Here Comes The New SevenFriday V-Series

Thanks to a cool design, the right price point and some clever marketing SevenFriday watches have seen their popularity grow in leaps and bounds. Today we’re taking a closer look at the newly announced – and much anticipated – V-Series.

The SevenFriday V-Series

Launching in late September/early October the new SevenFriday V-Series is currently comprised of just two models, the V1/01 and the V2/01, although given the level of variation available in the previous M and P-series I think we can safely assume there will be a lot more iterations to come. As is stands though, you have two different color schemes to choose from.

As with the previous series, the designers at SevenFriday have taken their inspiration for the V-Series from the industrial world. Starting from the outside and working our way in, of particular note to SevenFriday fans will be the introduction of a completely new case design. Although the earlier M and P-series looked distinctly different from each other their cases designs were essentially the same. With the new V-Series however it is clear that this is a completely new watch.

Incorporated into this new case design is the patent-pending Fast Strap Changer (or FSC) system developed by SevenFriday, which as the name suggests will allow you to quickly change out straps on your new V-Series watch. Interestingly the company has also incorporated NFC chips into the casebacks of all the new V-Series so that you can quickly authenticate and register your watch using your NFC-enabled smartphone and the SevenFriday app. This is a great way to protect innocent buyers from replicas and the company is also planning to roll out a number of useful after sales services and community features for registered owners.

Back on the front side of the watch though is where things start getting really interesting for me. SevenFriday is perhaps best known for its highly unconventional dial designs that display the time in a manner that can only be described as over-engineered. That’s not a criticism mind you, it simply means that the company has found creative ways to take something very simple and make it appear more complex and as you can see in the photos, the four-level dial construction of the new V-Series is no exception to this.

At first glance it is not immediately clear how to read the time. In fact it is not even clear that you can read the time on this watch given that the hour indices only goes from 0 – 4. The small seconds indicator between 4 and 5 o’clock is similarly confusing, with its scale only going from 0 – 20. This is where the second innovation from SevenFriday comes into play. Called the “Additioner” system (also patent-pending) it functions pretty much as the name suggests – you have to add numbers together. So, how does it work?

Well, you will notice there is a small rotating disc at the center of the dial with three large numbers printed on it, 0+, 4+ and 8+ (although all three numbers are never present at the same time for reasons that will soon become apparent.) This disc effectively serves as the hour hand, although there is a little bit of a twist.

Essentially, you need to add the number on the disc to the number shown on the hour indicator to get the actual hour of the day and then combine this indication shown by the more conventional minute hand. For example, in the picture below it is approximately 5:11pm. The small seconds indicator works in the same way. There is also a handy day/night indicator at 10 o’clock.

Providing the power is an automatic Miyota 82S7 with a 40H power reserve. It’s nothing fancy by any stretch of the imagination but it is a solid workhorse and reflects the reasonable price point of the new V-Series, which is CHF1,055 excluding taxes (about US$1,080).

Overall the new V-Series is a very solid offering from SevenFriday and demonstrates that the brand is still full of creativity and will not be going away any time soon, much to the chagrin of some of the more established brands.

For more information about SevenFriday check out the official website at www.sevenfriday.com.