The fake Cartier Ronde “Croisiere” Cruise Collection

Well, though it’s still just barely mid-August, the days are already getting shorter, and the first back-to-school sale catalogues are in the mail. A lot of us are spending the last couple of golden (we hope) weeks of summer getting all the relaxation crammed in that we can before heading back to our various versions of work-related reality. So, since summer’s lease hath all too short a date and that date is pretty much replica watches upon us, why the heck is Cartier launching a “cruise collection” of men’s watches now?

Well, to understand the timing, you have to know what a cruise collection is. In the style world, a cruise collection (the word “croisiere” is French for “cruise”) is also sometimes known as a resort collection and the idea here is that a lot of folks don’t just head to the beach during the dog days of August – historically, folks with the means to do so often made a point of heading south for the winter, or at least for a few weeks during the winter, to enjoy the sun and social scene at places like – oh, as varied as the Côte d’Azur, or the Isle of Capri, or the Caribbean. Ian Fleming, the ex-spy turned novelist who gave us the adventures of a parvenu arriviste replica watches Scottish sociopath named James Bond, liked to spend his Januaries and Februaries at the Jamaica estate called Goldeneye; and he and cosmopolites of his era were part of a tradition, dating back to the ’20s and the first great steamship era and still with us today, of the Quality getting out of Dodge when the weather gets dodgy. For such gentlemen and ladies, the first Cruise Collections were made – apparel casual enough, comfortable enough, and durable enough to withstand a day spent, perhaps, disporting oneself on a yacht, but stylish enough for an early evening’s cocktails-and-canapes on the veranda.

Thus, the Cartier Cruise Collection, for the gentleman traveler who wants a watch that can be worn on those late fall or midwinter excursions abroad, where a certain elegance and a certain dash might be expected to go hand in hand.

The Cruise Collection of men’s watches number three at the moment – they are part of the Ronde de Cartier family of round watches. They manage, we think, to combine a sense of very Cartier-esque refinement with a certain go-anywhere aura of practicality as well. These are fairly wide but also fairly flat watches, at 42 mm x 9.7 mm and they have a very pleasing feel in the hand and on the wrist, with the rounded crystals and smooth, rounded cases giving one the sensation of holding in one’s hand a stone apt for skipping across the surface of some limpid South Pacific lagoon (not that you would). The bezels don’t turn but then, this isn’t a dive watch and they do make a lovely additional decorative touch (especially attractive on the steel and pink gold model). There is the de rigeur fake Cartier cabochon on the crown (in black spinel, on all three models) and though as we’ve said these are not dive watches per se, they do feature a water resistance rating of 100 meters so if you are a yachtsman you needn’t fret about water intrusion should you hang a little too far over the rail. A sports-elegant watch is a lot harder to do than the ubiquity of the clichéd term “sporty yet elegant” would lead you to believe and Cartier did very well with these, we think.

The cherry on the sundae, by the way, is that for around 5,000 bucks or less, on all three models, you not only get a sharp design and a watch that can effortlessly shift gears from poolside to cigar lounge to, if necessary, formal duds for the Captain’s Dinner, but also has an in-house movement: Cartier’s self-winding 1847MC. At this price, for this purpose, we think Cartier got the power-to-weight ratio just right. Oh, and while we do dig the way the applied numerals catch the light on the pink gold/steel and steel/ADLC models, we loved this little lagniappe on the white dialed model:

Secret signature, baby.

Cartier Ronde Croisiere watch, steel, 18k pink-gold-plated bezel and 18k pink-gold crown, $5,300; the Cartier Ronde Croisiere watch, steel/ADLC, $4,650, the Cartier Ronde Croisiere watch, steel, $4,650. Find them online right here at Cartier.us.