Farer Takes on Vintage Proportions with 36mm Three Hand Collection

Watchmaking is a wide ranging and diverse industry full of elaborate and exciting complications, functions and designs, but sometimes it’s nice to remember the fundamentals. And you can’t get more fundamental than a three hand, time only watch, distilling horology to its foundational elements of hours, minutes and seconds. Farer have launched four new time only watches in vintage proportioned cases, the 36mm Three Hand Collection.

I say vintage proportioned because back in the late 20^th century, it was a lot more common for watches to have smaller diameters. In modern watchmaking, large watches tend to lead the way due to the popularity of diving and pilot’s watches, both of which are typically big, 42mm, 43mm, even 44mm are not surprising sizes to see. Which makes the 36mm Three Hand Collection a welcome relief from the giants.

The four watches in the collection are the Discovery Red, Erebus Midnight, Resolute and Resolute Sorbet. In classic Farer fashion, each one is a colourful treat in red, navy, white or salmon respectively. Each has a slightly different design, for example the Discovery has a two-tone sector dial vibe while the Erebus is quiet and refined. However, given the combinations of names and colours, all I can think about now is a salmon sorbet and I can’t work out if that sounds tasty or not.

Odd personal quandaries aside, the watches are essentially miniaturised versions of their 39mm cousins. They even house the same La Joux-Perret G101 automatic calibre, visible through the exhibition caseback. It touts a with 68-hour power reserve, which is seriously impressive for a sub-£1,000 wristwatch.

Each watch is presented with a choice of four strap and bracelet options. There’s Barenia leather or rubber for £890, Granalo leather for £895 or a Milanese bracelet for £905. It could be argued that a 36mm collection based on existing watches isn’t the most exciting watch release ever, particularly when they’re following up launches like the Cushion Case and Chrono-Classic but what the 36mm Three Hand Collection proves is that Farer knows their fundamentals and they execute on them really well.