Exclusive: Frederique Constant Manufacture Moonphase

I am super excited to tell you about our new shop and most of all, about our collaboration with Frederique Constant for this Manufacture Moonphase exclusive for Fratello.

Let’s start with the shop. For us, the shop is a (new) way to keep our magazine growing in the best possible way. Traditional advertising is slowly fading away, and we don’t want to have paid editorials like most other titles out there do. It is something I‘ve always said to myself and others: as soon as I have to write about watches that I don’t want to write about, I’d rather find myself doing something different. We want to be able to bring you independent reviews and tell you like it is (in our opinion). But besides that, we also want to have fun and I think a shop will do that for sure. One of my dreams used to be to become the owner of a watch shop, and it is actually how I started Fratello in the first place in 2003. A website on which I offered accessible vintage watches (when I was still a student). It stopped as I also had a normal day job in IT that required my attention. In 2004 I turned it into a watch blog and the rest is history.

We want to use our shop to offer you the things we’d like to have ourselves

A shop needs to make sense though, and we want to use our shop to offer you the things we’d like to have ourselves. And we want to do it the right way. This means we aren’t after a quick and easy off-the-self webshop, but we have a shop system developed especially for Fratello. We want to be able to inform you in the best way possible about a new watch (or accessory) and we’ve put a lot of time and effort into creating something good that will bring you perfect online shopping experience. A huge thank you to the designer and developers of the Fratello Shop. Also, we do purchase all stock ourselves. No consignment or other types of offers. We will seek selected collaborations with watch brands and manufacturers of accessories and keep you posted here on Fratello Magazine if we have something cool in store.

Frederique Constant Manufacture Moonphase

The first watch we have to offer is something special and exclusive for Fratello, the Frederique Constant Manufacture Moonphase. Only limited to 29 pieces, and each of them engraved with their unique number (x/29). This watch normally comes with a blue or silver dial, but we offer you a version with a beautiful grey dial.

Finding a dress watch isn’t easy, especially when you’re not into these very classic small-sized models. This Manufacture Moonphase model is a more contemporary proportioned dress watch without becoming too big and bulky. It comes on a beautiful croco leather strap with Frederique Constant signed folding buckle.

The Frederique Constant Manufacture Moonphase has a stainless steel case (with a diameter of 42mm) and a beautiful grey dial with white Roman numerals. The moonphase aperture is located at 3 o’clock and is perfectly in balance with the date aperture at 9 o’clock. It is a very classic design, but the size of 42mm and the polished steel bezel make it big enough to not only be worn with a suit.

A moon phase was one of the first complications that I ever saw on a wristwatch.

A moon phase was one of the first complications that I ever saw on a wristwatch. I was just a kid and one of our neighbors showed us his newly acquired watch, and it had a moon phase on the dial. It was like magic to me. Only much later, I understood the complexity of a moonphase display on a (mechanical) watch. But aside from what it takes to develop this complication for a wristwatch, I simply love the idea of having something beautiful like the moon on a dial. The moon is something magical to me, and every time there’s full moon I observe it for a few minutes from our apartment’s window. And whenever my little daughter is still awake, she often comes up to me and I will pick her up so we can admire the moon together. These moments are so precious to me. The grey anthracite dial of this Frederique Constant Classic Moonphase Manufacture combined with the blue moon phase disc looks as peaceful as the real moon does during a starry night. The moonphase remains to be one of my favorite complications for a watch, not in the last place because it reminds me of those wonderful and peaceful moments at home observing the full moon.

Frederique Constant, just like Fratello, has Dutch roots. Founders Peter Stas and Aletta Stas-Bax founded the company in 1988 and developed it to what it is today: a manufacture being able to produce and offer interesting mechanical watches with in-house movements for a very fair price.

The Frederique Constant Manufacture Moonphase for Fratello has an in-house movement based on their FC-700 calibers, with a moonphase complication and we offer it in the Fratello Shop for €2595,- (including VAT and including insured shipping). This watch will be only shipped within the EU, due to the croco leather strap and the import restrictions these have in other countries. If you are outside the EU and interested in purchasing this watch, shoot an email to our shop team via [email protected].

As mentioned above, this Frederique Constant Manufacture Moonphase is produced in a limited run of 29 pieces and is available exclusively in the Fratello Shop. They are all individually numbered on the case back. For the images of this page, we used the prototype, which doesn’t show a number.

All details of this watch can be found in the Fratello Shop.