Watch Dandy

Here at Time+Tide we have a soft spot for smaller brands that are built on passion. Oak & Oscar definitely fits that bill. Chase Fancher (the man behind the brand) has made a series of retro-ish classics with loads of thoughtful details — the sort of details appreciated by true believers. These details are still very much apparent on Oak & Oscar’s Humboldt, a solid 40mm steel three-hander that’s built with adventure in mind — quite literally, in fact, as the watch is named after 18th century explorer and scientific traveller Alexander von Humboldt. The dial, offered in either charcoal or navy, will be familiar to those aware of Oak & Oscar’s previous offerings, with Arabics at the cardinal points and a sandwich-style construction that punches well above the Humboldt’s price point. The watch also comes with a steel 12-hour bezel, perfect for ad hoc GMT duties. The 20mm lugs are drilled (one of my favourite user-friendly watch features) for ease of strap change, and, impressively, comes with a steel bracelet option. Now, getting a stock third part bracelet isn’t too hard, but the fact that Oak & Oscar have gone to the effort of doing their own bracelet (slightly…

The post INTRODUCING: The Oak & Oscar Humboldt appeared first on Time and Tide Watches.

There are few brands that take as much pride in their heritage as Longines. Not surprising, really, when you consider that the winged hourglass brand pioneered the way for the reissue. In fact, the Saint-Imier manufacturer is so proud of their history that their own museum is home to more than 10,000 historic pieces, while the brand also routinely holds competitions around the world in search of their oldest watches. Until recently, that honour fell to the 335th piece produced by Longines, but now, with the help of a dedicated Japanese-American collector, Longines have found a pocket watch with the serial number 183, dating the “savonnette” type silver pocket watch to the year 1867. A big year for Longines, 1867 was not only the same year that Longines began manufacturing their components under a single roof in their brand-new factory in the long meadows that the brand is named for, but also the year they began consecutively numbering the watches they produced. It was this system, as well as the brand’s diligent archiving of information, that made it possible for their historians and watchmakers to establish exactly when the pocket watch was made. Identifying it as one of the very…

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