Deconstructed Watch: Bremont Supernova

Since founding Bremont in 2002, brothers Nick and Giles English have been working towards a goal of returning Britain to large-scale watch manufacturing.

The pair now come a step closer to achieving that goal with the arrival of Bremont’s first series production watches powered by the brand’s ENG-300 in-house movement.

The three new models are the Fury (a classic pilot design), the Audley dress watch and the Supernova, pictured above, which marks a stylistic departure for Bremont in being its first integrated bracelet model.

The ENG-300 base movement began as the K1 calibre originally developed by Swiss maker THE+, which Bremont has acquired full rights to remanufacture.

That has led to a claimed 80 per cent of the mechanism being re-engineered by Bremont, with new features such as a revised escapement, extensively modified bridges, improved jewelling and the addition of a bespoke tungsten winding rotor.

All of the work has been carried out at The Wing, Bremont’s 35,000 square foot manufacturing and technology facility in Henley-on-Thames, Oxfordshire, which has the theoretical capacity to produce up to 50,000 watches per year.

The ENG-300 debuted a year ago in a limited edition of 150 ‘Longitude’ watches, but the brand now plans to scale-up production of the movement to enable it to be used in as many as 3,000 timepieces during the next year — a development it is calling ‘the most significant’ in its 20-year history.

The ENG-300 series movements are tested using Bremont’s own H1 Timing Standard which is said to exceed the official ISO benchmark that determines whether or not a watch mechanism is of chronometer-grade accuracy.

Unlike the regular test, H1 evaluates movements with subsystems such as self-winding mechanisms and date discs already fitted, just as they will leave the factory.

The tests have also been carried out with the mechanisms placed in concept watch cases that have been taken extremes, including being put through multiple live launches with ejection seat manufacturer Martin-Baker.

The £7,995 Supernova uses a complex, hardened steel case, which is said to have taken three years to develop. It is entirely made in-house and features satin-grained and polished areas that are finished in 12 separate stages.

The tapered bracelet is a bespoke design and also made at the manufacture, while dials come in a choice of Midnight Blue, Pitch Black or Albus White with each version having a transparent case back revealing the new movement.

Large-scale watch manufacturing came to an end in the UK in 1970 when Smith’s — which once produced as many as 500,000 mechanical timepieces per year — closed its factories in Cheltenham, Gloucestershire and Ystradgynlais in Wales. The firm’s decline was blamed on changing fashions and the arrival of inexpensive, battery-powered movements.