Description
Nivada Grenchen has reached its centenary, and rather than issuing a commemorative dial print it has rebuilt its integrated-bracelet sports watch from the movement outward. The F77 MKII is the second generation of the model, and its headline is a set of natural stone dials — six offered permanently, a seventh reserved for the anniversary piece.
That is the part worth pausing on. At this price a "stone dial" is very often a printed or lacquered impression of stone. These are cut mineral slices, and there are seven of them: Labradorite, Jade, Azurite, Shungite Black, Smoky Quartz and Black Opal as the permanent range, with Ice Agate held back for a 100-piece centenary edition on individually numbered casebacks.
The second upgrade is mechanical. The MKII moves to the La Joux-Perret G101, taking the power reserve to 68 hours. Pricing runs EUR 1,660 on a strap and EUR 1,870 on the integrated bracelet, with the collection launching on 24 September 2026.
Design
The case is 316L stainless steel at 38 mm, with a 46.2 mm lug-to-lug, 22 mm lugs and a 6 mm crown — compact, and closer to the 1970s proportions the F77 descends from than to the modern integrated-bracelet norm. Surfaces alternate vertical brushing with polished accents, and the bezel is octagonal. A double-domed sapphire sits over the dial; the display back is sapphire too, engraved for the centenary and individually numbered on the Ice Agate edition. Water resistance is 100 m. Quoted thickness differs slightly between sources — Monochrome gives 11.5 mm including the crystal, Time and Tide 12.1 mm — so treat it as approximately 12 mm.
The dials are where each variant separates. Labradorite throws blue-green schiller across the surface as the wrist moves; Jade is a dense, even green; Azurite runs deep blue shot through with vivid green; Shungite Black is raw and fractured rather than polished smooth; Smoky Quartz is a warm grey-brown; Black Opal sits dark with scattered colour flashes. Ice Agate, the limited dial, layers pale blue and white in bands. Over all of them the layout is identical and deliberately plain so the stone carries the watch: hours, minutes and a central seconds hand, openworked baton hands, faceted applied indices and Super-LumiNova dots around the periphery. The bracelet is integrated steel with tool-free micro-adjustment, and canvas Velcro and black rubber straps are offered alongside it.
Specifications
- Reference: F77 MKII, seven dial variants
- Case diameter: 38 mm
- Case thickness: approximately 12 mm (11.5 mm per Monochrome including crystal; 12.1 mm per Time and Tide)
- Lug-to-lug: 46.2 mm — Lug width: 22 mm — Crown: 6 mm
- Case material: 316L stainless steel, vertically brushed and polished
- Bezel: octagonal
- Crystal: double-domed sapphire
- Caseback: sapphire display, centenary engraving; individually numbered on the Ice Agate edition
- Water resistance: 100 m
- Dials: Labradorite, Jade, Azurite, Shungite Black, Smoky Quartz, Black Opal (permanent); Ice Agate (limited edition)
- Movement: La Joux-Perret G101, Swiss automatic
- Jewels: 24 — Frequency: 28,800 vph (4 Hz)
- Power reserve: 68 hours
- Winding: automatic, unidirectional tungsten rotor, striped and signed Nivada; KIF anti-shock
- Complications: hours, minutes, central seconds
- Bracelet: integrated stainless steel with tool-free micro-adjustment; canvas Velcro and rubber straps also available
- Limited edition: Ice Agate dial, 100 pieces
- Price: EUR 1,870 / US$1,790 / £1,630 on bracelet; EUR 1,660 / US$1,590 / £1,450 on strap
- Availability: 24 September 2026
What's Exciting
Seven genuine stone dials and a 68-hour Swiss automatic under EUR 1,900 is an aggressive piece of pricing, and it is the clearest value-for-money story of the week. Stone dials are expensive to produce because the material is brittle, the yield is poor and every slice has to be cut, stabilised and drilled without cracking; that is why the price of entry for one is usually several times this. Nivada has absorbed that at a level where most competitors would have printed a texture and moved on.
The movement change is the quieter but more consequential upgrade. The G101 is a La Joux-Perret calibre, not a Nivada in-house one, and it should be described as such — but at 4 Hz with 68 hours and a tungsten rotor it puts the F77 MKII a clear tier above the ETA and Sellita baselines that dominate this segment, and the 38 mm case with a 46.2 mm lug-to-lug is properly sized rather than nominally vintage. The result is a watch that is interesting on specification alone before the dial material is mentioned at all.
History
Nivada Grenchen was founded in 1926 in Grenchen, in the Swiss canton of Solothurn, and spent its mid-century years building tool watches with a following well out of proportion to the company's size — the Antarctic, named for its use on the 1957 US Navy Operation Deep Freeze expedition, and the Chronomaster Aviator Sea Diver, one of the few watches of its era to combine a chronograph with real diving capability. The brand faded during the quartz decades and was revived in 2020, rebuilding its catalogue largely from its own archive.
The F77 came out of that revival, reviving a 1970s integrated-bracelet design from the brand's back catalogue at a moment when the entire industry was mining the same decade. The MKII is its first substantial revision, and the timing is deliberate: 2026 is one hundred years from the 1926 founding, and the Ice Agate edition of 100 pieces is the explicit marker of it.
