Credits: Article and images by Tim Mosso @ Quill & Pad. See the original article here - https://quillandpad.com/2024/02/02/hyt-h2o-reviewed-by-tim-mosso-it-looks-huge-but-it-merely-wears-big/
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The H20 employs a proprietary rubber strap fixed by screws to the case. It’s a secure arrangement for a large, heavy, and expensive watch.
HYT’s specific design choices yield a quirky band that looks like it might be a 1990s Ikepod homage – albeit differentiated by golf ball dimples.
This HYT titanium deployant clearly is a purchased component, but its push-button micro-adjustment feature is brilliant regardless of origin.
What’s it like to wear the H20? It’s great fun on its own terms. This isn’t something to be taken too seriously. The size, shape, and display system broadcast the H20’s novelty status, and I mean that not in the Baselworld sense of “novelty” but in the Texas State Fair sense. HYT’s watch is wonderful the same way fried ice cream, two-pound hotdogs, and lifted one-ton dually diesel pickups are wonderful.
Civilization likely would implode if we lived that way daily, but on the right occasion, it’s a blast.
The H20 is refreshingly devoid of pretense because it’s so ridiculous.
And unlike hundreds of haut-de-gamme watches I’ve worn, the H20 is a magnet for gen pop curiosity. Well-meaning people with no prior interest in watches approach the H20 with genuine awe and interest.
Most of these folks wouldn’t bat an eye at some elite independent product with an eight-year waiting list, but the HYT hits them like a magnet. There’s something wonderful about a watch that instantly and profoundly commands the attention of potential newcomers to the watch hobby.
Looking back on how many words I’ve wasted on wristwatch evangelism, it’s shocking to see the H20 achieve liftoff almost non-verbally. Granted, these same folks have a coronary when I tell them the price, but the seed was planted.
It can’t be a coincidence that many of the most original watch concepts issue from companies that seem to play chicken with fate. Upstart outfits like Devon, 4N, Cabestan, Hautlence, MCT, and HYT seem to fade into and out of production while fighting twilight battles against the centuries-old dominance of conventional hands and dials.
Whatever Urwerk figured out in 1997 remains a trade secret; nobody else in the indie space seems able to graft weird time displays to an ironclad business model. Hopefully, the recently reborn HYT company breaks the cycle. This world is more interesting with watches like the H20 in it.
For more information, please visit https://www.hytwatches.com/aboutus
Quick Facts: HYT H2O
Reference: 251-AC-46-BF-RU
Case: Stainless steel with 51mm diameter, 20.4mm thick
Dial: Luminescent with rhodium plated brass, PVD blue, regulator display of hours, minutes, seconds
Movement: Caliber 210 APRP-designed, manual wind, 192-hour power reserve, 28 jewels, 3Hz, free sprung, full balance bridge, overcoil hairspring
Functions: hours, minutes, seconds, power reserve indicator, temperature gauge, retrograde minutes
Production period: 2018-2020
Limitation: 25 pieces
Original Retail Price: $95,000
Market Value 2023: $35,000
* Tim Mosso is the media director and watch specialist at Watchbox. You can check out his very comprehensive YouTube channel at www.youtube.com/@WatchBoxStudios/videos.
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Credits: Article and images by Tim Mosso @ Quill & Pad. See the original article here - https://quillandpad.com/2024/02/02/hyt-h2o-reviewed-by-tim-mosso-it-looks-huge-but-it-merely-wears-big/