Changing of the Guard: Bremont Celebrates the Coronation of King Charles III & New Leadership at The Wing

There’s a certain level of homeland pride in every way that Bremont operates. It’s apparent in their designs and palpable throughout their entire company from top to bottom. The Giles brothers have made it their life’s mission to produce beautifully British-made mechanical watches and if there needs to be any more confirmation of how successfully that’s going, then let “The Wing”, Bremont’s vast campus and headquarters in Henley which has subsequently brought watchmaking back to U.K. shores, put any queries to bed. As Bremont ambassador and now friend of Worn & Wound, Alex Bescoby eloquently put it in a recent interview, “Bremont is all about beautifully putting together traditional and British design, and celebrating that.”

Well, for the folks living across the pond, there’s lots to celebrate as this past weekend, in front of 2,200 ceremony attendees and millions watching around the world, King Charles III was crowned as Great Britain’s new monarch. It’s only fitting that Bremont, who already has an ongoing partnership with the Ministry of Defence (MoD) to honor His Majesty’s Armed Forces, has released two limited edition models that marks a moment in history with the coronation of His Majesty.

The MBII King Charles III Limited Edition largely retains the familiar design cues of the Martin-Baker collection – dual crown configuration, internal rotating bezel, a distinct knurled barrel design and internal case reinforcements. As every other Bremont with the MB namesake, you can bet that this LE has also gone through a rigorous testing program including the Live Ejection Test, where the watch is attached to a test-dummy and is ejected out of a cockpit at speeds up to 30 Gs.

The tribute to the new leader of the Commonwealth on the dial is quite simple and subtle. The seconds hand is now adorned in purple, a regal color that dates its usage all the way back to the ancient monarchies. The seconds hand no longer sports the signature multi-colored loop at the end, but still has the lollipop design that extends right up to the dials edge. Other than that, this is your tried and true white dial MBII. Black Arabic numerals with corresponding outlined rectangular markers encircle the dial, a sword handset at the center, and a fully-graduated internal bezel ready to be used by way of the four o’clock crown.

The case utilizes a stainless steel Trip-Tick® case construction but the one significant difference here is a knurled barrel made out of titanium. Typically in a regular production MBII you’ll see an aluminum barrel, but this particular model uses the lightweight metal knocking the weight of the watch head down to 88 grams. On the underside of the watch, the caseback features a decorative emblem that honors and dates the coronation of King Charles III.

In addition to the white dial, Bremont also announced a black dial MBII King Charles III Limited Edition late last week. This model also uses the purple seconds hand and presents with the coronation emblem on the caseback. The knurled barrel however, gets a dial matching jet black shade as opposed to the titanium sheen on the white dial version. Both limited editions also feature recognizable case reinforcements that include an inner soft iron anti-magnetic Faraday cage and a patented anti-shock system mounted to the in-house Bremont Caliber BE-36AE.

At the time of the announcement of the black dial MBII King Charles III Limited Edition, the white dial version had already sold out of its limited 50 pieces and unfortunately at the time of this writing, the black dial limited edition model, which was limited to 100 pieces, has also sold out. The commemorative coin that accompanied both models will be made available to those who purchase a watch from Bremont for the entirety of this month.

In other Bremont-related news, the brand recently announced Davide Cerrato as CEO and a member of the board. Cerrato has been around the watch industry block with long-time stints at prominent luxury brands such as Panerai and Montblanc. Most notably however, was Cerrato’s tenure with Tudor. As Head of Marketing, Design & Product for Rolex’s sister company, Cerrato spearheaded the re-launch and design of the venerable Black Bay in 2012 which laid the foundation for a brand that would become a behemoth in their own right.

Following Bremont for some time now, it just seems that all the perfect pieces are coming together at just the right time. To appropriately use an NBA analogy being that the playoffs are in full-swing, Bremont is like a budding NBA team that has a strong front office foundation, has finally found the right coach, has the right mixture of player-personnel, and everything in between is clicking at exactly the right time. Since the launch of “The Wing” in 2021 and their first ever in-house movement with the ENG300, Bremont has shown promising growth as a brand while staying true to their identity. Now, with a sizeable $59M investment made by Bill Ackman and Hellcat LP back in January, a couple of next-generation pieces with in-house movements and Davide Cerrato at the helm, Bremont is positioned to make some more serious noise in the industry. Bremont