Timex Goes Flying With Pan Am, Tissot Counts Down The Shot Clock, And New Watches From Wren, Toledano & Chan And GO

Hey friends, welcome back to It’s About Time. Despite how corny it might get, I love a good Pan Am reference, I can't help myself. Also, I'm writing the second issue of the Caseback right now and I like it so much that I'm considering making that free as well. In the meantime, you can enjoy the first issue here, absolutely free.

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1/ Timex Brings Pan Am Back With Two Waterbury GMTs, An Automatic And A Bomb Of A Quartz

Timex has been putting the Pan Am name on watches since 2022, mostly pilot’s watches that played up the aviation style. But Pan Am pilots weren't fighter pilots. They didn't need military-style pilot's watches. What they did need is a traveling pilot's watch. A GMT. And this is exactly what happened, since Pan Am crews were among the first to need one in the 1950s, and the airline’s link to the Rolex GMT-Master is a big part of why the complication exists at all. Now, Timex's homage to the iconic company gets two GMT watches, a new Waterbury Automatic GMT that looks just fine, and the quartz Waterbury GMT that looks much, much better.

Both are 41mm wide in steel, water resistant to 50 meters. The automatic has a rotating 24-hour bezel in blue and black and no crown guards. The quartz is brushed vertically and has the Pan Am globe on the crown. Both variants have a lug-to-lug of 48mm, with the quartz measuring 12mm thick and the automatic 13.5mm. Both of those numbers could be much smaller.

The automatic’s cream dial uses applied triangle, dot and bar markers, a lollipop seconds hand and a sword hour hand. The GMT hand has its arrow set toward the center, and the Pan Am logo is printed where 9 o’clock should be. The quartz has serif numerals on grainy white, a small sky-blue plane at 12, the logo above 6, and a 24-hour scale on a wide rehaut in black and sky blue, read by an orange GMT hand. Both have a date at 3.

The automatic uses the Seiko calibre NH34A, a caller-style GMT, so the 24-hour hand is the one you set with the crown. It beats at 3Hz with 41 hours of power reserve, visible through a caseback with the Pan Am logo printed over a Timex rotor. It comes on a steel H-link bracelet with a butterfly clasp. Timex doesn’t name the quartz movement. That one comes on a three-link steel bracelet.

The Pan Am x Timex Waterbury Automatic GMT is available now, priced at $669. The Pan Am x Timex Waterbury GMT is also available now for $349. See more photos here, or the automatic here and the quartz here.

2/ Tissot Puts the NBA Shot Clock on the Bezel of the Grey Supersport

Tissot has been the official timekeeper of the NBA since 2015, and if you’ve ever watched a game, you’ve seen their logo on the shot clock above the basket. Most of these sports league-watch collaborations are just logos and colors changes, but this one adds a bit extra, with a shot clock reference on the bezel.

The watch comes in a 42mm wide and 11.27mm thick stainless steel case. Everything is sandblasted, including the bezel and the pushers, so the whole thing has a nice matte, tool-like look. Instead of a tachymeter or a 60 minutes scale, the bezel on this chronograph has a 24-second scale, the length of an NBA shot clock. It's not like you're going to use it, but are you going to use a tachymeter to clock your speed? Didn't think so. On top is a sapphire crystal with anti-reflective coating, and you get 100 meters of water resistance. The caseback is engraved with the Eastern and Western Conference logos.

Then, there’s the dial. It’s grey almost matching the satin steel of the case, with white dashed lines around the edge that look like the lines on a basketball court. The date window is shaped like the key, the painted area under the basket, which is a fun touch. The only color on the watch comes from the NBA logo at the center of the seconds hand. The applied markers and hands are filled with Super-LumiNova.

Inside is the Tissot G10 quartz chronograph. A mechanical chronograph would have pushed this into a completely different price range, so this will do. The watch comes on a grey rubber strap with channels running down its length, closed by a pin buckle.

The Tissot Supersport NBA is available now, priced at €495. See more photos here and the watch on the Tissot website.

3/ Wren Leaves the Water With the Vessel, a Very Futuristic Faceted-Sapphire Cushion Case Watch

Every integrated-bracelet steel sports watch under $5,000 seems to be drawn from the same two or three designs from the 1970s. Wren’s Vessel isn’t. It’s the first non-diver from a brand that has only made sensible dive watches in the past few years, designed with Max Resnick, and its cushion case and faceted crystal don’t look like anything else in the category.

The case is made out of 904L steel, and measures 39mm wide and 39mm tall, 10.6mm thick. On paper that’s quite modest. But there's nothing very modest about this watch when you see it. The crystal is one slab of sapphire cut with curved facets on top and matching inverse facets underneath, so the dial stays legible when you look in from the side.

The crystal is where it gets strange: one slab of sapphire cut with curved facets on top and matching inverse facets underneath, so the dial stays legible when you look in from the side. It's a very unique look, especially at this price point. The case itself is built in three parts, which leaves room for other materials later, and water resistance is 70 meters with a push-pull crown.

Two dials will be made for the first batch. The steel sunray is clean, with almost no text, while the pale grey meteorite adds texture. Both get an aqua seconds hand borrowed from the original Diver One Aqua, and the same color turns up on the rotor.

Inside is the Sellita SW300-1, a slim automatic running at 4Hz (28,800 vph) with 56 hours of reserve, visible through a sapphire caseback. Nothing exotic, and any watchmaker can service it. The bracelet got more of Wren’s attention: 904L links, quick-release, and micro-adjustment inside the links so the butterfly clasp stays slim. The first links drop away sharply from the case, allowing the watch to fit smaller wrists. Lug width is 26mm, but I doubt a random aftermarket strap will fit the watch. You can get a rubber strap from them for an extra $195.

The Wren Vessel is available for pre order now, limited to 150 pieces for each dial and priced at $2,900 with the steel dial and $3,400 with meteorite. See more photos here and the watch on the Wren website.

4/ Toledano & Chan Goes Stealth Mode With First World War Ship Camouflage Inspired B/1

In 1917, navies started painting ships in clashing stripes and angles as a form of camouflage. It did help mask the boat against the waves when viewed from a plane, but it was even more effective at tricking the new weapon in World War I, the submarine. Ships carrying this dazzle camouflage were near impossible to tell which way they were heading or how fast. It worked wonders. The cammo has recently become increasingly popular, and appeared in the watch world as well, as seen on the patterns that the Grey Nato is using on their products. Now, the same pattern shows on the new variant of the Toledano & Chan B/1. This was already a very cool angular titanium watch, but now it gets a wild pattern on the case, bracelet and dial.

The Grade 5 titanium case is 32mm wide, 31.5mm long and 9.1mm to 10.4mm thick, with a faceted sapphire crystal and 50 meters of water resistance. A CNC machine cuts the pattern first, then it's frosted with diamond dust, and the cased is finished with a brushing on the proud parts. That leaves three textures, from smooth to coarse, each throwing light back differently, so the case seems to change shape when you tilt it. Like the dazzle camouflage should do in real life.

On the standard version, which will be made in 188 examples, the engraving continues straight onto the dial. The only other things there are two angular blades for hours and minutes. Reading the time means finding two hands in a surface designed to confuse the eye, which is just too fun. Toledano & Chan will also make a 12 piece series called the Double Dazzle, which gets 350 natural pavé diamonds on the dial instead of the cut pattern.

The Sellita SW100 inside is an automatic based on the ETA 2671, a calibre built for small cases, beating at 4Hz with a power reserve of 42 hours. The integrated titanium bracelet is fantastic, with each link a different size, narrowing toward a butterfly clasp perfectly hidden.

The Toledano & Chan B/1 Dazzle is limited to 200 pieces: 188 priced at $7,700 and 12 Double Dazzle at $9,700, both before tax. Sales open October 24. See more photos here and the watch on the Toledano & Chan website.

5/ Glashütte Original Paints Autumn-Flowering Cherry Onto Its Latest Meissen Senator

Around €30,000 is a lot for a watch with two hands. But you know that there's so much more to watches than that. With the new Glashütte Original Senator Meissen Cherry Blossom, what you're paying for is that incredible dial (and a gold case, as well) – Meissen porcelain, painted by hand in layers, now with a beautiful flowering cherry motif. This is the fourth design collaboration between Glashütte Original and the legendary porcelain maker Meissen.

The red gold case is unchanged from the 2025 variant, measuring 40mm wide and 10.2mm thick, with a lug-to-lug of 47.09mm. Those are decent numbers, but I assume it would look even better if it were a bit smaller. The case is polished, on top is a domed sapphire crystal, out back is a sapphire caseback and you get a decent 50 meters of water resistance.

Then, there's the dial. The painted flowers are Jugatsu-zakura, a Japanese cherry that flowers in winter, painted in pink and white over white porcelain. There are no indices, only a pair of solid 5N gold hands. The closeup of the logo is interesting, you'll have to decide if that's the charm of hand-painted text or a bit too wonky for the price tag.

Inside is the calibre 36-16, an in-house automatic built on the 36-01 base, beating at 4Hz with 100 hours of power reserve, with a silicon hairspring and swan-neck regulation. Through the back you can see Glashütte ribbing on the three-quarter plate, a hand-engraved balance cock and a skeletonised rotor with a solid-gold weight. The strap is dark blue alligator with a red-gold pin buckle.

The Glashütte Original Senator Meissen Cherry Blossom, reference 1-36-16-05-05-01, is available from October 2026 through Glashütte Original boutiques and authorized dealers, priced at €36,700. See more photos here and the watch on the Glashütte Original website.

⚙️Watch Worthy

• A review of the Atowak Manta-X Violet Purple
• Hands on with the CIGA Design Hunter Tourbillon In Blue

⏲️End links

• For The New York Times Magazine, Blair Braverman tells the story of Steffen Skjottelvik, a 29-year-old Norwegian man who attempted a multi-year trek across the wilderness of Canada. Despite danger in the form of wolves and polar bears and trail hardships like bug swarms of biblical proportions, Skjottelvik revelled in a life of adventure on the land with his dogs.
• Nearly 60 years ago, John McPhee rafted the Colorado River with a longtime Sierra Club reader and his nemesis, taking notes as the men argued over the fate of the land, the future of Lake Powell. Today, McPhee is 95 years old and widely acknowledged as a singuler chronicler of place, people, and time. As David Schurman Wallace notes, he also has “a good chance of outlasting the lake.” In a stimulating review of Encounters with Wild America, a four-book collection by McPhee, Wallace sets a master’s time-intensive and famously lengthy projects against the contemporary attention economy and the media industry. Longform writing didn’t spring from a hashtag; it was a natural outcome of applying narrative frames to complex subjects, including nature itself. Now, writes Wallace, “this work of dedicated attention, so essential to thinking about, say, the environment, is at risk of becoming a relic.”
• Louisiana recently started executing death-row prisoners after more than 20 years of not doing so (save a “voluntary” execution in 2010, when a prisoner waived his right to appeal and said he wanted to die). John Corley, an award-winning writer who is incarcerated at Louisiana’s Angola prison, reflects on how MAGA politics have re-invigorated the practice of state killing in Louisiana and elsewhere, and what it means for the tenor of life in institutions like Angola.

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