The Best Minimalist Watches For Men

These Minimalist Watches Prove That Less Is More In Stylish Wristwear

November 28, 2016

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It’s a horrible cliché to describe a watch’s ‘timeless’ design, but it makes sense when you’re talking about the best minimalist watches. These styles – characterised by a very deliberate lack of bells and whistles – have been around for decades, harking back to Bauhaus and mid-century modernist rules. Less-is-more functionality is the big mainstay, and the clean aesthetic will appeal to any man who thinks chunky, flashy watches are the wrist-bound equivalent of a red Ferrari.

RELATED: Affordable Slim Watches

They pair nicely with everything from jeans to dinner jackets and you’ll find clean lines and understated elegance at every budget, from affordable quartz options through to the very best in Swiss and German watchmaking. Here are our favourites.

Braun Gents Classic Slim

Braun’s slimmest case houses a typically clean and clear design. The man behind Braun’s watches is the German designer Dieter Rams. He came from the Functionalist school and aimed for products that said “less, but better”. Job done on this clean and pleasantly affordable model.
£129.19 at Amazon

Mondaine Helvetica No1 Light

Known for its iconic Swiss railway watches, Mondaine’s line based on the classic Helvetica font makes complete sense. It’s a marriage of streamlined simplicity that’s all the more refined for the lack of anything shouty going on with the design. That Milanese bracelet will look great under the cuff of a crisp white shirt and an accurate quartz movement keeps you on time as well as on point.
£300 at Asos

Movado Museum Watch

First designed in 1947, the feature-less dial on Movado’s Museum watch is punctuated only by a disc at 12 o’clock, which supposedly symbolises the sun at high noon. Wear it as an elegant, non-stuffy dress watch.
£375 at Watch Shop

Uniform Wares M40

East London brand Uniform Wares designs watches with the bare minimum bling or branding. If you want tachymeters, skeleton dials or bezels the size of a hubcap, you’d best look elsewhere. This brand is about well-made (Swiss-made) timepieces that offer restrained luxury over macho, try-hard design additions. The M40 in grey is a good example of its architectural good looks.
£350 at Mr Porter

Junghans Max Bill Chronoscope

Max Bill was an architect and designer who collaborated with German watchmaker Junghans in the 1950s. He came from the Bauhaus design tradition – think functional beauty with no pointless ornamentation. The watch named after Bill follows those rules to the letter. Under a beautifully domed case, you have a dress watch that is also simple enough for everyday wear, with a self-winding chronograph movement running the show.
£1,500 at John Lewis

Daniel Wellington Classic

Clean, elegant watches look great on a colourful Nato strap, as this example from Daniel Wellington proves. The stark hour markers stand out proud against the eggshell dial, and the interchangeable strap will pep up and prep up any outfit.
£103.20 at John Lewis

Nomos Glashutte Metro Neomatik

A favourite of our very own Watch Snob, Nomos is a brand that creates automatic watches with in-house movements noticeably more affordable than others in its class. As watchmakers go, the German company is relatively new. Founded just after the fall of the Berlin Wall, its design ethos is much older, harking back to Bauhaus design with simple, modernist, easy-to-read dials. The Metro Neomatik takes its minimalism a step further with an ultra-thin calibre that makes the watch very slender on the wrist.
£2,880 at Goldsmiths

Kartel Kendrick

Kartel supposedly makes watches inspired by the Scottish landscape, although we’re not seeing anything rugged or overly dramatic in this splendidly clean design. The quartz-powered timepiece is a dark knight accessory for a monochrome look, with a nice peekaboo date display on its otherwise blackout design.
£90 at Watch Shop

Rado True Thinline

There’s almost nothing extraneous on Rado’s stripped back beauty, but this watch is minimalistic in more ways than one. As well as its unadorned dial design, the case measures just 4.9mm off the wrist and, thanks to Rado’s obsession in materials, the scratchproof ceramic is almost shockingly light.
£1,700 at Goldsmiths

Greyhours Vision Classic

Founded in 2014, Greyhours produce a small number of watches but in a vast array of colourways and strap options. A good example of how set-back design can somehow jump out at you, the brand’s Vision Classic has a well-balanced dial with day and date functions. The hour markers look embossed or stamped into the dial – a neat way of minimising fuss in the design without compromising legibility.
£180 at Greyhours

Skagen SKT1100 Smart Watch

Most minimalist design is about stripping away anything that doesn’t need to be there. Skagen takes a slightly different tack with its latest piece, which sneaks a surprising number of functions into a smartwatch that still looks clean on the wrist. Pairing with your smartphone, this offers notifications for texts and emails, subtle goal-tracking on the sub dial (for sleep and activity) and you can even take a photo remotely at the push of a button. You can argue about whether all of that is strictly necessary, but you can’t deny that it looks good.
£195 at House of Fraser

Georg Jensen Koppel

Better known for its silversmith work, Georg Jensen began making watches in the 1960s and worked with the Danish artist Henning Koppel in the 1970s. As you can see, there is no Scandi drama in the design, just elegance and understatement. There’s a Swiss ETA movement in the dial running the small seconds function at the centre of the dial.
£1,611 at Georg Jensen

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