made of - Tantalum. Tantalum was discovered in 1802 by the Swedish chemist Anders Ekeberg and is rarer than gold. It is harder than Titanium and resists corrosion by acids even the acid Aqua Regia that can dissolve gold and platinum. Oh, did I forget to mention that it is naturally black. I love Tantalum and I love this watch.
It happens again and again - cool thing becomes popular, everyone jumps the bandwagon and bad taste ruins a good thing. And so it is with black watches. Here are some prime examples;
Take one of the finest watch makers today, add the finest materials available and sprinkle with bad taste. This is the recipe for a watch design disaster. Which designer has ever thought of mixing a red gold case with a carbon fiber casing and a vulcanised rubber crown protector with a crocodile strap. The design and material choice is all over the place and the result is a mess - a very expensive mess.
Happy diamonds is a concept that appeared some years black with diamonds mounted in little discs mounted between layers of glass allowing them to slide around - looking happy. It is a concept that i categorize together with useless phenomena such as Bratz and Reality TV. But when you take a concept that was made for pure Bling Bling effect and mix it with a sports utility watch it really gets silly. This is exactly what Chopard has achieved with their Happy Sport Line. Bratz meets Action Man. Please stop.
There now many many black watches out there. Here are a few that I couldn't find room for above but deserves mention:
Fortis Limited Art Edition that mixes cool masculine black design with art.
Audemars Piguet Survivor which was launched just a few days ago is totally over carbonised with carbon casing and carbon movement.
Breitling Super Avenger Blacksteel with the nearly-black special steel alloy.
Linde Werdelin Hard Black DLC the all-black version of the Nordic design with the attachable computer.
Bell & Ross Phantom.
Panerai Lunimor Black Seal PAM 292.
Hublot Big Bang All Black.
Fortis B-42 Chronograph Black.
Porsche Design Dashboard P6612 PTC.
Suunto x9Mi.
IWC Flieger Chronograph Top Gun.
Wyler Limited Edition Tantalum Chronograph.
Corum Admirals Cup. Ouch, my eyes are hurting.
Chopard Happy Sport. Bratz meets Action Man.
