It’s hard to launch a watch brand. And yet, every year, new brands appear. It’s honestly tough to keep up sometimes, and when looking back at 2025, there seemed to be a flurry of new brands competing for our attention at all levels. It’s a truly crowded market, and in spite of the conventional wisdom that we’re moving towards consolidation, the reality on the ground for us is that there’s a surplus of good watches from new players out there to consider. More, in fact, than we can even cover.
This is a selection of brands that broke through the noise in one way or another and impressed us in 2025, a difficult task when your inbox is overflowing with press releases and notifications of new stuff to check out. I’m quite certain I missed plenty of good stuff that will only resurface in 2026 when these brands will just be “new to me” and not simply “new,” but that’s an inescapable aspect of covering this industry – there’s simply never an end to the creativity and ingenuity of people drawn to the watch world.
Anemoic
This first brand immediately forces us to define our terms. Did Anemoic “debut” in 2025? It was the year that founder Magnus Swann began discussing the brand with members of the media and collectors, but they don’t actually have a watch to sell, and may never. It’s a design project from a member of the Studio Underd0g team, and it looks incredibly promising, but is also the type of thing that could vanish into the ether.
The information we have, though, is tantalizing. It’s a rectangular cased watch that is dominated by a faceted, tinted crystal that gives the piece a jewel-like character. The inspiration is touted as being rooted in the style of 1970s France. Not being French, or alive in the 1970s, it’s tough for me to verify, but the storytelling makes sense.
It’s fun to see a project like this spring up from a designer who cut his teeth in the micro/indie world only recently. Watchmakers and designers going solo after stints with big brands is a common trope that we see frequently at the highest levels of haute horlogery, and it seems like it could be a phenomenon that plays out in our own community over the next few years, as brands like Studio Underd0g and others continue to see tremendous growth and success. It’s only natural members of those teams will want to strike out on their own, and the fact that Swann has the blessing of Richard Benc and the Studio Underd0g team points to an underlying camaraderie in our community that will only help projects like this succeed.
Dennison
I’m cheating here in a few ways. Dennison is not a “new” brand, technically. It’s a well known watchmaking name that has existed for decades, but was only just recently relaunched in its current form. They also appeared in this guise late in 2024. Sorry.
Still, 2025 will be the year that we remember fully metabolizing Dennison as a serious new player in the affordable watch space. It’s a clear cut case of “right brand, right time.” They scratch the affordable itch with watches coming in under $1,000 that make it feel easy to take a risk on, even if the designs aren’t typically your flavor. And of course they’re capitalizing in a major way on the stone dial (and shaped case) trend that has engulfed all of us. The new dual time zone pieces are a real phenomenon in certain circles, and do a nicer job of capturing a very particular 1970s vibe than just about any affordable watch I can think of.
Dennison’s growth has been so dramatic in 2025 that it forces us to think about how they’ll manage the upcoming year and beyond. If you look at Instagram comments and travel in certain enthusiast circles, there’s already a small backlash brewing. That’s to be expected, I think, when any brand experiences widespread and relatively sudden success. The trick for Dennison will be to resist the urge to copy/paste the formula that has worked so well over the last year. They’ll have to get beyond stone dials, introduce new shapes, and increase the quality of their component parts rather than stripping further back to maximize profit. Enthusiasts expect better watches as a brand grows, and Dennison’s next few years will be an important test. But there’s no denying that 2025 belonged to them when it comes to new, affordable, and trendy.
Horologically Unique
Horologically Unique is a new Singapore based brand that appeared in the back half of 2025 with a watch that trades on one of the year’s most popular trends: the “new” Calatrava style watch. We’ve seen versions of this creep into the watch landscape from all over the world, and it reflects a shift, I think, away from sports watches being the center of watch enthusiast enjoyment. This is a very positive development in my opinion, not because I have anything against sports watches, but because there’s so much more to watch design, and I look forward to seeing brands stretch their creativity a bit.
The Horologically Unique watches are quite simple, and directly inspired by the famous Reference 96, the skeleton key of Patek Calatravas. The HU-01 is available in glossy black and white dial variants, has the familiar fluid case shape that this type of watch is known for, and well executed Breguet numerals. The size is a conservative but appropriate 36mm, and they’re kept thin at 9.1mm tall including the crystal thanks to a slim manually wound Sellita movement. Currently the HU-01 is sold out (retail pricing was set around $1,400 after currency conversion, so an impressive value play for sure), but we look forward to seeing how Horologically Unique develops in 2026.
Urban Jurgensen
This is another cheat, but I couldn’t just leave off the splashiest launch of the year. Urban Jurgensen, of course, is not a new brand. They are, in fact, a very old brand, with a lot of history. But the version of Urban Jurgensen that showed up in 2025 is sufficiently different from the previous iterations of the brand that we can count them as “new” for the purposes of this list.
The relaunch of UJ had been one of the most anticipated events in the watch world for some time, largely because of watchmaker Kari Voutilainen’s involvement. Voutilainen is the co-CEO of the brand, and primarily responsible for running the actual watchmaking at the newly re-formed company. That shows in the brand’s first releases, all of which exhibit the exceptional finishing and extravagant movement design that Voutilainene is known for.
These watches hit with a bang that is uncommon in our industry. Pomp and circumstance of course is inherent in the luxury world, but in the watch industry it’s often relegated to big moments like Watches & Wonders. Urban Jurgensen relaunched with a celebrity filled event in Los Angeles earlier this year, and the watches at the center of the party share an uncompromising vision that reflects a seriousness in craft and execution. Assuming people want to buy these watches (they are essentially all six figure propositions), Urban Jurgensen is positioning itself as a brand that competes with only the heaviest of heavyweights. That’s an exciting prospect, and could have ripple effects throughout the industry for years to come.
Temporal Works
Maybe there’s some recency bias here, but Temporal Works feels like one of the more cohesive and interesting new projects to come across our desks in 2025. Launched only weeks ago, this is Armoury founder Mark Cho’s new watch brand, and it’s fascinating to see his taste reflected in a watch that is of his own making. Mark and the Armoury have of course been involved in the watch industry for years, working on collaborations with a number of brands, and retailing them in their stores, but it’s different when the brand is built from scratch.
The Temporal Works watches are refined and stylish, but also modern in their dial designs and especially in the colors chosen for the debut series. At 37mm, these watches are also in communication with a prior era that seems like it’s on the cusp of just becoming the norm again, at least for some of us.
Zach Kazan
2025-12-22 19:00:00