UPDATE:  Shortly following publication of this article, Bell & Ross has updated its webpage to note that this watch has “sapphire crystal with anti-glare coating, lined in colored mineral glass”

Cool looking military watch from Bell & Ross, with a blue ceramic case.  The size is nice at 42mm, and the look is very stealth military.  Note that the crystal is also tinted blue, very nice look — but it is, peculiarly, mineral glass — scratching might be a problem.  Price is $4,500 — unfortunately a bit high given the specs, but I still admire it from afar.

Bell & Ross BR03 Blue Military Ceramic Watch

42mm matte blue ceramic case, automatic mechanical movement (ETA), water resistant 100 meters, luminescent numerals/index/hands, colored mineral glass crystal, blue rubber strap

Baselworld 2012:  Hot off the the top of my stack is the new limited edition Bell & Ross WW1 Jump Hour series, available in 18k rose gold and platinum.  The WW1 Jump Hour takes its movement from the Vintage Jumping Hour series and features a digital hour indication at 12 o’clock.   Minutes are indicated via the large, center-set hand.  A power reserve scale is located at 6 o’clock. Overall the design is simple and easy to read, as you would expect a jump hour to.

By the way — a great year to be a watch fan, eh? Amazing watches up and down the spectrum — stay tuned in because I have many, many more yet to show you.

Bell & Ross WW1 Jump Hour

limited edition 25 platinum, 50 rose gold

42mm case, wire lugs (replicating the style of early wristwatches converted from pocketwatches), power reserve indicator

rose gold:  grained silver dial with blued indicators   |   platinum:  two-tone dial with a linear power reserve indicator

Baselworld 2012:  The new Bell & Ross pieces are a strong showing — for now let’s see the WII Bomber Regulator.  I love regulators, and I like the overall direction Bell & Ross is headed.  Recall 2011 the brand intro’d the vintage “WWI” pieces, reinterpretations of the first wrist watches worn during World War 1.  For 2012 we get reinterpretations of the military watches and navigational instruments in the “WWII” collection, as you see here.   Immediately you notice the deep notched bezel on this watch.  Also, note the oversized crown has been placed on the left at 9 o’clock, rather than the more traditionally placed 3 o’clock.  The large crown and the wide-notched bezel ensure optimal ease of use, facilitating operation while wearing gloves as a WWII pilot would have.  Mechanically, I also like that this piece has a higher-end movement (Dubois Dépraz) rather than the oft-seen ETAs used by Bell & Ross, but this was probably necessitated by the watch being a regulator.

Bell & Ross WWII Bomber Regulator Watch

49mm sand sandblasted steel case with grey PVD finish, automatic mechanical movement (Dubois Depraz), distressed calfskin strap

Functions: hours (counter at 6 o’clock), minutes (central hand), seconds (counter at 12 o’clock). Bidirectional notched bezel. Numerals, index and hands covered in a sand-colored photo-luminescent coating

theme shot

Baselworld 2012 sneak peak, courtesy of Chrono24….looks like it belongs in the cockpit not on the wrist, very much in the spirit of the Bell & Ross “instrument” theme…follows other instrument watches like the Radar and the Compass…full details in about a week…

Bell & Ross Horizon Watch

limited edition 999 pieces

Charity…

February 29, 2012, the “24 Ore Group” together with Antiquorum Auctioneers and the Embassy of the Sovereign Military Order of Malta in Belgrade will host a charity watch auction entitled, “24 Hours for Help Them” (nice grammar, by the way) in Milan.   All proceeds raised from this unique charity auction will be used to build schools for the children of Serbia, which is to be applauded.  While this auction certainly does not have the high profile of something like “Only Watch“, participation is broad with 25 leading brands contributing a watch to auction for charity, so hopefully they can raise some good money.  Participating brands include: Audemars Piguet, Baume & Mercier, Bell & Ross, Breitling, Cartier, Chronoswiss, Corum, De Grisogono, Eberhard, Erwin Sattler, Hamilton, Hermès, Hublot, IWC Schaffhausen, Jaeger LeCoultre, Longines, Louis Vuitton, Officine Panerai, Parmigiani Fleurier, Piaget, Porsche Design, Richard Mille, Roger Dubuis, TAG Heuer.  Browsing through the catalog I thought I would post a few of the pieces that caught my eye.  Thanks to Antiquorum, 24 Ore Group, and the Embassy of the Sovereign Military Order of Malta in Belgrade for hosting the auction.  You can browse the full catalog HERE.

Bell & Ross BR 03 for Help Them Auction

Ref. BR 03-94-S-88888

Hamilton, “Jazzmaster Spirit of Liberty , Andrew Hamilton, Pennsylvania, Lancaster 1892”

Ref. H32.566.791. Made in a limited edition of 1892 examples in 2011

 Richard Mille “RM016”

Unique Piece Ref. RM016 AH WG/111

Corum Admiral’s Cup GMT 44

Ref. 01.005

Here’s a first look at the new Bell & Ross WW1-92 Military watch.  Wait!  Don’t confuse this watch with the one you saw just two days ago — in fact this watch is the second of two “WW1-92″ watches that Bell & Ross unveiled this week (did you miss the Bell & Ross WW1-92 Heritage I showed you a couple days ago — check it out here).  The differences between this watch — the WW1-92 Military — and the WW1-92 Heritage–  are minimal.  Basically any B&R watch with the “Heritage” tag means that it will come with the B&R Heritage-style strap.  This WW1-92 Military piece has more natural/suede-style strap and white numerals/dial markings.  See the side-by-side below.

Bell & Ross WW1-92 Military Watch

45mm blasted steel case with grey PVD finish, automatic mechanical movement (ETA 2892(

Bell & Ross WW1-92 Heritage (left) and WW1-02 Military Watches (right)

Bell & Ross has unveiled a new piece in its “Heritage” collection, this one the WW1-92.  The dial design on this pilot-style watch is notable in that it is designed for short flights of under an hour, in which the minute display became the focus of the observer.  Thus, the minute numerals are prominent along the outer edge of the dial, and the hour numerals moved to a smaller circle within.  Though the WW1-92 is a nice looking watch, I find it’s case size a bit large at 45mm and the “heritage” style straps a bit too narrow for my tastes.  Given a choice, I’d step it up a notch and go for the Glashutte Original Senator Navigator as my watch of choice for this particular design.

Via  Hodinkee via Acquire.

Bell & Ross WW1-92 Heritage

45mm steel case with grey PVD finish, automatic mechanical movement (ETA), “Heritage” strap

pic: Acquire

Continuing my previews of the ONLY WATCH 2011 Charity auction (Fall 2011), here’s the Bell & Ross contribution:  the “Casino Watch.” Unfortunately the preliminary renderings leave a bit to the imagination, but you get the idea, right?  As you can see below, the watch dial a mini-roulette wheel.  Yes, it keeps time, too — the “0″ number on the roulette wheel indicates the hours (there are 12 little diamonds on the outer edge of the dial for standard timekeeping), the roulette ball indicates the minutes.  Most cool, however, is the roulette spinner which will rotate once every 60 seconds.  OK, maybe it’s a bit cheesy, but because it is for a good cause I’m not going to come down too hard on B&R this time.

For more, see the running list of the ONLY WATCH watches I have previewed HERE>

Bell & Ross Casino Watch for ONLY WATCH 2011

Unique Piece

Pink Gold Case

“Only Watch” is a biennial charity auction of one-of-a-kind watches created by many of the most renowned watch brands in Switzerland.  This exceptional event is held every two years in Monaco during the Monaco Yacht Show and is under the patronage of HSH Prince Albert II.   All the proceeds from Only Watch go to support Duchenne Muscular Dystrophy research which is why many of these watches go extraordinarily high prices.

Starting today Perpetuelle will begin its coverage of Only Watch 2011.  Stay tuned in because over the next few months, you will get to see awesome “piece unique” watches from each of the participating brands for the 2011 event:

Click through to see our in-depth preview of each watch:

• Harry Winston Midnight GMT Tourbillon
• Patek Philippe Ref 3939A Minute Repeater
• Urwerk UR-103 “Phoenix”
• Romain Jerome “Rock the Rock”
• Hublot Oceanographic 4000m dive watch
• MB&F HM-4 “Flying Panda”
• TAG Heuer “Monaco Mikrograph”
• Bell & Ross Pink Gold “Casino”
• Louis Vuitton Tambour Diver Chronograph
• Blancpain Villeret Grand Decoration
• Piaget Altiplano Skeleton
• Breguet Reveil Musical Watch
• Audemars Piguet Gstaad Classic
• Jaquet Droz Petit Heure Minute
• Van Cleef & Arpel “From the Earth to the Moon” Watch
• Girard-Perregaux ww.TC
• Corum Golden Bridge Automatic Titanium
  
• Vulcain Anniversary Heart Watch
• Chanel J12 Marine Watch
• Franck Muller “Totally Switzerland”
• Ulysse Nardin Freak Diavolo
• Vacheron Constantin “Dove” Watch (M.C. Escher-inspired)
  
• Zenith El Primero “Destro” watches
• Montblanc Villeret 1858 Pulsograph
• Ikepod Red Hourglass by Marc Newson
• Bovet Fleurier, Celsius, Chaumet, Chopard, De Bethune, Delacour, De Witt, Frédérique Constant, Hermès, Laurent Ferrier, Maurice Lacroix, Richard Mille
  

Only Watch 2011 will be held September 24, 2011 and managed by watch auction house Antiquorum.  But you don’t have to wait this long — because part of the excitement leading up to the September 24, 2011 event is the release of each participating brand’s special edition watch.

ONLY WATCH 2009

If you are interested in looking back, I covered the Only Watch 2009 auction extensively including blogging about several of my favorites inlcluding:  Piaget Emperador Coussin, MB&F Sage Vaughn HM-2, Bovet 3-in-1 Mona Lisa Watch, Tourneau Jump Hour, Louis Vuitton Tambour, Chanel J12 Joallerie with pink sapphire, and Blancpain 500 Fathoms.   You can see all 34 “Only Watch 2009″ watches here on the Perpeuelle World Watch Forum.  The Only Watch 2009 auction was hosted by Patrizzi & Co.

Bell & Ross has announced two new BR02 dive watches that will be available for wrists everywhere starting August 2011.   Carrying a 1,000 meter water resistance rating, helium escape valve, and a unidirectional inner rotating bezel with a photoluminescent reference point, these BR02′s offer dive watch specs in a couple of distinct looks.  The movement is a standard, though reliable, Swiss automatic mechanical (ETA 2892).  The Bell & Ross BR02 Steel with carbon fiber dial is priced at $3,500, and the black PVD BR02 Phantom is $4,000.  Unfortunately I don’t see much here to get me excited — but how about you?  I think that Omega and others have more to offer dive watch enthusiasts who are buying here in the mid-to-higher end range.

Bell & Ross BR02 Dive Watches

44mm steel case (brushed or black PVD), carbon fiber dial (“Clou de Paris” pattern dial on the Black PVD model)