300 pieces £5500



50 pieces - £19650

 

Nice ... Glassbox?

 

Nah, 42mm 'Elegant'

 

I was curious about the character above the date window. I assumed it stands for Dragon. While I have some knowledge of the Japanese language, I know very little about Chinese.

A quick google search showed me these two characters for Dragon. But these look quite different.


More research brought up this evolution of the character, but none of these are used on the watch.


Finally I found it. Apparently a Cursive version of the character is used on the watch.

 

Same same but different

 

The close ups of the dial suggest these might look better in person, I'd like to see some live shots of the watch.

These are much more restrained compared to the Year of the Rabbit or Tiger. Which for me is an improvement.

 

Definite Speedmaster vibes from this gold and dark red combo...

 

So next year is the Snake, that will make a good watch... but then we're into the Horse, Pig, Monkey and Chicken.
Can't wait for the Carrera Year of the Chicken.
Eggs on the dial maybe?
Then again they made a cool 'rat' watch, so who knows.

 

I'm still curious why they didn't do a Year of the Ox, following the Rat.

 

Live video of the gold: https://www.instagram.com/p/CzmKQ3TsgBc/

Not sure if it's the bright lights, but it looks too shiny for my taste.

I was told by a boutique the US allocation for the steel is already sold out. But I suspect that our allocation is rather low compared to Asia.

 

Live shots of the stainless steel from @kinkongwatchco. Looks better under this lighting.

 

Maybe due to the pandemic? Especially with China being the main market. Or maybe they just didn't think Ox's are sexy enough?
I mean, the rat is hardly sexy... but they made a bit of a joke out of it. Can't even do that with an ox.

 

Yes, perhaps the pandemic had something to do with it.

But these watches are planned years in advance. While mainland China was in total lockdown, many other Asian countries weren't. Plus they have e-commerce sales. You'd think if it was already in the pipeline, releasing it would still give them some form of ROI despite the pandemic.

 

Yeah, wasn't there also a clamp down by the Chinese govt on people buying luxury goods? Maybe that had an impact...

 

Just had a chance to try it on finally. It’s very handsome, I really like the shade of bordeaux red against the silver dial.



Might be my favorite 42 so far.

EDIT: 42 Elegant I mean, of course

 

Looks great, might have to up my score at the year end...

 

More pics from Kin Kong.

 

Everytime I see that dial, I think about Arabic calligraphy rather than cursive mandarin