Maystone Skybreaker Chronograph

Maystone's Skybreaker is a chronograph running a mecha-quartz movement and it costs £299. It is the cheapest thing in this month's independent releases and the one we would recommend first to somebody who has never bought a watch on purpose.

Mecha-quartz is the compromise that nobody markets well, so here is the case for it. A quartz chronograph is accurate and cheap but the pushers feel like a television remote and the second hand sweeps back with an electronic whirr. A mechanical chronograph feels wonderful and starts at about £1,500 for anything you would want to own. Mecha-quartz puts a small mechanical module on top of a quartz base: the timekeeping is quartz, so it is accurate to seconds a month and you never wind it, and the chronograph is a real mechanical cam that snaps under your finger and flies back to zero when you reset it. It costs about £40 more than the pure quartz version.

That snap is ninety per cent of what people enjoy about owning a chronograph. You are not timing anything. Nobody is timing anything. You are pressing the button.

At £299 it is also the price at which a watch stops being a financial decision, which is a good place for a first one to sit.