The brand Backes & Strauss is a historic name in British watchmaking that is kept alive today as a family business, run by people who come from the world of diamonds. Backes & Strauss is formally owned by Geneva’s Franck Muller Group, which produces the watches for Backes & Strauss. The brand is typically very high-end, with a major emphasis on watches decorated with diamonds, something the brand still does very well. More recently, however, Backes & Strauss has committed to creating more options for newer watch enthusiasts. That’s where the Backes & Strauss Berkeley W1 AM watch came from, as an interpretation of a Backes & Strauss icon but in a more affordable and easily wearable package. Backes & Strauss has not completed its mission of trying to appeal to newer and legacy watch enthusiasts, meaning it will be interesting to see what further steps it takes in the future with interesting products of this nature.
On a basic level, the Backes & Strauss Berkeley W1 AM is a thin steel watch with a distinctive case, matching bracelet, and straightforward wearing experience. The watch is meant to be comfortable, legible, stylish, and easy to wear on a daily basis. It has some quirks for sure, but the bold styling and classy looks of this timepiece have charmed me. Not everyone likes the Backes & Strauss design direction, and I appreciate that. Some of the maximal proportions and big elements, such as the hands and hour markers, strike people as lacking elegance or refinement. What Backes & Strauss does with a design like the Berkeley W1 is merge brutalism with classicism. It ends up looking like a toy. Not in terms of how it is made or in a bad sense, but rather in that it is simple, easy-to-understand, and has large overall proportions. The watch isn’t trying to make a complicated statement, but rather a loud statement. That’s perfect for some wearers, and not for others. Backes & Strauss has never tried to make timepieces with universal appeal, but rather a niche collective of fans (as is the case with most high-end luxury timepiece makers, to be honest).
The Backes & Strauss Berkeley W1 AM case is in brushed and polished steel. It is sized at 40mm wide and 10.5mm thick, though it feels thinner when on the wrist. Oddly, there is no mention of water resistance, which I am guessing is thus 30 or 50 meters. Over the dial is a large geometric sapphire crystal, with another being placed over the caseback with a view of the movement. Backes & Strauss produces a few versions of the Berkeley W1 AM dial, which currently includes either this blue dial or a white one, with various colors of hour markers. For example, this model has the “white” Roman numeral hour markers, but this same blue dial can also be ordered with rose gold-toned Roman numeral hour markers. Given that this is Backes & Strauss, there are probably more diamond-decorated options also available. With that said, because this is a “diamond watch brand,” even the relatively affordable Berkeley W1 AM has a diamond on the watch. An 0.06-carat stone is placed in the crown as a cabochon.
To keep the watch as thin as possible, Backes & Strauss opted for a manually wound mechanical movement for this version of the Berkeley W1 Am. I have advised the brand to consider finding a suitably-thin automatic movement for future versions of this watch, a request the brand seems to be taking seriously. The choice of movement and its presentation are interesting. The base movement is quite simple, looking like a base Swiss Made ETA Peseux 7001. This manually-wound movement operates at 4Hz with about 48 hours of power reserve. In this execution, the dial features just the time with hours and minutes. Even though it is thin, the movement would be rather boring without additional flair. So what Backes & Strauss did was have the bridges of the movement hand-decorated with engravings. This is done in-house at Franck Muller – and is actually a nice touch. Even though I would prefer an automatic movement in a timepiece like the Berkeley W1 Am, I think at this price point the decorated movement is a nice touch to make up for the otherwise pedestrian nature of the mechanism. This is not meant to be a pedestrian watch after all (and yes I know, London is a cherished “walking city”).
In an era when square and geometric cases are popular, Backes & Strauss would be remiss not to promote their own entrant as part of the trend. Backes & Strauss have been making other versions of the square Berkeley case long before square watches were generally en vogue, and I think this watch has a lot of merit. The rounded edges of thick steel soften the angles, and help the watch appear more flattering when worn. The bracelet is a good mixture of being familiar, while also echoing the “classy brutalism” of the overall Berekley W1 AM theme. I think this watch could also work nicely on a strap – though I’ve not tried it yet. The bracelet is also rather simple, having a standard butterfly-style deployant. It is also quite comfortable to wear. The only issue I have with the bracelet is that when worn on smaller wrists like mine, the middle links stick out a bit on account of their thickness. When the bracelet is draped over a wrist with a larger circumference, this would not be an issue. Backes & Strauss will likely refine this element in the future, as the Berkeley W1 Am is still a first-generation product. Nevertheless, it is still a very enjoyable product.
The Berkeley W1 AM’s quirks and nuances will help it reach customers who want a geometric watch on a bracelet, that feels rather classic, but that also doesn’t look like everything else on the market. Backes & Strauss really does have a good mixture of approachable simplicity, and luxury detailing for the Berkeley W1 AM to be more widely successful. I’m certainly looking forward to spending more time with one and seeing how both watch lovers and the general public react. Also in this article, I quickly added a few pictures of the women’s Backes & Strauss Mayfair 33 timepiece. I thought it was interesting to see how the dial color and face style work in other case shapes and sizes equally well. Price for the Backes & Strauss Berkeley W1 AM watch as pictured is 6,500 Swiss Francs. Learn more at the Backes & Strauss website.
