BY HARLAN CHAPMAN-GREEN
It’s cold outside. There, that’s the most accurate weather forecast the UK will see for the next five months. It’s not cold enough to freeze water or snowy enough to reenact the Ice Age films, but it’s cold enough for us Brits to make a remark about the cold as we wrap our coats tighter around our shoulders. Anyway, for the wintery season that’s upon us, Bell & Ross recently introduced a new version of the BR-05 watch with a cracked ice-style dial and I’ve been having a play around with it.
I’ve reviewed a BR-05 watch before, although it was another special edition piece called the “Horolum”. I remember from the review of that watch just how interesting it was that nearly every surface had a matte finish. I was also struck by how heavy that watch was, it remains to this day the heaviest stainless steel watch I’ve reviewed and one of the heaviest overall (where I’ve remembered to weigh the watch). I was, therefore, quite sure of what I would find when the delivery man handed over this new watch in its shipping box.
The BR-05 Skeleton Arctic Blue wasn’t what I expected in some ways. I got a 40mm x 10.33mm rounded square Bell & Ross watch, sure, but it was very different from the Horolum. Very different indeed. Whereas the Horolum had a moody and industrial character to it this one comes off as a lot more casual but still with plenty of character.
The version of the BR-05 Arctic Skeleton I got hands-on with for a bit had the white rubber strap although a stainless steel option is available. The strap is of excellent quality. It’s smooth and flexible and doesn’t go all shiny in about five seconds thanks to your skin’s natural oils.
Sizing the bracelet’s folding clasp is a doddle, too, and the clasp is both minimalist and secure. Like so many luxury watches, the end of the strap folds underneath the main strap rather than being left outside to dangle while ill-placed strap minders do very little; that just wouldn’t work the clean aesthetic.
The watch is also very comfortable to wear on the wrist. The proportions mean it doesn’t stand out too much and it’s by no means ungainly. It does have a pleasing heft, though, measuring on my VSS (Very Scientific [kitchen] Scales) at 128 grams. I imagine that on the stainless steel bracelet, this would be approaching the heft of the Horolum, which I measured as 165 grams. I like my watches to have a bit of mass to them, it reminds you that you have a quality item where someone took time to pore over the details.
As for the dial, it’s quite special. Sapphire crystal forms the dial base with laser engraving being employed to create the “cracked ice” finish. For further effect, the sapphire crystal has been tinted blue, but you can still see through to the movement. You might think that this impedes legibility, as is so often the way with skeletonised watches, but on the whole, it’s easy to read at a glance. The only thing I had trouble with was getting my camera to focus on the shiny applied Bell & Ross logo floating on the sapphire.
If the watch had a date window then I think it would be a bit too cluttered, and that would be harder to read too, so the simple three-handed look was the correct choice.
There is also plenty of blue-coloured SuperLumiNova on the hands and markers. Perhaps they could’ve done a little more with it, like if they’d used some lume on the ice cracks as well, THAT would look very cool at night, but this is still good. Most importantly, it’s legible in the dark.
Inside the watch and on view through the sapphire crystal is the self-winding calibre BR-CAL.322.1. Bell & Ross has been rolling through its watch lines and updating the movements as it goes; this one is no exception, boasting much better specs than the Horolum did.
It’s still based on a Sellita movement, the SW300 to be precise, but it now has a longer 54-hours of power reserve and runs at 4Hz. Bell & Ross haven’t said that this is a chronometer, but that doesn’t mean it’s not an accurate watch.
The movement in this version of the BR-05 isn’t any different to look at than the other watches in the range, but again, that’s no bad thing. There’s a sticker with the Bell & Ross ampersand logo covering the main rotor bearing, and the rotor itself has been styled to look like a sporty alloy wheel; at least, to me, that’s what it looks like. The grainy grey finish is contemporary and there’s no rotor wobble like there is on other Sellita-powered watches.
So, how best to sum this one up. It’s an elegant smart/casual sports watch. With 100m of water resistance and that brushed/polished stainless steel case, there’s clear sporting potential, but it’s not got rotating dials or any other bells & whistles to make it look remotely technical. And while it doesn’t look exactly like Bell & Ross’ most pilot-y models the square shape and exposed screw heads remind us of its heritage.
It’s not all sunshine and roses, though, there are two issues I have with it. The first, as I pointed out in my Horolum review, and I apologise for referring to that one again, is that the crown is too small. It was hard to get a good grip on and it seemed determined not to hook back on its thread when I wanted to screw it down. With that said, when taking photos I am constantly readjusting watches to get the hands in the ideal position, so I end up using the crown much more than owners are likely to in one sitting. If you kept this one running all the time it wouldn’t be a problem.
The other issue I have with it is the price. I get it, it’s a limited edition watch with some cool laser technology being used on its sapphire crystal dial, but I’m not sure that translates well to the customers. One of these will set you back $7,700 on the rubber strap or $8,200 on the bracelet. It’s a little difficult to see from Bell & Ross’ website whether they’re calculating sales taxes for the USA; they mention that they include VAT in their pricing, but VAT is something we Europeans have and Americans don’t because shopping and doing extra maths is fun, I guess.
I suspect that the price tags above don’t include sales taxes, and Bell & Ross say that deliveries in Florida will have a further 7% tax added to the price with no reason given for that. I’m guessing it’s a local law Floridians are familiar with. Some leeway can be given for the fact that Bell & Ross is an independent watchmaker, meaning it doesn’t have a giant corporation like Richemont or the Swatch Group to help it out in rougher economic climates and ours have been really rough as of late.
With all of that said the Bell & Ross BR-05 Arctic Skeleton is a high-quality watch and one I’d like to have around as an alternative to the usual, which incidentally is where I think Bell & Ross works best. It could easily be your daily driver timepiece if you wanted it to, thanks to the robust case and movement, although it would still be elegant to go to evening events as a dressier watch. Flexibility like that has real value. I wonder if they’ve sold all 250 yet; if not, you’ll need to make your way to one of their boutiques or order it from their e-boutique.
