Squale have been on my affordable watch radar since about 2014. Several years ago I met some members of the proprietor Italian family at Baselworld, and was struck by their simple down to earth attitude and modesty coupled with that typical warm hospitality and classy sophistication of our Italian friends !
The company that became Squale was originally Von Buren S.A./Montres , founded by Charles Von Buren in 1946 at Neuchatel on the lake of the same name in Switzerland. Neuchatel is a beautiful little city that has been populated literally thousands of years, with an impressive castle dating from the start of the 11th century, and is a place with strong links to early swiss watchmaking.
Squale is a brand with a long history and serious dive-watch DNA, which has not been brought to the limelight up until now at least…so is undoubtedly under-marketed (rare in today’s watch-world!) Von Buren was originally a case-maker producing dive watch cases for dozens of brands including Hueur, Blancpain, Doxa, Zeno and others. In the 1950s VonBuren stated making their own watches, always with the squale shark on the dial as had featured on many watch dials using VonBren cases, and the 1960’s saw the first Squale-brand watches from the company, which subsequently became Squale watches. Many European freediver champions and spearfishing legends swore by them for years. Squale have continued to produce robust diver’s watches over the years, until the company was bought by it’s Italian distributor, the Maggi family, several years ago.
Their current line-up consists of good old-fashioned solid dive watches including watches rated at 300, 500, 600 and 1000 meters water resistance. Although it’s a predominately masculine model range, Squale has recently released a beautiful unisex dive watch in various dial colours, the Onda (‘wave’) … I was blown away by the prototype at Basel in 2018, and it has proved to be a hit, several having been sold by Geneva Blue in the last couple of years.
With Squale’s impressive historic experience with dive watch cases I have no hesitation in recommending these watches as a true tool watch ready for the Australian lifestyle !
Prices from AUD 1390.00
