To this point, Toledano & Chan has leaned into the stone and stone adjacent hysteria, following up the b/1 with watches featuring dials in mother of pearl and another with a dial and case in meteorite. They also ship their watches in a concrete box. Stone is part of the DNA of the brand. So it’s a little surprising they went in another direction with the b/1.3r.
“When we released the b/1 with a lapis dial, stone dials were pretty uncommon for a small brand, but it’s safe to say that last year there was a tsunami of stone dials,” Phil Toledano explained in an interview. “It became quickly apparent to us that the stone dial has become a commodity. Where’s the creativity in picking something out of a catalog?”
Phil and his business partner, watch designer Alfred Chan, had originally planned for this release to feature a stone dial, and they had reached the prototyping stage. But ultimately they decided to shelve that idea, start from scratch, and invent something new. “Riskier,” said Toledano, “but creatively a lot more satisfying. That’s who we want to be as a brand – rather than showing people what they want, we want to show them what they’ve never seen.”
What they’ve come up with for the b/1.3r is something they describe as a “ripple dial,” made from solid 18 carat gold, with a texture inspired by a ripple of water, emanating from the corner of the case. It’s a simple idea, filtered through the Toledano & Chan design language, which still includes a dramatically faceted, asymmetrical crystal, the whole package becomes more a lot more visually complex than you’d anticipate, with views and impressions of the dial changing significantly if seen from an unusual angle, or through one of the facets on the sapphire.
“It took us about 6 months of experimenting to get to this final version,” Phil told me when I asked him about getting the dial to meet his vision. “It’s always a challenge when you work with a factory to have them do something they’ve never seen, so the initial learning curve is steep. Then it’s a war of inches, until you finally get to exactly the thing you’re after.”
The b/1.3r represents a more ambitious price point for Toledano & Chan, with the watch retailing for $10,200. The brand has produced one-offs for auction that have hammered well into the five figures, but the original lapis lazuli dialed watch was a significantly more modest creation with a lower cost of entry (that watch retailed for $4,000). The brand is in different territory with the b/1.3r, but unlike the price creep that we see from large brands that continue to offer products that are materially the same for a higher and higher cost, the b/1.3r shows real signs that Toledano & Chan are interested in pushing forward as a brand, increasing the degree of difficulty with each release.
The b/1.3r goes on sale at 9:00 AM on February 12. More information can be found on the Toledano & Chan website here.
Zach Kazan
2026-01-26 14:00:00