If you’re trying to mindfully navigate through the sh**strom that’s surrounding the watch world these days regarding the Swatch X AP Royal Pop collaboration, then you, dear reader, have reached an intellectually neutral destination.

Because I’m not here to tell you whether to camp outside of your local Swatch store or not, or whether AP is “falling out”, or show you more AI slop designs… 

But you already knew that before clicking on one of the Time-Telling Magazine articles. 

This article puts things in perspective for you. Because Audemars Piguet and the Swatch Group are not complete strangers. It is true that this previous “relationship” wasn’t commercialized, but it is nevertheless something crucial to keep in mind, if you’re someone interested in horology and not the noise of the 2000 watch influences you follow on Instagram.

So, before people started debating whether a Royal Oak-inspired plastic watch is “good for the culture”, it’s worth remembering that AP and Swatch Group had already collaborated on something infinitely more important than a hype release.

The hairspring. Tiny component. Massive significance. And unless you’re the type of person who spends evenings reading technical patents instead of Reddit arguments, you probably never heard about it.

Back in the early 2000s, the Swiss watch industry quietly entered what was essentially a technological cold war. Not against smartwatches, not against fashion brands, but against magnetism itself.

Mechanical watches were suddenly living in a completely different world than the one they were designed for. Phones, laptops, tablets, speakers, airport scanners, magnetic handbag clasps, induction chargers… modern life had become a minefield for traditional movements.

And the problem was serious because a magnetized hairspring can completely destroy the accuracy of a watch. The coils begin sticking together, the oscillation changes, and suddenly your meticulously adjusted luxury timepiece starts running like it just drank three espressos and developed anxiety.

This is where the story becomes interesting, because the hairspring is not just another watch component. It is the regulating organ of the movement. The literal heartbeat of a mechanical watch. And historically, one company controlled that beat more than anyone else: Nivarox-FAR, owned by Swatch Group.

For decades, even brands competing directly against Swatch Group depended on Swatch infrastructure to manufacture accurate mechanical watches. Which created a strange dynamic within the Swiss industry. Publicly, brands sold independence, exclusivity, identity. Behind the scenes, many of them were sourcing critical components from the same industrial ecosystem.

And during the 2000s, tensions surrounding that dependence started growing.

Nicolas Hayek had already made it clear that Swatch Group wanted to progressively reduce external supply to competing brands. Suddenly, the entire industry realized something uncomfortable: if Swatch controlled the hairsprings, then Swatch indirectly controlled Swiss mechanical watchmaking itself.

That fear triggered one of the most important unseen technological races in modern horology. Rolex developed Parachrom. Patek Philippe pushed Spiromax silicon technology. Omega went all-in on anti-magnetic engineering. And then, in 2018, Swatch Group and Audemars Piguet officially announced the development of Nivachron.

Yes. Audemars Piguet. The fiercely independent Le Brassus manufacture that collectors love to portray as existing on its own secluded mountain above the rest of the industry had quietly collaborated with the largest watch conglomerate on earth.

And the funny part is that almost nobody noticed. Probably because there wasn’t a queue outside a boutique for it.

Nivachron was different from silicon solutions because it preserved a metallic architecture while dramatically improving resistance to magnetism, shocks, and temperature variations. In simple terms, it modernized the traditional hairspring without abandoning traditional watchmaking altogether.

That matters more than it sounds. Because silicon, despite being technically brilliant, has always created philosophical debates in high horology. It’s difficult to reshape, difficult to regulate traditionally, and for some purists, simply feels too industrial. Nivachron became a middle ground. Advanced enough for the realities of modern life, but still mechanically familiar.

And here’s the part that makes this entire story fascinating. Audemars Piguet did not collaborate on a limited-edition hype product. They collaborated on infrastructure.On metallurgy. On chronometry. On the survival of the mechanical watch in the digital age.

The same technology partially developed alongside one of the most prestigious names in haute horlogerie would later end up inside watches from Tissot, Hamilton, Longines, Mido, and even Swatch itself. Which completely breaks the fantasy most people have about the Swiss watch industry.

Because watchmaking has never been as isolated as marketing wants you to believe. The brands compete, absolutely. Ruthlessly, sometimes. But they also coexist within an interconnected industrial network where suppliers, research laboratories, movement manufacturers, and technical patents constantly overlap behind the curtain.

Nivachron simply exposed that reality publicly. So whether the Royal Pop collaboration excites you, horrifies you, or simply exhausts you, remember this:

AP and Swatch Group already worked together long before colorful bioceramic cases entered the conversation. They just did it somewhere infinitely less visible. Inside the heartbeat of the watch itself.

And this is SO cool to me and my fellow watch nerds. I made an instagram reel an hour ago and the response is just amazing. People really didn’t know about this. Even big journalists and creators. And that tells you something.

Watch collecting is just another way of justifying the overconsumption culture that capitalism feeds on. 

I know, huge statement. Especially in an article about buying watches.

This article is me, your friendly neighborhood watch connoisseur, recommending a few watches I would spend my hard earned money on. Nothing crazy, nothing niche or experimental or weird. But definitely cool and useful. Because you should never forget that watches are tools. Tools that serve a purpose in a certain context. 

Disclaimer: “Without breaking the bank” doesn’t mean cheap. It means taking your time to pick a watch that works for you and your lifestyle, and that you’ll be wearing for a couple of years and build an emotional bond with.

Anyway, here are the 7 chosen watches (tap on their names to discover each one):

1. Unimatic UC1

Unimatic is what happens when industrial design nerds start making watches instead of furniture. The UC1 is pure Italian tactical minimalism. Big lume plots, matte surfaces, chunky proportions, zero unnecessary decoration. It looks like military equipment somebody accidentally turned into a collectible. And somehow, despite the brutalist look, it’s still pretty elegant.

This is also one of those watches that reminds you why tool watches became cool in the first place. Automatic movement, 300m water resistance, clean legibility, no fake vintage gimmicks. Online, people constantly compare Unimatic to old military instruments, which honestly feels accurate. It has that cold functional beauty a James Bond fanatic like myself is a sucker for.

Price: €640.

2. Nomos Club Sport Neomatik Worldtimer Ref. 792

I already said during Watches & Wonders 2026 that this watch would probably end up in my collection soon. Still true. Nomos somehow managed to make a worldtimer that does not feel like it belongs to a finance bro explaining airport lounge access. At 40mm wide and only 9.9mm thick, this thing is absurdly wearable for a worldtime complication.  

The best part is the dial layout. Technical without becoming messy. A lot of collectors online compared it to aircraft gauges and vintage dashboard instruments, and I completely get it.   The DUW 3202 movement is also genuinely impressive for the price point, especially considering most brands would make a watch like this twice as thick and twice as expensive. This feels like a real daily watch for people who actually move around. 

Price: €4,260 retail.

3. Charlie Paris Initial Coeur Ouvert Vert

I had this watch on my wrist for more than a week and it completely surprised me. This is the perfect spring and summer watch. The green dial absolutely wakes up under sunlight and the open worked section slowly grows on you the more you wear it. Usually open heart watches try way too hard. This one feels balanced and relaxed.

Charlie Paris also understands something a lot of brands forget: not every watch needs to scream “luxury.” This thing is approachable, comfortable, easy to style, and honestly just enjoyable to wear. Linen shirt, sunglasses, coffee outside somewhere warm. That is the vibe. It feels very French in the best possible way.

Price: €485.

4. Minim MN01 CNY LE 

Minim is for people who are slightly tired of safe watches. Not weird for the sake of being weird, just creative enough to feel refreshing. The MN01 limited edition has a really strong visual identity without sacrificing wearability. Sharp case architecture, interesting dial execution, modern proportions. You can tell actual design people worked on this.

I’m also paying extra attention to Minim recently because I’m working on something pretty exciting with the brand. And honestly, I like seeing smaller independents take risks while bigger brands keep recycling the same three sports watch designs over and over again. This is the type of piece that gets noticed by actual watch enthusiasts instead of people just recognizing a logo.

Price:  €1,200–€1,400

5. Anders & Co AC2 VOLCAN Manual Wind

The manual wind AC2 VOLCAN collection is probably what Anders & Co needed the most. It gives the brand more credibility. Manual winding changes the whole experience of wearing a watch. You interact with it. You slow down for five seconds every morning instead of treating it like another object you throw on before leaving the house.

The open caseback also helps a lot. Being able to actually see the movement makes the watch feel more honest somehow. Design wise, Anders & Co continues mixing vintage inspiration with modern execution without becoming cosplay or homage coded. That balance is harder to achieve than people think. I’ll go deeper into this collection in another article because there is way more to unpack here.

Price: €1780.

6. Jacques Bianchi JB200 Poulpro

This might genuinely be my favorite modern dive watch brand right now. The founder is a friend and I’m excited to spend more time with the watches soon, but even without that connection, the JB200 Poulpro would still be my pick from the catalog. I got the chance to handle it at Chronopolis Watch Fair in Geneva and It has real old school Mediterranean dive tool energy. Rough around the edges in the best way.

Most modern dive watches feel overly polished and sterile now. This one still has soul. The asymmetrical case, oversized hands, our octopus friend ofc, and overall design language feel rooted in actual diving history instead of “luxury ocean lifestyle” marketing campaigns. It also somehow works ridiculously well as an everyday watch, which honestly matters more than most collectors admit.

Price: Around €1,162.

7. Arsène Lippens Artigiano Collection

I saw the Artigiano collection during Chronopolis at Geneva Watch Days and the dials immediately stole the show for me. I was ready to skip the rest tbh. These watches impress emotionally because it plays with textures and colors that have a ridiculous amount of depth in person, and the way light hits the dials makes them constantly change character.

What I like most is that the watches still feel elegant despite all the visual work happening on the dial. A lot of brands overdo texture and end up making something exhausting to wear. Arsène Lippens keeps things controlled. This feels like the kind of smaller independent brand collectors will suddenly pretend they always knew about in two years. Because they always do…

Price:  €1,109.

If you end up getting any of these watches, please email me or DM me on instagram (@walid.benla) your experience and first impressions!

I kept going back to the Sero Signature more than I expected, and that’s a huge compliment. It’s one of those watches that only starts to make sense once you begin placing it against other things you already know, once you start measuring it mentally against references that defined this category in the first place. Not to say that it’s « du vu et revu » as in something we’ve seen before, but to hammer down my point that there’s a clear respect of the traditional way of doing things.

Because whether Sero intended it or not, this watch lives in a space that’s already been written. You don’t approach Breguet numerals, a slim manually wound profile, and a restrained case without inevitably entering the orbit of watches like the Patek Philippe Calatrava ref. 96, the Vacheron Constantin ref. 6073, or even more modern reinterpretations like the F.P. Journe Chronomètre Bleu. Different price brackets, different intentions, but the same underlying language. Again, a compliment.

And that’s where the Signature becomes interesting. Not because it competes with those watches (it doesn’t) but because it clearly understands the framework they established.

The case proportions are the first indicator. 37.5mm is the easy number to read (sweet!), but the 46.5mm lug-to-lug is where the watch really positions itself. It stretches just enough to avoid that compact, almost fragile stance you get with smaller Calatrava-style pieces. It wears more like certain oversized references from the 40s, where lugs carried more visual weight and extended the watch across the wrist. It’s a subtle shift, but it changes the entire posture of the watch.

The 9.5mm thickness is exactly where it should be, and that’s largely due to the Sellita SW210-1. There’s nothing mind blowing about that movement, but from a construction standpoint, it’s coherent. Around 3.35mm in height, manual winding, stable architecture. It allows the case to remain slim without forcing the watch into ultra-thin territory, which often introduces compromises in durability or water resistance; AKA having to take it off to wash your hand. The 100 meters rating here is not just a spec, it tells you the case has been built with actual use in mind. 

But to get into the main part, the dial is where Sero takes a more deliberate position.

Engraving the numerals directly into the dial instead of printing or applying them changes the reading entirely. From a horological perspective, you move from surface decoration to taking away from the material itself. The numerals exist as negative space, and that means light behaves differently. You don’t get the crisp contrast of printed lacquer or the shadow line of applied markers. Instead, you get something more variable, more dependent on angle and intensity.

This is closer, in spirit, to how traditional guilloché dials interact with light, although achieved through machining rather than hand-turned patterns. The vertical brushing underneath adds a directional grain, which keeps the dial from becoming too static while maintaining control over reflections. It’s a measured approach. 

The consistency of execution is what stands out here. The chemin de fer, the numerals, even the signature text all follow the same engraved logic. That avoids the common issue where different techniques compete on the same dial, printed tracks next to applied markers next to stamped logos. Here, everything is resolved within the same surface.

The handset is another area where the watch holds together, and honestly the first thing I noticed. Heat-blued spade hands, correctly dimensioned, doing exactly what they’re supposed to do. The minute hand reaches the track with precision, which is something you’d expect, but not something you always get. The hour hand sits cleanly within the numeral ring, and the seconds hand remains visually light. 

It’s basic watchmaking discipline, but it’s often where watches lose coherence.

Looking at the different dial configurations, the variations don’t try to reinvent the watch. The silver and champagne dials stay closest to classical references, where the engraving becomes more subtle and the watch reads almost like a study in restraint, to be a little more poetic. The blue dial increases contrast and sharpens the overall presence, pushing it slightly closer to contemporary tastes.

The red dial is the outlier, but it still respects the underlying architecture, which keeps it from feeling disconnected. A little different, but different strokes for different folks.

Now, where the Signature really needs to be placed is in its price segment. At around €1,100 to €1,200, it sits in a very competitive space. You’re looking at watches like the Nomos Tangente, the Longines Heritage Classic, vintage Omegas…

Most of those watches take a different route. Nomos focuses on Bauhaus minimalism and in-house calibres, Longines leans heavily into archival design, vintage Omega Genèves are iconic and reliable. Sero doesn’t really sit directly with any of them. It’s closer to what smaller independent or collector-driven brands have been trying to do in recent years, tightening classical codes rather than reinterpreting them.

That’s also where the watch finds a bit of cultural relevance. There’s been a clear shift in the last few years, especially among younger collectors, away from oversized, overly expressive pieces toward something more controlled. Not necessarily vintage, but informed by it. The Signature fits into that movement as a very clear participant.

That doesn’t make it perfect. The “Signature” text still feels slightly more present than it needs to be when you look at how low-key everything else is, and the longer lug-to-lug will not work for every wrist. But when you place it where it actually belongs, within that €1,000 segment, against watches that often get one or two things right and miss the rest, the Signature holds together in a way that’s harder to dismiss.

What was interesting, and something that came up in conversation with Sergino, the founder, after I shared my thoughts, is that none of this is accidental. The positioning, the proportions, even the way the watch sits in this slightly uncomfortable but very deliberate space, it’s all been thought through.

And that also reflects in how they’re bringing it to market. The initial presale starts just under the €1,000 mark, with the first pieces at €899 before taxes, then €999 during the two-week window, before settling at €1,199 retail. It’s a detail worth mentioning because, at that earlier entry point, the watch shifts slightly in how you evaluate it. You’re no longer just comparing it to its immediate peers, you’re looking at it against a much broader field, and in that context, the level of attention given to proportions, dial execution, and overall coherence becomes harder to overlook.

If I were to discribe it in 1 word, I’d say traditional.

Check them out here.