Toledano & Chan has introduced their latest release, the B/1 Dazzle. Eagle eyed GPHG watchers might have gotten a small tease of this one when nominations were released a few months back (it’s fairly routine for brands to submit embargoed watches, and they’re often revealed before the official launch as part of the GPHG voting process), but now the cat is fully out of the bag. The Dazzle is actually a pair of watches, both using Toledano & Chan’s now familiar case architecture inspired by the former Whitney Museum building, designed by Marcel Breuer, and Brutalist forms and ideas more generally. Now with several distinct releases under their belt, it’s becoming more and more interesting to see how Toledano & Chan iterate on this platform. The Dazzle might be my personal favorite of the executions of this case design to date.
The idea for the Dazzle comes from camouflage used on battleships during the first World War. The so-called “dazzle” camouflage design was not meant to conceal, but to use complex geometry to confuse the enemy by disrupting proportion. The alternating black and white bars painted onto a ship that’s in constant motion would have been difficult for an adversary to pin down. The dazzle design language has been used in art and design for many years since, including on watches, but Toledano & Chan’s version plays with the idea in a few interesting ways that I haven’t seen before.
Like the most recent B/1 releases, this one is in titanium, and the entire case and integrated bracelet are covered with the dazzle lines and planes. What’s notable here though is that the finishing of each plane is uniform across the case, bracelet, and dial, which reinforces the idea of the B/1 as a sculptural object, something that I think has always been hinted at but made particularly clear here. The finishing is incredibly cool in person, and is achieved through a process whereby the pattern is CNC engraved, frosted with diamond dust, and brushed to a beautiful matte finish.
In addition to the standard B/1 Dazzle, Toledano & Chan is also releasing what they are playfully referring to as the B/1 Double Dazzle, which features a dial with 350 natural diamonds. I was really drawn to this one when we had samples of both watches in the office. The diamonds are impressive but also, somehow, a little under the radar, and I also enjoy the visual pun of using the concept of “dazzle” in multiple ways with this variant. And for anyone who follows Toledano & Chan cofounder Phil Toledano on Instagram, the use of diamonds here will immediately jump out as part of his “geezer watch” aesthetic. The design here feels very much informed by his own collecting taste, which I suppose will be hit and miss with each individual enthusiast depending on how much their own taste lines up with Phi’s, but I’m guessing if you’re remotely interested in one of these watches, there’s at least some overlap.
The specs for these watches line up with previous B/1 releases, meaning the titanium case is a little smaller than the first run of steel watches, coming in at 32mm by 30.6mm, and 12.3mm thick inclusive of the sloping crystal. It runs on a Swiss automatic movement. The standard version is a limited run of 188 pieces with a retail price of $7,700, while the Double Dazzle is priced at $9,700 and limited to 12 pieces. Both of the new Dazzle pieces will be available directly from Toledano & Chan as well as their authorized retailers beginning October 24. Toledano & Chan
