Remember me
The GRØNE brand was introduced in the fall of 2024 at the absolute height of what I think can fairly be called the diffusion line craze. Between MB&F with their M.A.D. Editions, Hajime Asaoka with Kurono Tokyo, and a host of others, high end watchmakers making accessible products in a well understood design language has been one of the more interesting developments across the independent watchmaking landscape over the past few years. The pace of these projects coming to market has slowed down somewhat, but that’s only helped us understand which ones are taken seriously as brands unto themselves by their founders and operators. GRØNE, I think, falls into the category of a brand that the founders, Bart and Tim Grönefeld, who also of course run their eponymously named brand, take seriously, or at least as a labor of love for their friends and family who are priced out of their largely handmade luxury watches.
The latest from GRØNE is a new three-hander in two variants, one meant to be serious and the other a little more playful. Both, I think, do a nice job of capturing the aesthetic cues of the Grönefeld brand in a way that previous efforts did not, while also acting as a showcase for the personalities of Bart and Tim.
The new Horologium is available in two variants: “Quirky” and “Classic”. The Quirky variant has a bright orange dial that points to the brand’s Dutch heritage with complementary baby blue accents. The Classic is a more refined salmon dial with sunray finishing. Both feature diamond cut and polished applied hour markers, and a multilayer dial construction with a bowled subsidiary seconds at 6:00.
These watches are the first time only GRØNE pieces to feature a display caseback, which shows off the manually wound La Joux-Perret caliber, which has a surprising amount of custom finishing in this execution. The caliber features sunburst snailing, blued screws, machine anglage, and a combination of surface treatments including sandblasting and mirror polishing. Both the Quirky and Classic variants feature a visible orange gasket on the caseback crystal. The Quirky variant also includes the words “Zoals het klokje thuis tikt, tikt het nergens” (“home sweet home”) printed on the inside of the crystal, while the Classic variant has no printed text on the crystal.
The case of the Horologium is 39mm in diameter and has been very subtly refined from previous GRØNE cases for this new release. The caseband now has a satin brushed finish, which the brand says creates an illusion of thinness (the case measures 10mm thick). The lugs have also been slightly redesigned for a more pronounced downturned angle to improve wearability.
I’ve had a chance to see previous editions of GRØNE watches in the wild a handful of times and I’m always impressed. While they obviously don’t match the intricacy and handmade feel of a Grönefeld, the brothers have done a nice job of distilling their unique design sensibilities into something far more affordable and easy to access (these watches will almost certainly sell out, but there’s still a years long waitlist for a Grönefeld piece). And while the effectiveness of case and dial finishing on a watch at this price is subjective, I’ve always come away from my experiences with GRØNE watches thinking they represent a good value for the quality of the product you wind up with.
The Horologium will be available to order beginning on August 13. Each variant is limited to 188 pieces, and delivery is expected in September. The retail pricing is set at €2,390, excluding all taxes and shipping. GRØNE