It was only a week ago that Tudor dropped, ahead of Watches & Wonders, a brand-new take on its Black Bay Chronograph. While much remains the same as on previous versions, two notable upgrades are readily visible: The watch now features the brand’s five-link bracelet with “T”-fit clasp and, more importantly—it’s hella pink.
Why pink? The timepiece is a celebration of Tudor’s new partnership with David Beckham-founded Inter Miami CF, whose livery is distinctly rose-colored. (The color also figures in the uniforms of Giro d’Italia, a bicycle race sponsored by the brand, and it’s the favorite color of Chinese musician Jay Chou, who is a Tudor ambassador.)
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So it was little surprise to see Beckham rocking one at a recent Inter Miami CF game in Ft. Lauderdale, where it jumped out against his navy blue suit. And we have to say: Man, does this watch look good.
There’s something about a thick, heavy-duty tool juxtaposed with a color typically reserved for female toddlers that just delights. I mean, just look at the specs of this thing: 41mm satin-brushed and polished 316L stainless steel case; fixed, anodized aluminum bezel insert in black; screw-down pushers; screw-down crown; domed sapphire crystal; dual-register chronograph display with date. This is a large, thick watch, water-resistant to 200m, that’s meant to be banged around. And then: It’s the color of a strawberry smoothie.
To be fair, the new Jubilee-style bracelet, which Tudor released in 2023, helps to soften somewhat its Brutalist profile and pair it with the brightly colored, pastel-like dial. But the net result is still whimsical in the best of ways: You’d simply never expect a watch quite like this from more serious sister brand Rolex. (Or, at least, you wouldn’t have expected something quite like this from more serious sister brand Rolex until 2023, when the Crown dropped the “Emoji” watch and the “Celebration” watch. Nowadays, it seems like anything is possible.)
There’s something else: Inside the “Pink” beats the Tudor COSC-certified Manufacture Chronograph Calibre MT5813 with 70 hours of power reserve—better known to Breitling fans as the Calibre B01. Tudor’s manufacturing concern, Kenissi—in which Breitling and Chanel also have financial stakes—has yet to build its own chronograph movement, so Tudor and Breitling use the MT5813/B01 in a kind of exchange. Will Tudor change this in the near future, adding its own, more in-house caliber to the mix and outfitting the Black Bay Chronograph “Pink” (and other iterations) with it? Could that happen as soon as next week? There’s certainly precedence for it—several other Black Bay watches, after all, were born with off-the-shelf movements and slowly switched over to Kenissi calibers.
It remains to be seen. But whatever the movement ticking away inside, there’s no denying that this fresh Back Bay Chronograph is one of the coolest pink watches of all time.
Just ask Beckham.
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Michael Strahan’s De Bethune DB28 Kind of Blue
Former New York Giants defensive end, TV personality, and extraordinarily tall guy Michael Strahan was spotted in a De Bethune DB28 Kind of Blue while sitting courtside at a Knicks game at Madison Square Garden. In sharing a name with one of the greatest jazz records of all time, this watch has a lot to live up to—which it does admirably: Housed in the brand’s signature pocket-watch-meets-Star-Trek case fashioned from sandblasted zirconium and Grade 5 titanium, it features a mesmerizing dial that displays hours, minutes, a spherical moon phase at 6 o’clock, a power reserve indicator on the back, and a performance indicator between 2 and 3 o’clock. Hand-wound like a vintage watch but distinctly avant-garde, this ludicrously cool, 42.6mm-wide piece looks perfect on Strahan’s 6’5” frame.
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Charles Leclerc’s RM 72-01
Young Monégasque F1 driver Charles Leclerc, who has the enviable job of driving well over the speed limit for Scuderia Ferrari, wore a Richard Mille RM 72-01 will signing a fan’s autograph at the Formula One Japanese Grand Prix this week. A longtime brand partner, Leclerc has rocked various RM models and prototypes for over a decade—but even for such an avant-garde marque, the 72-01 stands out: A flyback chronograph, it features a movement constructed of Grade 5 titanium that displays hours, minutes, small seconds, the date, and a function indicator. Arranged in an unusual configuration, this skeletonized wonder of micro-mechanics carries a price tag of roughly half a million bucks. (One can only imagine the premiums on Leclerc’s auto and jewelry policies…)
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Ludacris’s Patek Philippe Aquanaut
It’s hard to get mad about an Aquanaut, Patek Philippe’s sporty, Nautilus-inspired collection and the entry point into the maison’s catalog. Especially the stainless steel model with black dial, reference 5167A-001, which Ludacris rocked recently during an appearance on-stage at the 2024 iHeartRadio Music Awards in L.A. At $24,450, it’s no impulse buy, to be sure—but it’s also incredibly handsome, well sized, sporty as heck, and features a beautifully finished, automatic movement. Measuring 40.8mm wide and just 8.1mm tall, it’s a modern incarnation of a watch launched in 1997 as a Nautilus anniversary model—in adding conventional lugs and removing that lauded collection’s case “ears,” however, Patek had a winning formula on its hands for a younger, more affordable series of sport watches.
Jay-Z’s RM-47
One more Richard Mille for ya: This insane RM-47 worn by none other than collector extraordinaire Jay-Z. It’s difficult to overstate how intricate, painstaking, and detailed the process to create this dial is: Hand-engraved by Pierre-Alain Lozeron, it requires 16 hours of work just to decorate the 11 components constituting the samurai armor and blades. (This is before Lozeron’s wife, Valerie, begins her own work of painting the components, which is itself a delicate process.) The result—a hand-wound, tourbillon-equipped wristwatch with decorative elements in yellow gold and a movement made from Grade 5 titanium—is nothing less than extraordinary. Which is why the RM-47 carries a sticker price of roughly $1 million, and why you don’t see too many of this limited-run, 75-piece edition on the street.
