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The Angelus Chronodate is a study in contrasts.
At first glance, the watch appears to be a vintage-inspired chronograph thanks to its traditional dial, which takes inspiration from the watchmaker’s deep history, which stretches back to 1891.
But a closer inspection reveals a bimaterial case utilizing carbon fiber that’s about as modern as watchmaking gets.
Angelus’s latest version of the Chronodate further blurs the lines between modern and vintage with an intriguing new dial shade that feels equally at home in both eras.
Coffee date
Part vintage, part modern, all beautiful.Angelus
When discussing the Chronodate’s dual nature, it’s worth taking a deeper dive into its case construction and dial layout.
There are two versions of the new Moka Edition — one in Grade 5 titanium and one in solid 5N red gold. But that only tells half of the story. Each respective version uses its aforementioned metal material for the bezel, lugs, crown and midcase.
But resting inside the midcase, and visible through its skeletonized sides, is an inner case made from a blacked-out, lightweight carbon composite. This carbon fiber material is also used for the parallelogram-shaped chronograph pushers attached to the midcase, which feature red text labels denoting their functions (start/stop and reset). Very modern stuff indeed.
The Chronodate features a unique case structure, with its metal exterior surrounding a carbon composite inner container that also includes the chronograph pushers.Angelus
Moving on to the dial, its coffee-inspired PVD sunray color recalls vintage copper-dialed chronographs while also coming across as modern and trendy, thanks to its daring pairing of a brown background with black subdials (what a fashion faux pas!).
Outside of the large, lume-filled, applied gold Arabic hour markers, the layout of the dial feels very vintage-Angelus, thanks to the oversized chronograph registers reminiscent of 1930s chronographs from the brand, the pointer date, which is derived from ’40s models, and the old-school syringe hands.
Powering this retro-modern stunner is Angelus’s in-house Calibre A-500 automatic movement, which is a column-wheel chronograph that runs at 4Hz, has a 60-hour runtime and features a very contemporary sandblasted and NAC-treated black finish. The rotor is a stylized version of a vintage Angelus logo and features a portion made of gold on the gold version or tungsten on the titanium model.
The watch is powered by an in-house Angelus movement featuring a vintage logo and a contemporary finish.Angelus
Pricing and availability
The Chronodate Moka in red gold is limited to just five examples and is sold on a brown alligator leather strap that’s a perfect aesthetic match to the mocha-colored dial.
The titanium version isn’t much more plentiful, with just 25 pieces being produced. It comes on a faux-integrated, flat-link titanium bracelet, while also including the same brown alligator strap. Additionally, both models also include a textured black rubber strap.
The gold Moka Edition is the pricier of the two, of course, coming in with an SRP of CHF 43,100 (~$54,222). The titanium model is significantly cheaper, but still a nice chunk of change at CHF 25,100 (~$31,577). Both are available now, assuming you’re well-connected.
Johnny Brayson is an editor at Gear Patrol mostly covering watches. He enjoys watches that are packed with blink-and-you’ll-miss-’em details and believes nearly every watch could stand to be a tad smaller.
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