Worn & Wound
Watches & Wonders: Tudor Updates the Black Bay Ceramic with a New Bracelet
“So many Tudors, so little time.” That could be a bumper sticker, a tattoo, and perhaps even the Watches & Wonders motto in almost any year the event takes place. One of the real challenges of the show, at least in the very first moments of it, is deciding which Tudor releases to focus on. As we’ve discussed many times, Tudor is one of the only brands that does not give press early access to news of their new releases. Each of the last few years, their official press release has hit while our team was on the shuttle from our hotel to Palexpo for the first day of the show (where we always meet with Tudor first thing in the morning). Part of those first few hours of Watches & Wonders always involves discussing and trying to predict which of their novelties are going to be of the greatest interest to our readers. This year, it was pretty clear that the new Monarch was going to be the most discussed new Tudor release. It’s a brand new watch, after all, with a new case and bracelet design, and a new movement. Even if it went over like a lead balloon with the public, that’s clearly the most newsworthy release and the one to lead with. The Black Bay 54 in blue also felt like it would generate a lot of discussion. And we wouldn’t have suspected it at the time, but the Royal relaunch is actually pretty major as well – those watches are much better in person than we could have imagined from the press release, and they represent a substantial investment on Tudor’s p...