And so to my own Top 3 Monacos. I now feel, having held and worn at least 10 of the variants, I am at last able to understand this question I have posed to many others this past year…...and the winners are!

1 - 1133B Chronomatic
2 - 74033N PVD
3 - 1133G/1533G

1 - For me the Holy Grail and my favourite Monaco also happens to be the hardest to find. The Chronomatic 1133B, is a beautiful watch, sure I am partly drawn to it because of its rarity, but in the flesh it’s the special metallic blue dial this variant shares with the transitional model and the magical word “Chronomatic” that sits where the Monaco appears on the later variants. Combined with the Monaco appearing where later models see the words “automatic chronograph”, for me it makes the dial layout more balanced and after all this watch (along with the Chronomatic Carrera and Autavia) tells us it’s the very first automatic chronograph in existence. Shortly after this watch was produced the Chronomatic name was purchased by Brietling and ceased to exist on Heuers, I doubt the watch was ever sold as such, like the PVD and so is a prototype. I also prefer the chunky simple steel hands this early model has, for me it somehow matches the beautiful 2 part chunky steel case, and the silver hour markers, for me the later red striped hands for me don’t quite fit as well. To round my number 1 off, I think the blue lume on the dial and hands matches the blue dial, highly unusual and yet right at the same time…

2 - Tricky this one as the transitional 1133B would also appear in my top 3 but as it’s similar to the Chronomatic, I am going for a contrast and the watch I call the Dark Lord. Yes it’s the 74033 PVD. I’m not a massive fan of manual wind watches, but I like to have one. It brings about a different relationship with a watch, winding it every morning, feeling for the resistance and hearing it tick at 28800 beats makes me appreciate the movement. This watch looks amazing in the right conditions and with the right clothing, it’s a great sport watch and just so unusual, the flashes of bright orange from the chrono and sub register hands jumps out immediately. It also wears differently to the fatter cased variants which can be a nice change, feels lighter on the wrist...Of course I like the mythical nature of it as well and the fact it never appeared in a Heuer catalogue and possibly never even for official sale.

3 - This was something of a toss up for me between the 1533G and the 1133G (grey sub dials, marginally ahead of black ones), I may be breaking my own rules here, but they tie for 3rd place. In the right conditions the 1533G can be the most beautiful watch, up there with the best, but as Ron H pointed out to me once it does not look its best under certain circumstances indoors under electric lighting and this is true, it invariably led me to change the watch every evening! So the 1133G gets my joint 3rd vote, it offers me another 2 register variety which is firmly my favourite dial configuration and its nice to have a change of colour and it can cope with business dress or jeans. So these 3 (ok 4!) would get the most wrist time and with a blue, a black and a 2 different greys for me they cater for all circumstances.

Am I in danger of turning into a one trick pony?! Probably, but I just can’t help it, I’m addicted to Monacos! Will it change over the next 12 months? I guess it might, perhaps thats the fun of watch collecting, never standing still...

Rich

www,heuermonaco.co.uk