The watchmaking world doesn’t need any more unoriginal, derivative crap that will end up at the back of your desk drawer.
Luckily, Chicago’s Astor+Banks eschews that mentality with its second wristwatch, the Sea Ranger, a high-quality timepiece that can be worn from the boardroom to the beach with equal panache.
Back in 2016, we covered A+B’s first timepiece, the elegant and well-crafted Pilomatic automatic. Founder Andrew Perez has now created another military-inspired watch with a sportier, more utilitarian bent. Like the Pilomatic, the Sea Ranger is designed and assembled in Chicago, and the city is proudly engraved on the caseback.
The brand’s first watch with a stainless steel bracelet (versus a leather strap) is inspired by Perez’s time in the infantry, where duties on both sea and land are required. The Sea Ranger is meant to manage both with easy day and night legibility thanks to prominent baton markers and alpha hands, as well as a prominent red second hand lumed with BG29 and C3 Superluminova. The military 24-hour time track is nicely debossed into the dial.
Dimensions are modest, with a 40mm diameter for shirt-cuff-friendly daily wear. Jump from the office to the water thanks to a 300-meter depth rating, and count on the Swiss mechanical automatic movement within for battery-free timekeeping.
The brand is running a super-early bird preorder at $575 that starts today, Friday April 26th, and ends Sunday the 28th at midnight. After the June Kickstarter campaign ends, the Sea Ranger will sell for $850 retail.
The watches will ship in the fall of 2019.
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All images via Astor + Banks
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