We love vintage watches here at The Time Bum. We also have a soft spot for new watches that successfully emulate a vintage look. We’ve reviewed plenty of both, but I don’t think we’ve ever had something like the Havaan Tuvali Heritage 72 cross our desks. You see, the Heritage 72 is a brand new vintage watch. No, it’s not a new original stock (NOS) survivor or a reissue. Rather, it is a perfect marriage of authentic old parts and sympathetically designed new parts to create something entirely novel. It’s more of a reincarnation.
Havaan Tuvali was founded by Taiwanese watchmaker Eric Yeh. The Heritage is considerably different from his previous tool and dive watches. It started when Eric learned about a cache of NOS cases with acrylic box crystals sitting in storage at the factory he was working with. These plated 36x39mm tonneau cases had been made for a small French brand back in the 1970s, but the sale never went through. The company that ordered them had long since disappeared, so they sat in a dusty box for decades. This gave Eric ideas.
Of course, a vintage case needs a vintage movement, but it’s not like you can call up your movement supplier and order a run of pre-quartz crisis mechanicals. Finding something like that requires a bit of detective work. Diligent sleuthing unearthed a trove of Swiss hand-winding movements at a local antique watch store. Made in the 70s by Fabrique d’Horlogerie de Fontainemelon (since absorbed into ETA), the FHF97 is a 17-jewel, 18k bph movement that was popular back in the day and is right at home in those shiny old cases. After some wrangling, a deal was struck.
The dials are brand new but designed with a retro eye. Applied gold numbers at 3, 6, and 9 get topped off with an hourglass at 12. Faceted gold obelisk hands mark the time. As the Heritage 72 is a dress watch, there is no lume. That beauty mark you see is a hole to allow a look at the mechanism, and if you shine a light into it just right, you can catch a glimpse of motion, but to be honest, my old eyes couldn’t see much at all – even when squinting through my bifocals. Porthole aside, the dial works beautifully. It is clean, open, and while vintage-inspired, it is not an homage. Rather, it brings its own unique charm.
The Havaan Tuvali logo is printed in a looser hand-drawn typeface than on previous models, which is quite fitting given that Eric makes the dials himself, start to finish. It is truly a labor of love, I mean, really, you couldn’t pay me to hand polish each tiny number, but he does. Of course, taking complete control of dial production also gives him the ability to change colors on a whim. In addition to the Vanilla Cream dial you see here, the Heritage 72 also comes in Black, and most recently, Concrete Gray. A Salmon dial is currently in the works, and Eric is taking suggestions for more.
Flip the watch over, and you will discover one more treat; Eric has embedded an old Taiwanese coin into each one. It reminds me of when I was a kid and kept a dime under my watch in case I needed to make a phone call. Yeah, that’s right, a ten-cent call from a phone booth. I told you I was old. Anyway, the coin itself is nicely stamped, and I love how it imparts a touch of local character — temporal character too, as the coins were minted in the early 70s, of course. The case back and crown are sufficient to seal the watch for 30m of water resistance, which is what you would expect from a dress watch.
The Heritage 72 comes with both a tapered, 18mm leather strap and a fine mesh bracelet. Both look great and are perfectly appropriate for a dress watch. Now, if you really want to be period-correct, you can fit it with a throwback Spidel expandable bracelet. Personally, I prefer the beige leather.
Needless to say, this tidy little watch is an ideal fit on my 6.75″ wrist. At just 12mm thick from the case back to the top of that lovely acrylic dome, it tucks neatly under a buttoned shirt cuff.
Like any vintage and/or handmade piece, the Heritage 72 is not perfect. There won’t be a glass-smooth finish on the paint, and even in storage, those cases and crystals are likely to have picked up a fine scratch or two – but I remind you again, were are talking about 49-year-old parts and handmade dials. Imperfection is part of the charm.
The Heritage 72 is available for $386 US, and it is well worth every penny. This is one of those watches that reminds me of why I love watches. It has a cool story, a clever design, concrete links to particular places and points in time, and the hallmarks of a man who is doing something he truly loves. Honestly, if you don’t fall in love with this watch, then you must be dead inside. If you do indeed have a watch-loving soul, head over to HavaanTuvali.com. Needless to say, quantities are limited, and when they are gone, there will never be another quite like them.
