Introducing: The New Garrick S3 Deadbeat Seconds

When you buy a high-end mechanical watch, you may expect a few things — a fine guilloché dial, for example, and/or a smoothly sweeping seconds hand. British watchmaker Garrick sure knows how to deliver both of those. However, you get neither of them with the new S3 Deadbeat Seconds. What you do get, though, is a beautifully finished open-worked dial and a seconds hand that plays tricks on you. We’ve seen both those things from Garrick before, but now they come together in the same watch.

Garrick’s S3 Deadbeat Seconds is a logical step after the successful GPHG finalist S3 Mk2 and the S2 Deadbeat. The former came with a magnificently open-worked dial, and the latter featured that quirky connoisseurs’ complication. Let’s see how those two combine in the new Garrick S3 Deadbeat Seconds.

The Garrick S3 Deadbeat Seconds

When you order yourself a new Garrick S3 Deadbeat Seconds, you can choose between a 904L stainless steel or gold case. Regardless of the metal, the watch measures 42mm in diameter and 11mm thick, including the sapphire crystals on the top and bottom. As the in-house movement inside is a hand-wound example, there’s a nicely sized crown for winding and setting it.

The front of the movement is fully exposed, displaying some of the caliber’s 21 jewels and beveled bridges. Of course, Garrick’s signature Trinity free-sprung balance and its bridge flaunt themselves at 6 o’clock. Even though there are more gears and bridges to grab your attention, the oversized balance still has the power to draw you in. It also gently eats into the hand-crafted, circular-brushed German silver chapter ring with nice, legible markings that make it easier to tell the time.

At 2 o’clock, there’s also a power reserve indicator, which comes in handy on a watch with a hand-wound movement and a 45-hour power reserve.

The in-house DB-G07 movement

Inside — or more like out in the open — is the in-house-built-and-finished caliber DB-G07. It runs at a frequency of 18,000vph. However, you won’t be able to notice that, as the deadbeat seconds hand ticks once per second. The movement is also highly accurate because Garrick tested and regulated it to ensure a daily variance of less than +3 seconds. That’s well within COSC standards of +6/-4 seconds.

Regarding the movement’s finishing, Garrick can adjust it to your liking with custom color options. In addition, all the bridges and components on the movement are manually beveled and can be frosted, grained, or given a mirror polish. You can also choose between wheels in gold, silver, or rhodium and a multitude of motifs. The single-piece German silver chapter ring can also be infilled with any color. Finally, you can also choose between different types of hands, but I think the blued observatory-style hands look great, and their shape makes it easier to tell them apart from the background.

As good as it gets

Unfortunately, I haven’t seen the new Garrick S3 Deadbeat Seconds in real life yet. That means I haven’t seen the interrupted movement of its deadbeat central seconds hand. I would’ve also loved to see the high level of finishing and how all those wheels turn to make those hands move. From the pictures, though, the S3 Deadbeat Seconds already looks finger-licking good. When you buy a watch at this price point from an independent watchmaker, this is as good as it gets. The in-house movement with its quirky deadbeat seconds hand is a technical feat, and the high level of manual finishing is the icing on the cake.

The Garrick S3 Deadbeat Seconds costs £40,000 in steel or £47,500 in gold, both excluding VAT. Every watch is made to order, and the current production time is approximately 20 months.

Let me know in the comments below what you think of the Garrick S3 Deadbeat Seconds.