But the real highlight of this watch isn’t the dial, it’s the back. The push-button above the signed crown already hints that there’s something unusual going on.

In one of my earlier reviews—specifically the review of the Raketa Baikonur—I mentioned that I bought the watch from Watchbandit.com. Ever since then, I’ve been getting regular updates from them, and every now and then I browse through their selection (by the way, their lineup of brands has grown impressively since then, though Raketa is no longer part of it). Even so, despite coming across quite a few watches that tempted me, browsing was as far as it went.

This review marks my 72nd watch article—and if I’ve counted correctly, I’ve now covered at least 106 watches. And yet, despite that decent number, you can't find a single review of a Seiko watch among them. Which is kind of odd, considering Seiko is one of the biggest watch brands in the world.

A few months ago, I already did a deep dive into Oceaneva’s Deep Marine Explorer (DME) collection of Swiss-powered dive watches. At that time, Oceaneva was already teasing a new diver on their website—once again using the Sellita SW200 movement—this time promising an insane 6000 meters of water resistance. Naturally, I signed up for their mailing list so I’d be notified as soon as pre-orders opened.

If you’re a regular visitor of my website, you already know that I started my watch collecting journey by exploring Soviet watches. However, I abandoned that collection years ago and shifted my focus primarily to the world of mechanical wrist alarm watches. In building and researching my alarm watch collection, I’ve relied heavily on the two reference books I mention here. But even though Beitl’s book in particular is a true encyclopedia of alarm watches, it omits one watch that remains unknown to most alarm collectors—at least outside of Russia. The only reason I even know of its existence is thanks to my earlier collecting passion for Soviet watches. As the title already suggests, I’m talking about the Raketa 3031 alarm watch.

Some time ago, a fellow “Watch Geek” published a review of a Super Compressor watch by Berny, and even earlier, a review of another watch by the same company, which was an homage to the JLC Polaris. In both reviews, he emphasized the very good, high-quality craftsmanship for an incredibly low price. Although the Polaris homage didn’t convince me (JLC, and especially the Polaris models, are too dear to me to “dishonor” them with an homage), the Super Compressor review did prompt me to at least visit the Berny website and see what they were doing.

In my reviews, I have spent quite a bit of time discussing Venezianico watches, so after my last review, I was convinced that I had more or less covered Venezianico and that I wouldn’t be writing about their watches again. And I stuck to this principle, even though in the meantime I bought two rather interesting watches (the Nereide Lapis Lazuli and especially the Nereide Aquaforte, which is quite a unique watch).

Some time ago, I wrote a review of my first Oceaneva watch with a Damascus case and dial. As evident from my review, I was very satisfied with the watch—my only issue was the low contrast between the dial color and the hands. This turned out to be such a problem that I eventually sold that particular watch and pre-ordered a model with a dark brown Damascus dial, which I also mentioned at the end of my review.

Jaeger Le-Coultre Memovox cal. 489

Have you ever asked yourself what the main reason is for choosing a specific watch among the countless options available when buying a new one? Did you buy it simply because you liked it, or perhaps because others consider it a "good" watch? Was the price the deciding factor? Did you carefully analyze comparable models and brands? Why did you choose that particular model?

I must admit, I originally had no intention of writing about the watch you see before you today. In fact, I didn’t even plan to buy it. So why did this article about the Stalingrad Defender Titanium Lunar Dial come to be?

I apologize in advance to all watch enthusiasts — this won’t be a classic watch review as you might expect. This time, I have a watch on my desk that intrigues me for many other reasons: the Nubeo Star Trek Enterprise-D chronograph.

Honestly, I can’t even remember how long I’ve been on the Oceaneva company’s mailing list, nor do I know why I subscribed. It’s quite possible I’ve been on it since the company’s inception in 2019. Back then, this USA-based microbrand introduced its first diver watch, the Deep Marine Explorer 1000m, along with its vision to become one of the most recognized brands for quality and water resistance. They’ve actually lived up to that promise, offering watches with a declared water resistance of over 1000 m (mostly 1250 m), with the Deep Marine Explorer III even reaching 3000 m. Additionally, they boast that they are the only USA brand to test water resistance at actual ocean depths and claim to be one of only six brands in the world to do so.

Not so long ago, I wrote about the Venezianico Arsenale watch, sharing my impressions of the version with a purple dial. My conclusion wasn’t too optimistic. Even though the watch is exceptionally high-quality, I mentioned that I planned to sell it and rather purchase the black dial version for my son—a version I personally found very boring. Since then, two things have happened.

Incredible but true! Just one day after publishing the review of the Redentore Enigma watch, I received a notification from Venezianico that my Arsenale was ready for shipment. The reason for the time gap between the review of the Enigma and this one wasn’t due to a long wait for the Arsenale, but rather my holiday absence.

As almost every weekend, I received a newsletter from OrologioChePassione last weekend as well. Normally, I just skim through it, but this time, the Hoffman Diver 40 watch caught my attention. I was already familiar with the Hoffman brand thanks to this store, as they’ve been selling Hoffman watches for quite some time. However, until now, I hadn't found anything from Hoffman particularly appealing. Their flagship collection is undoubtedly the Racing 40 line, which consists of chronograph watches powered by the Seiko VK64 mechaquartz movement. I believe there are currently 16 different models in this collection, and I recently read that — for the first time in a long while — all versions are in stock.

It hasn’t been long since I posted my review of two Venezianico watches here.

One of my most time-consuming hobbies is by far cycling, primarily road cycling. I have two road bikes — one is located at home and the other at my holiday cottage. Let me be quite clear: I am just an amateur rider; I have never participated in any race! However, I enjoy watching races. Whenever there is a road cycling event on Eurosport, I try to watch it. So it's no surprise that at the beginning of May this year, I spent quite a lot of time on my sofa, closely following the first Grand Tour of the season — the Giro d’Italia.