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Temporal Works, the brand brought to you by Armoury founder Mark Cho and the Armoury’s creative director Elliot Hammer, is only about six months removed from their first release at the end of last year. Today, they’ve unveiled the next watch in their Series A collection, dubbed the Rambler. It’s a slight tweak on the simple idea that defined the Series A in the first place. According to Cho, he thought of that watch as something that should be as straightforward and effortlessly elegant as a well tailored navy blazer. If that first batch of Series A watches could be thought of as trading in a somewhat elevated level of refinement, the new Series A Rambler takes a similar approach but with a more rugged perspective.
The new Rambler takes a more tool watch forward approach than its predecessor in a few key ways. First, the case has been finished with a bead blasting process and forgoes the polishing of the original Series A, making it immediately more of a casual, toned down piece. Matte dials in “Black Sesame” and “Red Bean” feel both classic and kind of earthy, with handset designs borrowed from historic pilot watches. It’s a tasteful, sector dial with the brand’s logo appearing at the 4:00 position, and no additional text to speak of. Straps are also appropriately casual, with the black dial pairing with an olive canvas strap, and the red dial one in gray Alcantara.
The Series A Rambler is sized at 37mm in diameter and 45mm from lug to lug. It’s 10mm thick, thanks in part to the use of a Sellita SW210 movement with around 42 hours of power reserve. If there’s one small knock on the watch, it might be that the water resistance rating is only 50 meters, which is honestly plenty, but perhaps not quite enough to satisfy some enthusiasts who will see this positioned as an outdoorsy tool watch of a certain type. It’s not really that, at least not in a hardcore way, but instead more of a very well considered design object that is a bit of a companion piece to those first Series A watches we saw last year.
Temporal Works is a really interesting project, coming directly from Cho and Hammer, who occupy a unique space in the watch world. The Armoury is of course a menswear institution at this point, and Mark Cho is a serious watch collector with hugely varied taste and a great eye for design. Temporal Works, then, is a space for the menswear and watch worlds to actually meet in the form of a product, which is less common than you might think given the natural overlap between the two. There just aren’t a ton of examples of watch brands dipping into apparel (the hats and t-shirts given out at Watches & Wonders and other trade events don’t count) and menswear brands don’t typically have the resources to produce watches in a serious way. So, creative partnerships are needed to fuse the two, and as we await what we assume will be a Series B, C, and beyond, it’s interesting to consider how Temporal Works might evolve.
The Temporal Works Series A Rambler carries a retail price of $2,500 and is available now through the Armoury’s locations in New York City and Hong Kong, and via their website. It’s also available with a custom bracelet from Staib (in a matching bead blasted finish) for an extra $250. Temporal Works
