Now that the year has renewed and we are looking forward to all the 2023 releases, it is a great time to take a look back at 2022, which was a pretty tremendous year for watchmaking. There were so many amazing watches that Joshua Munchow’s “shortlist” that he realized he had to take a different approach.
As read by you, here are the top ten most viewed articles (plus a bonus one) on Quill & Pad this past year. There are a few favorites and a few surprises. Drum roll, please: in no particular order, our top ten most viewed articles of 2022 were . . .
Diver’s watches are meant to be rough, tough tool watches, and limited editions are made to cash in on a model’s popularity. The Bell & Ross BR 03-92 Diver Full Lum is both, yet disproves these paradox presumptions as Martin Green discovered after wearing this watch for a while. What did he think? “It’s lit!”
The watch year 2022 saw the release of a variety of well-crafted, more affordable timepieces. Sabine Zwettler shares three of these watches from Bell & Ross, Longines, and Tutima Glashütte that caught her attention.
Stephen McGonigle, owner and co-founder of McGonigle watches, has been regularly asked by friends and watch aficionados over the years to make something that they could afford – or at least aspire to. Making a relatively affordable watch that he could be proud of was a challenge, but one McGonigle has met with the first watch from his new Magon brand: the Fórsa Titanium, an automatic column wheel chronograph in a distinctive tonneau-shaped case.
As a fan of the extraordinary Seiko Prospex 1000, Dietmar Fuchs took the limited version of the reinterpretation of a famous Seiko diving watch diving and shares his real-world experience with it here.
The Lundis Bleus arts and crafts are a very special aspect of watchmaking. It is not so much about the mechanical side – escapements, micro rotors, gearwheels, and gold chatons – but more the artistic and aesthetic (dial) side of independent watchmaking. Is this why Thomas Brechtel chose to buy two custom-made watches from the boutique brand?
If there’s one thing that enthusiasts love, it’s access! Here GaryG shares his thoughts on the a set of two limited references by Louis Erard and Alain Silberstein developed in collaboration with Stephen Silver Fine Jewelry that are available now (until sold out).
anOrdain is not your average watch company. Located in Glasgow, Scotland, its name derives from a remote loch deep in the Scottish Highlands. There, Lewis Heath, a trained architect, first got the idea of creating a modern watch brand honoring traditional crafts. And the new Model 1 Payne’s Grey Fumé exemplifies how anOrdain not only honors these crafts but superbly progresses them.
Often with incoming pieces GaryG resists the temptation to wear a watch until he has had the chance to photograph it in pristine condition, but in the spirit of fun he chucked out the principle of restraint and slapped his new Hajime Asaoka Kurono Anniversary Green Mori right on his wrist. When you read Gary’s story and see his photos you will know why.