The Type 44 Origin Story

The Type 44 was developed progressively as our attempt a really bringing the authentic feel of a field watch from WW2 into your hands. Unlike the Tom Rice A-11, instead of going for a modernized look, we decided that Praesidus Watch Co was to be the brand with the irreproachably authentic A-11 Re-edition. This started our project originally nicknamed internally the "A-11 Bonklip" (because of the Bonklip bracelet) or, Design #96068_38mm_1. As you can see by the design numbers, we originally did not plan for a 32mm version!

In the meantime, we bought an actual Waltham 1944 A-11 on Ebay and, decided to get as close as we could to the original in terms of design & feel. This meant going for a 32mm, acrylic glass (despite reservations) and finding a manual wind movement that would fit such a small case.

Back then, we had already gotten some Swiss Made Automatic P024 movements from Soprod for our A-11 Marston Mat and, turns out it could fit in a 32mm case. The only issue was that it was automatic and not manual. We had to ask Soprod to "remove" the automatic part of their movement to basically forcefully transform it into a manual wind movement. This explains why you won't feel the movement's winding - it actually has kept its slip wind from the automatic that will prevent you from over winding the movement!

After having successfully developed both the 38mm and 32mm sized and managing to find a solution to our manual wind issue, I then worked on packaging. The Type 44 Packaging is actually inspired by the "BREAKFAST TYPE K" US Army WW2 ration box.

Finally, the name - obviously, we had to drop the internal nickname "A-11 Bonklip". I brainstormed and landed on Type 44. Why?
Well "Type" I felt worked well to define the strong & authentic military origins of the design (e.g the Type 20 French Military Chronographs). "44" was a reference to the original design year of the A-11 Waltham that had inspired the design. Simple yet effective. ;)

The Type 44 Origin Story

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