The positive energy around the new Glassbox Carreras have obviously kept up the good momentum for TH going into 2024; here's what I think from a design and storytelling standpoint are parts of the story:
- For years, there's been clamoring for TH to embrace its heritage roots on a deeper level. The Monaco was always the closest to keeping a vintage mindset. The Carrera was all over the place since the CV211X series.
- The Telemeter in 2015 started a new wave of vintage-inspired Carreras. No one really knows about it outside of us.
- The 2017 Autavia Cup Challenge generated excitement as TH's latest attempt to bring more and more heritage into its regular collection.
- The actual 2017 Autavia production design ended up being a miss; I like to reference JCB's comment that TH at that time was not interested in recreating vintage, but rather creating something new and modern but still connected to the past. Design choices of the production model led to.......hype dying fast.
- Clearly, the first 10 first gen Glassbox pieces were not displayed in boutiques, no promotion in store, no billboards, no Ryan Gosling movies. Sometimes sold / split between boutiques and Hodinkee, Revolution...the best of which had small batches of 100-250 only. Some of these pieces were made with "vintage fans" in mind (2017 Skipper) and others for the hype machine of social media (2019 fragment). But the group as a whole was definitely NOT produced for the masses. However, 10 pieces in about 9 years is great.
- Early 2020's: Original Glassbox era likely (and finally) reached its full potential with design cues / heritage-inspired designs that many enthusiasts collectively loved via the Ice King and 160th Panda in particular.
- 2023 Glassbox reboot. It's like the 1960s, 1996 re-edition, the CV211X series, and the first gen Glassbox had their collective DNA intentionally mixed together in Photoshop / Illustrator to create a new 2023 version. (think "Serpentor" from 1980s G.I. Joe)
- 2023/4: The hype machine seems thrilled with TH's decision to officially bring back a new, heritage-inspired Carrera as part of the
regular collection and not just a mysterious LE.
- The above is the key point in my opinion. The Carrera IS BACK FULL TIME and even better --> BIG TIME!! It's a full time member of the modern collection now. I see billboards in LA with Carreras on them now. And right out the gate we get black and blue dialed chronos, a new Skipper, a very cool Porsche design, a gold / black Jack Heuer inspired design, a green Dato, and a Ryan Gosling movie! Wow! Honestly, that's huge.
- Main point: The above is pretty damn strong push for TH and great content for social media creators to build upon. It's truly a lot of hype in just a 1 year cycle.
- It's a damn nice watch. (even though, similar to others, I am not a fan of the patchy dial)
- Do I personally wish TH kept more of the design cues / codes from the first generation Glassbox? Yes, absolutely, 100 times yes. I believe they had finally refined the first gen dial to the point that it was a work of art on the wrist. I think many of us here believe this and with a tweak to the original glassbox distortion ring and not much else that perhaps we'd have hit a sweet spot. But TH decided to tweak every design element after scoring a 10/10 in a heritage inspired design with the 160th Panda.
- This is just my assumption --> those who like the new design don't seem to mind the patchy dial and don't see it as a design negative as they mainly see the
Carrera design package as a whole and like where TH is headed. Those who don't particularly like the new design point to the patchy dial as the main dealbreaker in my opinion. I think there are nitpicks here and there but you either *** see *** the patchy dial or you don't. It's like a Rorschach.
- But what's
absolutely clear is how the positive coverage has been consistent and increasing since launch and that there's also been a major push from TH to introduce new additions to the new Carrera line that also draw inspiration from the past and have released them all thus far in a very short timeframe. Absolutely huge.
- So back to the hype machine -----> Universally, I think the consensus is that many in the blogosphere / social media / watch journalism circles are happy to see TH "finally" embracing its roots at such a high level. But above all, I think what is appreciated the most is that a heritage-inspired Carrera is *** after a long time *** officially *** part of the *** regular *** collection. And in a big way.
- Positive coverage over an extended period can help convince skeptics and also helps pull in new fans. Clearly, TH is doing a good job there.
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Personal notes:
As a redo of 2017, I hope a 60s Autavia design comes back in a major way in the coming years.
But just please don't give it a curvy, patchy dial.
