XLarge Ape Logo watch

About 18 months ago, I blogged a collaboration between the Citizen Independent line and a clothing brand called X-Large (or XLarge). Today's watch is another X-Large watch, but released on its own.

The X-Large brand started in 1991 in California. It is a brand making street, skate, and hip-hop wear, and has been very popular due to its supposed links to the Beastie Boys (although the link is only that one of the band members helped formulate the idea of the brand). Their clothes are still popular and have a strong second hand market. The brand is known for its Ape logo, which supposedly came before the Bathing Ape /Bape brand.

This watch prominently displays the X-Large Ape logo with it taking up almost the whole of the dial. It is a 3 hand dial design with a Japanese quartz movement, and is 30m water resistant. The rest of the watch design is quite plain with just a shiny silver case and expanding bracelet strap.

The warranty card shows returns to ZNX Timerica from California. They are a watch distribution company, and may have been the manufacturer or distributor on behalf of X-Large.

Citizen Dandy Seven Custom

A little while back I posted a Citizen watch from the Crystal Seven range. Today's watch is part of that series, but with a different name an look.

This watch is a model called the Dandy Seven Custom. It is part of the Crystal Seven range of watches, which was the overall name for a range of automatic mechanical watches with the 52xx movement. Not much is known about the Dandy Seven models, but as they are normally marked by unusual case designs, and were often more colourful than the normal Crystal Seven watches, the speculation is that they were aimed at the younger market. According to sweep-hand.org, the Dandy Seven watches were first released in 1968, and are marked with a crossed sword and shield logo on the face. It looks like they weren't made in large numbers, and are very rare outside of Japan.

This model has a 27 jewel automatic mechanical movement (with a frequency of around 18,000 bph), and the movement number of 5200. It is ha 3 hand design with a date window at the 3 o'clock position, and a day window at the 9 o'clock position. It has a round face in a rectangular stainless steel case with curved sides.

The model number is 4-520041 and it looks like it was made in 1969.

Jetour Promotional Watch

I've been travelling today, so I've worn something flight related.

This watch is modelled on the the Swatch style of basic case with a plastic construction and basic plastic strap.

This watch was made as a promotional item for Jetour. Jetour is a Hong Kong based travel company dealing with holiday planning. The face has the Jetour logo, and the strap shows cartoon pictures of various holiday locations. The pictures cover a Chinese dragon, a couple on a jet-ski, a dancer and palm trees in the sunset (Hawaii?), the Statue of Liberty (New York), the Eiffel Tower (Paris), a Koala, and the Sidney Opera House.

It is a 3 hand dial design, or more correctly a 2 hand and 1 disc design. The disc is the seconds display, and is a clear disc with a small cartoon aeroplane with eyes.

There is no information on the back, so I don't have any more details or a date.

i-n Dual Watch

Today's watch is one for if you want to know the time in two different time zones at the same time.

It is also a watch which confuses search engines. The brand name (or watch name) is i-n or i.n, so it's almost impossible to search for as most engines convert this to 'in', and searching for 'in watches' leads to too many answers.

The watch has a typical 2 dial layout with the two 3 hand dials side by side in a round case. As is often the case with dual dials, it also has one dial with numbers and one with just dashes. It is quite a thick watch, but this is a lot due to the thickness of the glass. The glass has no rim and sticks out around 5 mm above the edge of the metal case. The design is completed by a stainless steel mesh strap. The back doesn't tell much more information about the watch apart from the material, the 3 bar water resistance, and that the twin quartz movements are of Japanese origin.

The design could be from anytime since the 80s, but based on the length of time I've had this in my collection, I guess it was made in the 2000s.

JAL Jumbo Watch

It's a novelty watch for my blog on this Sunday evening.

The watch is modelled after a fat shaped jumbo jet, the Boeing 747. I've of a couple of these, and they are normally issued as in-flight purchases for passengers, and occasionally in the airports.

To release the watch part, you press down the back tail wings of the plane. This makes the front of the plane pop out revealing the 4 digit LCD display with the normal time, date, and seconds displays. There is also a switch on the back of the watch which starts the lights and sounds (although this runs the battery down pretty quick). Batteries are held under the top of the plane where there are 2x AG4 batteries.

It is made for Inflight Supply International from the Netherlands but made in China. There is a design registration number of 1057775 on the back.

This particular one is made for Japan Airlines, also known as JAL. The plane is in the JAL livery and has the logos on the side of the plane and on the tail.

Super Lovers All Stars - Spinning Rainbow watch

It's the Eurovision Song Contest final tonight, so I've chosen a watch to match - something big, colourful, strange, loud, and a little over the top.

The watch I chose is by the Japanese design brand Super Lovers. The Super Lovers watches are released for the Harajuku Super Lovers company, and the more I find, the more mysterious it gets.

This model caught my eye because of the mad design. The face has stripes of colour through the glass so it looks colourful from above, but the stripes also block the view if you look from the side. The entire case rotates as well, so you have to make sure it is the right way up before reading it. This is all then mounted on a wide red leather strap.

The watch is a 3 hand dial design, and the face features the Super Lovers Superman heart logo, with the words All Star around the edge (along with a few stars).

Inside is a module (0120?) by Morioka Tokei Inc, which I think is owned by Seiko. On the inside of the back case is the number 2001 which I think is the date, and a surprise. It seems that the case was made by ZZYZX, who have featured on my blog in 2012 for their 2001 range of musical instruments watches. They are a brand name under the ownership of Hong Kong based Hind International Investments Ltd. This is the only Super Lovers watch (so far) to have this reference, so it seems to fit with my theory about Super Lovers commissioning watches from different places (with different case makers and different companies modules).

Zeno De Luxe square watch

I decided on a mechanical watch for today's blog entry with the Zeno De Luxe.

This Zeno De Luxe is a hand wind mechanical watch in a square perspex (or actually Acryl /Acrylic) case. The case and strap style is very similar to the Super Lovers 60s model I blogged, which I guess was modelled on this original type of design.

The watch is a 2 hand design with a normal looking round dial. The rest of the watch is transparent, and the 17 jewel mechanical movement can be seen through the back. The back is actually solid, and the module comes out of the front of the case. The movement is made by, and has the model number 1218-21

Inside the back, the case is printed with the name Fabuleux. Fabuleux is a Swiss watch brand with manufacturing in Switzerland, but their watches aren't so common.