Maybe you know Ressence, and maybe you don’t. Either way it is worth reiterating that simply put, no one else makes watches in the same way. Plenty of brands have come up with novel ways of displaying the time, from Urwerk’s radial wandering hours and retrograde minutes to Christophe Claret’s magnetic balls suspended in tubes. However, no other brand takes the same dedicated approach to making the basic concept of hours, minutes and seconds fundamentally more legible. By placing each of them on a disc that rotates in the same plane, Ressence’s Type 3 retains the at-a-glance angle between the hands, but removes any ambiguity between them. It’s like a regulator dial for the 21st century – but then, in a true maverick move, Ressence fills the dial compartment with oil, for perfect visibility at any angle with zero refraction.

Well, back to basics by Ressence’s standards, at least. This limited-edition piece (rather than a specific numbered limitation, it will only be produced for the year of 2022, an approach Ressence took last year with its all-red Type 1) sees the Type 3’s dial stripped back to its essential elements. The running seconds indicator has been removed, making this much closer to the original Type 3 design that won a GPHG award in 2013. All colours have also been washed away, leaving just white and pale grey to contrast with the black background. High-impact is also the order of the day on the case back, where the underside of the smooth sapphire has been DLC-coated, before being engraved with text that’s then painted white.

Followers of the brand will know that before the Type 3BBB there was the Type 3BB, and the Type 3B before that. And yes, you guessed it, the “B” stands for black. No points for imaginative nomenclature; maximum points for taking one simple idea as far as it can go. The 3B simply had a black dial and strap; the Type 3BB added a black DLC-coated titanium case, and now the Type 3BBB gives the dial the ultimate monochrome makeover explained above. It’s fair to say this is probably the end of the line for black Type 3 designs, at least if Ressence wants to keep its reputation for making watches you can actually read.