Today I get to present to you our newest brand at Timeless, Speake-Marin, joining other recent additions like Omega and Tudor. Choosing a Speake-Marin to review was quite difficult, as they have such varied and exotic models. I wanted to begin with their most affordable model, this Wing Commander, although not because of its price. This was simply the craziest dial we have in stock at the moment while we await the full panoply of Speake-Marins. I'm opening with a very sporty watch, but this look really only characterizes Speake-Marin's more recent offerings. Most of their watches are dressier and are probably best classified as haute horology, and rest assured, we'll get to those too. For today, however, we get to look at this extremely complicated sports watch.
Speake-Marin is a relatively young brand, roughly 15 years old, and is unusual among watch companies in that it's still run by its namesake. It's best known for its really exotic pieces, like the Triad, but it does have a fairly complete portfolio of high-end dress and sport watches, like this Wing Commander.
This model, the Wing Commander, is part of a collection of sporty watches called Spirit. It's joined by a similar looking chronograph, the Seafire. Although the Wing Commander lacks the chronograph complication of its brother, it's my favorite of the two. I like really avant garde dials like those you might find in a Zenith Chronomaster or JLC Master Geographic and this is right up there.
Despite the incredibly complicated look, it really only has two complications, a big date at 12:00 and a power reserve at 6:00, but they're both executed in a pretty interesting fashion, particularly the power reserve. The most striking element is the seconds subdial, however, which is absolutely massive and prominently features the brand's logo, based on a topping tool. This instrument, which reshapes wheel teeth, is a common motif throughout Speake Marin's lineup.
The Wing Commander may be fairly young, but the case it's in, the Piccadilly, is not. It is, by far, the brand's most prolific case, so much so that it can probably be seen as a symbol of Speake-Marin itself. In this instance, the watch is moderately large at 42mm, but relatively light due to its titanium composition.
The Wing Commander, aside from its brother the Seafire, is probably Speake-Marin's sportiest dial. It has the feeling of being inspired by a flieger, although it departs too greatly to be classified as one itself. The face almost comes off as tool watch-esque, with its super high contrast white, luminescent accents against a matte black dial, but stylistic flourishes like the hands and seconds subdial keep it out of that classification as well.
No, the Wing Commander is doing its own thing and defies easy classification. Even the matte black dial is a bit unique as, in bright light, it has just a little of sparkle to it.
There are many striking elements to the dial, but we'll start with the hands. The "poires stuart" hands are surprisingly classic but highly legible, thanks to a high degree of dissimilarity between hour and minute hands. They are both completely painted white, the center being white lume. Far more noteworthy is the seconds subdial, which is actually the logo of Speake-Marin. It resembles an elaborate topping tool, an instrument used to reshape the teeth of various gears. The entire disk rotates and, due to the forward-leaning shape of the spokes, it's quite mesmerizing to watch. Unlike similar approaches, like some TAG Heuer Grand Carrera models for instance, the seconds disk doesn't stutter. A small hole at the top of a spoke can be used to zero the subdial when setting the watch and as an index to determine how many seconds have passed, but really, the subdial here is much more for style than substance.
Almost as striking are the hour markers. The hour and minute markers are surprisingly large and very easy to read against the black dial. Most interesting, however, is the use of Roman numerals for only 3:00 and 6:00. This was necessitated because 9:00 and 12:00 are totally consumed with their respective subdials. Cutting off a numeral, which is itself undesirable (to me, at any rate), was not even an option here.
This all culminates in a rather dazzling display of lume. Pretty much every opportunity to add lume has been taken here with truly massive amounts applied to the hands and hour markers. Even more interesting is the use of cutouts above/on top of the writing for Speake-Marin, Power Reserve and Swiss Made in a fashion reminiscent of Panerai. This is a watch that is absolutely capable of being read late into the night, pretty much as well as any good dive watch. As always, neither the color nor intensity of the lume was edited for this photograph.
Here's a closer look at the big date complication, as well as that cool Panerai-esque recessed writing. Clearly Speake-Marin has gone with the A. Lange & Sohne approach to big dates, with one numeral a bit higher than the other. That's not quite ideal, at least when compared to alternatives from Girard-Perregaux and Glashutte Original, but those cost substantially more. There is a huge perk, at least in my book, to this date though, and that's that it changes over instantly at midnight. I hate seeing the date slowly roll over for an hour or more while I’m writing these articles late at night, and this one is completely free of that issue. As an added bonus, albeit slight, the quickset date is one of the fastest I've used and you can fly through dates almost instantly.
The power reserve, completely empty here, is another welcome touch and also includes recessed writing. It too is atypical, with three different colors showing how much power is left as opposed to something like the index on the North Flag. The silver (black in the photo, likely reflecting my camera) is the middle of the reserve and shows it's getting low while red means it's dead or near dead. It hides an interesting secret when wound, however.
Yes, even the power reserve is luminescent on the Wing Commander. The luminescent portion, white in daylight, is basically the "do not worry, you've got plenty of power left" area of the disk. When completely empty, it is reduced to a small line.
All in all, a pretty wild dial design. I always try to evaluate models against the backdrop of the category they're in, but I can't really classify this watch. Too busy and elaborate for a tool watch or flieger, yet too utilitarian to be a dress watch or haute horology piece, there isn't exactly a standard by which to judge it. In a sense, that's actually a compliment. It takes elements from many different styles and adds a new one, the seconds wheel, to create something quite novel.
The Wing Commander’s dial is a departure for Speake-Marin, but the case isn't. This is the brand's most important case, the Piccadilly, in titanium. It's a very elaborate element, mostly in the sense of its crown and lugs.
The shape of the case is basically a barrel, with a horizontally brushed center section and a highly polished bezel and ring around the very edge of the case back. The finishing here is very good and I'm surprised how bright the titanium in the watch is. It lacks the characteristic gray of that metal.
The crown is also very well finished and signed with the Speake-Marin logo. Its large size makes it very easy to set the time and wind the watch (although it's an automatic) and relatively easy to pull the crown out.
I always appreciate screwed lugs which is good because these are extremely pronounced. These are among the boldest and most stylized lugs available.
14mm really appears to be the emerging standard of modern watch thickness. As usual, it doesn't bother me, particularly on a sporty watch like this, but I do wish there were more options for thin watches out there.
The topping tool motif continues onto the solid back. Unfortunately, because I can't actually see the movement, much less take photos of it for anyone else, I'm skipping the movement section for this article. It's a Timeless (no, not us) 1024SPM, apparently, a bidirectional winding mechanical movement with 48 hours of power reserve. Beyond that, I can't tell you much about it, so hopefully I get a chance to see one of these movements uncased and I can write more thoroughly on it later.
Check out our video of the Wing Commander here.
So that's the Speake-Marin Wing Commander, one of the more complex reviews I've done from a writing perspective. Speake-Marin threw out the rule book for this model (and for most of his others too).
The Wing Commander, therefore, will appeal to collectors, primarily of fliegers, who are tired of the same basic variations on an old design.
For myself, I'm a fan of both power reserves and big dates, particularly ones that change over instantly, so those are big selling points for me. I also love the lume on the watch. It's far in excess of what was practically necessary, clearly done for the artistry of it, but I think it's very cool and something the owner will appreciate when he walks into a dark theater or back to his car from a restaurant at night. It's by no means a discreet watch, and yet, neither is it obtrusive, at least not in this black and white version. For the few that think this model didn't go far enough, it's available with red, blue or orange accents as well. I rather like the blue myself, but having spent some time with this watch I think that this black and white version is what I'd go for.
If this is your first look at Speake-Marin, I'd recommend checking out our Speake-Marin brand page here. Speake-Marin in general doesn't seem to do mundane, conventional watch designs, but they do have a wide variety of models, including dressier options.