If you’ve been watching the socials lately, you’ll know that Chanel is a talking point for men right now. Encouraged by a handful of seriously A-list men like A$AP Rocky wearing one-off tweedy jackets and toting signature interlocking C bags, men who are into style have begun to gaze wistfully in the direction of the famously women-only brand, wondering, perhaps, if the house will finally cough up something significant for the boys. Well, if you’re one of them, you’re 26 years late.
When Chanel launched the 38mm J12 black ceramic watch in 2000, it was billed from the get-go as a unisex sports watch. The medium size (in an era when most men’s watches were sticking resolutely above 40mm) and the slinky polished ceramic certainly pleased the ladies too, making it a long-running best seller that endured largely unchanged until 2019. But the J12 was also sporty enough to appeal to men, all the more so as sizes increased in new editions like 2005’s Superleggera, inspired by legendary Milanese sports car coachbuilder Carrozzeria Touring, whose famous cursive logo graced some epic 20th century Ferraris, Alfa Romeos, and Aston Martins.
This week the Superleggera is back in a new 42mm, COSC-certified chronometer edition ($13,750) with the Superleggera logo picked out as before in red. While the original 41mm edition from 2005 was an aluminium and ceramic chronograph, the new version is sleeker in all black steel and ceramic, with a toned-down three hand execution. Should that not be quite sleek enough, another edition of the J12, also launching this week, is the J12 Golden Black ($12,150), featuring the same Kenissi 1.21 caliber chronometer but featuring a display using gold plated indexes on an all-black ground.
