The echo/neutra Rivanera is a watch like that. It’s one of my favorite watches of the year both because it feels completely new and different, and not like anything I’ve seen before, at least at its price point, and is also in communication with watchmaking history, putting a very different spin on a format that just about every watch lover has some familiarity with. It’s a watch that I’ve seen people immediately connect to, and it honestly gives me hope that the community is open to daring design decisions in a way that it might not have been just a few years ago.
We’ve covered echo/neutra on Worn & Wound for years. They are a niche microbrand with a devoted following and have always made watches of very high quality, but if I’m being completely honest, up until the Rivanera they hadn’t made a watch that really resonated with me. So, that was really surprise #1, and I don’t think it should be overlooked. I’m probably more guilty than most of looking to brands I’ve liked in the past to continue making watches I’ll be drawn to, but the Rivanera is a good reminder, at least for me, that great ideas can come from anywhere. Enthusiasts who count echo/neutra as a favorite likely didn’t need to be told they were capable of something like this, but for everyone else, there’s an undeniable excitement in finding something unexpected in a brand that wasn’t necessarily on your radar.
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Broadly, what echo/neutra has done with the Rivanera is rethink one of the most classic, well worn watch designs and place it in an entirely new context. The rectangular dress watch, for a literal century, has been a mainstay in watch design. We can all point to the obvious examples of classic and important watches from the likes of Cartier and Jaeger-LeCoultre, but the Tank and Reverso just scratch the surface – you’d be hard pressed to find a brand that’s been around for any significant length of time that hasn’t at one point or another made a rectangular dress watch. It’s a design trope in watches that’s every bit as common as the field watch, or the diver, or the racing chronograph, if not significantly more so.
It’s too easy to say that echo/neutra have taken the principles of a classic rectangular dress watch and crossed it with a modern tool watch. I mean, they have literally done that with the Rivanera, and that’s maybe the elevator pitch for this watch. But I think to reduce it to Cartier meets tool watch does not give echo/neutra the respect they deserve here, because the result is a lot more complex than a simple mashup. Also, we shouldn’t forget that Cartier themselves have effectively made sporty versions of their watches for years. You can buy a Santos with a black ADLC coating on a rubber strap right now, if you’d like. The Calibre de Cartier dive watches are (unfortunately) discontinued, but these are what sporty Cartiers really look like.
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The Rivanera, to me, is a much more original creation because of the way it uses the rectangular dress watch format as a canvas for a completely unique aesthetic. When I posted this watch to my Instagram recently, one commenter referred to it as a “neo gothic minimalist” version of a Tank, and I’m going with that. This is a watch that could have been pulled from an imagined reality where Dracula runs a design firm, or if the concept of a rectangular dress watch was born in the 2020s rather than the early 20th century. Because this watch, more than most watches that you’d draw easy comps with, feels distinctly contemporary.
Much of the Rivanera’s originality and charm come from the more technical aspects of the case construction and finishing. The sandblasted titanium case measures 40mm from top to bottom and is just 5.9mm tall. That, for most people, is going to be in that “impossibly thin” category where you will literally have to check periodically to make sure the watch is still on your wrist (the lightweight titanium case is doing some of the work here as well, of course).
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The dimensions themselves are only part of the story, though. The case geometry is deceptively complex. While the watch wears quite flat on the wrist, visually it has a lot of angles and little facets that make it feel sculptural, which is pretty tough to do when you’re dealing with a case height that doesn’t even clear 6mm. echo/neutra is able to achieve this through lugs that angle slightly downward and are paired with an outer facet that matches that angle precisely. This polished edge creates a dramatic visual contrast with the rest of the case, which is entirely sandblasted and has the color of a cool, gray overcast sky, typical of grade 5 titanium. The eye is drawn to those angles and makes a case that in reality is quite flat have the appearance of something with more height and shape.
I imagine one of the keys to achieving the intended effects of the case design is the use of the ETA 7001 movement, which can be seen via an exhibition case back on the reverse side of the watch. While not really a caliber for the movement nerds out there, this is a perfect choice for the Rivanera. It’s thin, robust, and, most importantly, allows echo/neutra to meet what must have been a tricky design goal without charging an inordinate amount of money to their clients. At $1,490, it feels like you’re getting something pretty special for a very competitive price, in my opinion. I’m sure there will be some who think nearly $1,500 is too much to pay for a watch powered by such a simple movement, but those people will almost surely not have handled the Rivanera. To do so is to understand the incredibly tight tolerances that must be observed in the manufacturing process, and the deliberate nature of the design where every micron across the surface of the watch is considered. None of that comes cheap.
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The material, finishing, and size of the case make the Rivanera feel like a completely modern creation, but if there’s an area of the watch that’s drawn almost fully from classic design principles, it’s the dial. This is an aspect of the watch where echo/neutra have decided to hew somewhat close to traditional dress watch norms, with an Art Deco style minute track and handset, and minimal branding. We also get thin, applied hour markers which are nicely faceted and do a perfectly commendable job of catching and reflecting light, aiding somewhat in legibility. If I have a small criticism of the Rivanera, it’s that legibility is a bit tricky given the changing shape of the minute track and the small size of everything you’re meant to look at. This, ultimately, is more of a personal eyesight problem than a Rivanera problem, and it’s really only a concern if you’re trying to get the time exact and to-the-minute. A more general approximate readout of the time is not a problem at all.
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Wearing the Rivanera is a lot of fun, and I found that while it might initially read as a dress watch for most simply because of the shape, it really works as a casual, daily wearer. I chalk that up to the tones of the case and dial (the dial can be had in the black seen here, as well as a very nice gray colorway) as well as the size. This watch, unlike many retro inspired rectangular dress watches I’ve tried on over the years, is big enough to feel like a modern watch on my 7.5 inch wrist – it doesn’t feel miniature in any way. And the dichotomy between that classic rectangular shape and the industrial finishing really makes the watch feel like a statement piece, almost in the vein of something like the C1 Bel Canto. Though not as radical as a Bel Canto, it presents as a similarly futuristic or almost hyperreal design. This is a watch that feels like it could be a prop made for a science fiction movie, or worn by a supervillain in a comic book. It’s truly imaginative, and dares to exist well outside the context of watches that came before it.
Some time ago, I wrote about a watch by Isotope that positioned itself as an imagined version of a 1940s pilot’s watch. That was a watch that wasn’t vintage inspired, but imagined, effectively, an entirely new vintage, a fanciful alternate timeline that can only exist in the imagination, or, I suppose, on your wrist if you buy into what’s happening here. I get similar vibes from the Rivanera. It doesn’t claim to be some future version of a Tank or anything so specific, but there’s some world building happening with the aesthetic, simply because of how unusual it is. It’s asking us to put it in a certain bucket, but the bucket doesn’t exist, so we have to create an entirely new one, and that’s exciting.
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All of us here at Worn & Wound see a ton of new watches every year, and every year there are big new releases that are predictable favorites and make their way to year end retrospectives (which we’ll be starting up here very soon), but it’s watches like the Rivanera that I’m genuinely grateful for, because in addition to just being a great experience on the wrist, they challenge us to think about why it’s appealing. There’s something almost mysterious about it and I’m not sure I fully have a grasp on it yet, but the pleasure I’ve had in attempting to get to the bottom of it has been one of the year’s big surprises. echo/neutra
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