Editor’s Note: Watches & Wonders (formerly SIHH) has moved online and Baselworld 2020 is canceled, but that hasn’t stopped watch brands large and small from debuting their new wares. Stay on top of this year’s best new watch releases here.
Bell & Ross is famous for its Instrument series watches, which draw on the gauges found in the cockpit of fighter aircraft. With their no-nonsense aesthetic and square case shape, they’re unique and easy to spot, and form a special niche in military-inspired timepieces that the brand has occupied since its inception in 1992.
The Instrument series provides a platform on which to iterate ad infinitum, and while some of those variants feel fairly run-of-the-mill, once in a while we get a true stunner from the brand, such as last year’s Bi-Compass. The latest entry in the BR 03-92 series, called the BR 03-92 HUD, looks just as cool.
“HUD” stands for “head-up display,” which you may be familiar with if you’re a military aircraft aficionado, or, alternatively, if you’re drive one of any number of modern vehicles that sport a version on the dashboard. A HUD is simply a transparent glass display that provides a pilot driver with mission-critical information (such as airspeed or heading) during a flight or drive.
The BR 03-92 HUD’s housing is that of any other BR 03-92 watch — 42mm matte black ceramic case; automatic movement with hours, minutes, seconds and date display; 100m of water resistance. However in this case, the hour hand takes the shape of a central, rotating disc, much like on the Bi-Compass, and the crystal is made of green-tinted sapphire with an anti-reflective coating and four right angles in the corners. The effect, when viewing the black, Super-LumiNova-coated dial, is reminiscent of that of a HUD on a jet aircraft.
While we’re sure that actual military pilots will say that the watch is hardly a perfect analog to a HUD, it’s tough tp argue that the watch isn’t pretty damn cool looking. Limited to 999 pieces and shipping with both black rubber and black synthetic fabric straps, the BR 03-92 HUD costs $3,990 and will be available beginning in June.
