Zinvo Blade – Hands-on review

June 16, 2015

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Zinvo Blade

From time-to-time, I come across a watch that is quite intriguing, with a design that won’t let me indifferent, it just bugs me. Such a piece is the Blade, a three hand and date watch by the Boston based microbrand, Zinvo.

I asked their founder, Borys Khudomaka, why he decided to start his own brand? He seemed to share the same problem as many other watch brand founders: he could not find a watch to his taste that would be affordable.

His first model was the Zinvo 1, a handsome three hands and date watch, with 44 mm carbon fibre case that gives him a sporty allure and powered by a quartz movement. Encouraged by the positive reception of the Zinvo 1, he went on and came up with a more daring design, the Blade.

At 13.2 mm, the Zinvo Blade sits quite high on the wrist

If Project Watches, an online boutique of unconventional quartz watches, would sell mechanical watches, for sure the Zinvo Blade would be a great candidate. What grabs the attention at this watch is the transparent disk replacing the seconds hand, printed with a propeller pattern, vaguely reminding me the Perellet Tourbine, only that here, the disk is covering the hours and minutes hands, leaving visible only their tips, to somehow help you read the time.

The dial of the Zinvo Blade

The brushed metal chapter ring, in my opinion, is one of the coolest features of this watch. Indexes are replaced by holes drilled into it, wider one for 12, 3, 6 and 9 o’clock and a smaller diameter at every other five minutes.

While it’s hard to see, there is a date window, which for this model, I would have preferred it to be skipped altogether. It is not very useful and it’s just a hassle having to set it, plus it would have been cool to have a microbrand doing a no-date model.

The sapphire crystal on the dial side has the Zinvo logo printed in grey, it works well with the rest of the watch, especially with the stainless steel case.

The round stainless steel case comes with a diameter of 44 mm and with a height of 13.2 mm. On the wrist it sits larger, not just because of its lug-to-lug 50 mm length, but probably the crown too, by sticking out 4.3 mm, has something to do with it. Thanks to its shape and size the crown is really easy to manipulate, and I also like the way it echoes the same hole patterns found on the chapter ring.

A side view of the Zinvo Blade

The high profile of the case, offers plenty of surface to create a nice machine turned pattern playing with the textures. The case combined with the attached lugs and the black leather strap with red stitching, give the Blade a rather sporty, going in the direction of motorsport watches. And this is where I think its secret lies, the Blade is a dialog between a sculptor, a pilot and a mechanic.

I won’t recommend the Blade, unless you are open to a new approach, to something uncommon, if you enjoy trying out unbeaten paths. Its price is one of the most affordable in this category, at $185, you can’t go wrong with the Blade. It is the kind of watch that I would put in the “conversation starter” category you should consider adding it to your collection.

A closer look at the dial

With the Blade we are only at the beginning of the Zinvo story, there is a new model in the works, called Rival, a casual stainless steel timepiece on rubber strap that will be unveiled in the coming weeks. Early July, there will be a full carbon fibre model, called Venom. They are also looking into moving the production of their watches to Switzerland and employing Swiss movements, of course with the price increase that such a move implies.

I asked Borys, where he would see Zinvo in 10 years from now?

I certainly see Zinvo a well-developed brand with a big variety of watches. Women’s line will definitely be there a bit later. 10 years is a long-term and it is hard to imagine how everything will turn out, but we got big plans for development and expansion. We are very excited about every new watch we make. We will certainly remain passionate (about watches), and we believe it is the key to success.

More at uk.zinvowatches.com