Shortly after I posted the announcement of the inaugural watch from Egard Watches, Ilan contacted me asking if I was interested in reviewing the Shade when it was ready. I was excited at taking a look at the shade, and so I agreed. Ilan got the watch to me a week or two ago and I have been enjoying it for the past week or two at home, careful not to scratch the sample up. There will be an upcoming video review as well.
Gorgeous multi-layered dial with a peekaboo view of the skeletonized Miyota 8N24 movement. The front crystal is a curved, AR-coated sapphire crystal.. which for me is a very important feature. The roman numerals on the top half combined with the stick indices on the bottom half give the watch a pleasing look without being overly roman.
The hands are a softer, medium blue which reminds me a bit of JLC’s blue used on the Master Compressor Diver watches. A very pleasing color to me. The blue is continued on the upper and lower tracks for the roman numbers at 1 to 3 o’clock which adds a bit of continuity and is a nice touch.
Signed screw-down crown, which was unexpected to me. I thought it would be a pushdown crown due to the style, but screwdown is always a plus to me unless its a handwinder. You can get a sense of the case shape from the side view here – the watch is quite cylindrical. The bezel is rounded and stepped slightly, with angular lugs that are quite tight in to the case. The shorter lugs allow the 43mm case to feel a bit smaller, which is good since this is more of a dress watch.
A shot of the other side, which features an engraved “EGARD” name, which I found quite attractive. The fully polished case is quite well done and I really applaud the attention to design details. They didn’t just take something someone else made and change it a bit – its very unique looking.
Here’s a close up of the textured dial with applied romans, and all the various layers and dial elements applied as well. Its quite an attractive dial, but the vertical lines have sort of a wavey gloss to them that I would have preferred if it was a bit less glossy. More of a matte line would be my preference but still quite nice.
There’s a shot of the whole dial, and as you can see, there isn’t any lume at all on the dial. The hands actually look like they could have been filled with lume but were intentionally left skeletonized. The open heart feature shows the escapement quite nicely.
The back gives you an exhibition view of the Miyota 8N24 movement, which while not especially attractive, isn’t any less attractive than a bone stock ETA 2824 really. The exhibition glass is also sapphire, and the etched writing around the caseback proclaims the 200m water resistance, as well as the sapphire crystal and automatic movement.
Overall a solid first effort from a new watch company which I will be paying close attention to as they release more models. There are other models in the works, which are supposed to be higher end. I am excited to see what they have in store.
Specs:
43MM Case
Aerospace-grade 316L stainless steel
8N24 Skeletonized Automatic
Water Resistant to 660 feet | 20 ATM
Screw Down Crown
Sapphire Crystal Top
Anti Reflective Coating
Sapphire Crystal Bottom
High quality thick leather strap with butterfly buckle
Extra brown tang leather strap
