There are few watches that have appeared over the last few years that I’ve been as excited about as the echo/neutra Rivanera. I wrote about it at length last year, and coming up on twelve months since I had to send my sample back to Italy, I still think about this watch and how original and full of ideas it is. It did something that’s hard for a single watch to do: it clarified to me what echo/neutra is about as a brand. Up until the Rivanera, I honestly didn’t have a fully formed concept in my head as to what the echo/neutra team was working toward. I liked their watches well enough, but they didn’t speak to me on a gut level. The Rivanera did, though, and it helped me see the vision of the brand in a clearer light.
The latest release from echo/neutra, the Rivanera Piccolo, further cements them as one of the most interesting design forward, affordable indies out there at the moment. A sequel of sorts, the Rivanera Piccolo continues to riff on the original’s rectangular shape, but dares to make it smaller, squarer, and, somehow, sportier. If the Rivanera was a new spin on designs like the Cartier Tank and early Art Deco, the Piccolo jumps a few decades ahead – there’s some distinctly 1960s/70s funk here in a way that I haven’t seen presented in a watch of this type. It places itself right in the middle of the current “stone dials on everything” trend without actually including a stone dial.
Let’s get the proportions out of the way first. The Piccolo measures 26mm x 33mm and were it not for the brancards on either side would effectively present as a square. Case height is just 6.9mm, and the material is still titanium, so it’s incredibly light and easy to wear. When I wrote about the Rivanera I focused a lot on how they were able to take a retro idea (a classic rectangular dress watch) and make it feel modern and contemporary. The Piccolo feels like much more of a throwback, and it does wear like a vintage watch, but the sculptural complexity that echo/neutra achieved with the original Rivanera is still very much present. We still get the sharp angles, a subtly faceted crystal, and a case shape that feels labored over until it achieved a level of perfection from the design team. It has a ton of charm on the wrist, and I’d encourage anyone who might see the size and think it’s too small to give it a real shot. It looks and feels great.
There are three total dial options to choose from at launch. The samples we were sent are white and black versions of a guilloche pattern called “Grain de riz.” It has a gorgeous pattern that resembles the petals of a blooming flower through tiny granules (1,000, according to the brand). The dial is free of minute or hour markers, which is certainly the correct choice for these watches. One of my only real criticisms of the original Rivanera was that it was a bit tough to get a beat on the exact time as everything was clumped so close together on a dial that was small by necessity. That problem has been avoided here and the watch is better for it.
The other dial option is a Musou Black option. Musou Black is an acrylic paint capable of absorbing 99.4% of all light. It’s an idea similar to Vantablack (used exclusively in watchmaking by H. Moser) but is an actual paint or coating applied to a surface, whereas Vantablack is a material in and of itself. This is where the Piccolo really feels like an extension of the stone and MOP dial trends we’ve been seeing emerge over the last few years, but with a modern, tech forward spin. They’ve achieved a similar aesthetic goal but have done so through a less traditional route, which seems right in line with what echo/neutra has been going for more broadly with their release strategy over the last two years.
Another unexpected surprise with the Piccolo is a new ribbed rubber strap option. Our samples were sent on leather straps, but we had a chance to see the new rubber option at Windup in New York City last month, and it works incredibly well on these cases. It’s thin, pliable, and very comfortable, and adds a surprisingly sporty element to the wearing experience.
The Piccolo is powered by an automatic Sellita SW1000 movement with a date positioned at 6:00. While I think I prefer the manually wound experience of the original Rivanera, echo/neutra deserves credit for figuring out a way to get this much style and functionality from an automatic movement. Like the Rivanera, the Piccolo is going to be largely defined by its size, and especially its thinness, and the fact that echo/neutra was able to accomplish this with an automatic caliber is a feather in their cap.
The new Rivanera Piccolo is available beginning today, with a retail price of $1,980. echo/neutra
Zach Kazan
2025-11-21 17:00:00