Watches: Longinnes, Lange lead Watch Time NY

very year, the world’s watch brands unveil the vast majority of their new pieces at either the SIHH watch salon in Geneva in January or at the huge Baselworld trade fair in March. Occasionally, however, some brands debut a new model, or even an entirely new collection, later in the year, independently of the two major fairs. And in recent years, the venue several of these brands have chosen is WatchTime New York, the two-day collectors’ event hosted annually by WatchTime Magazine at Manhattan’s posh Gotham Hall. This year’s WTNY was the biggest ever, with 30 sponsoring brands and nearly 1,200 guests. Here are five new releases from five brands that you didn’t see at SIHH or Baselworld.

Longines Avigation Bigeye

A modern re-issue of a chronograph that Longines produced in the 1930s, the Avigation BigEye (“Avigation” is an amalgam of “aviation” and “navigation,” which are the two functions the original watch was engineered to serve) is distinguished by its extra-legible, semi-glossy black dial with big luminous Arabic numerals and extra-large 30-minute chrono counter at 3 o’clock (presumably, the “big eye” referred to in the model name). The dial, protected under a domed sapphire crystal with several layers of AR-coating, also has a 12-hour counter at 6 o’clock and a sub-dial for running seconds at 9 o’clock. The 41mm stainless steel case is water-resistant to 30m and features two prominent chronograph pushers for easy handling, even for a pilot wearing gloves.

Powering the watch, albeit hidden behind the engraved caseback, is Caliber L688, an ETA A08.L01 modified exclusively for use by Longines. The self-winding movement has a 54-hour power reserve and column-wheel chronograph control. A brown calf leather strap with contrast stitching completes the vintage-aviator look.

A. Lange & Söhne Blue Dials

Germany’s A. Lange & Söhne brought to the U.S. for the first time a quartet of new, blue-dialed timepieces from four of the brand’s most coveted collections. The deep “Prussian blue” dials adorn new versions of the Lange 1, Lange 1 Daymatic, Saxonia, and Saxonia Automatic. All four models are in white gold cases and contain manufacture movements, adorned with polished hands and rhodiumed gold appliqués that provide a stark and pleasing contrast with the azure dials, all made from solid silver. All are mounted on dark-blue alligator straps with solid white-gold buckles.

The Lange 1, widely regarded as the flagship of the Saxon brand’s collection, has a 38.5mm case and is equipped with the manually-winding Caliber L121.1, which powers the hours, minutes and subsidiary seconds indication as well as an indicator for the watch’s 72 hour power reserve and the model’s hallmark “outsize” date.

The Lange 1 DayMatic is the self-winding, slightly bigger brother to the Lange 1, with a 39.5mm case and driven by the automatic Caliber L021.1, whose power reserve is 60 hours. Instead of the power reserve indicator – not as important in an automatic watch – the DayMatic adds a retrograde day-of-the-week display to the timekeeping and outsize date functions.