Stowa has always held a special place within our repertoire of hands-on watch reviews. They were one of the very first brands that we reviewed shorty after our founding in 2015. We were lucky enough to receive samples from them back in 2018, with our review of the Stowa Partitio and then subsequently in 2019 with the Flieger Classic 36. As I entered my journey into the watch industry, these were both very exciting watches to go hands-on with; German made, Swiss automatic movements, and intriguing pilot watch designs. Well, today we are re-entering this fun and affordable sphere of Stowa watches with one we’ve never spent much time with until now, and that’s the Flieger Classic Pilot Chrono – and I have to say I love the heritage and vibe Stowa brings to the table with this watch just as much as I did with their other models 8 years ago.
Proportions and Fit
Just a few important thing to note as we kick off the review, flieger style watches do tend to run large in terms of case size and dial breadth. The Classic Pilot Chrono we have here today rings in at a 41mm case size, but its wide dial layout makes it feel and look bigger than it really is. The case is also quite thick at 14.7mm due to the Sellita SW 510 chronograph movement. The watch sits fairly high on my wrist due to its specs, and when viewed from the side its admittedly not a first choice in terms of sizing for my small 6.5 inch wrist. If you’re entering the arena of 7 inches or larger it’s fair game and I’d recommend trying this watch on to see how you like it.
The lugs do help somewhat tame down the overall chunky wearing style of the watch, but even they are quite tall. The lugs do slope aggressively downwards but they’ve remained just as thick as the case in order to avoid looking unproportional. Despite the watches rather large appearance on my wrist, it does seem to be quite comfortable, which I’d say is partly due to the really nice and supple leather strap. This is a very tough watch for a niche affordable brand to manufacture, on one hand they want to make an attractive looking watch, but on the other they need to work within spec constraints of mass produced movements such as the Sellita inside. Finding the easy medium is what Stowa has accomplished here, which is no easy feat, as the watch looks fantastic and realistically speaking it will fit most of the general publics wrist sizes – and if not they offer a slew of other amazing smaller sized watches.
Visually speaking the watch is excellent, with its conical bezel and subtle brushed luster found on the entire watch, from its case to open caseback. The side of the watch even has a nod to the original Stowa pilot watch with the same engraving of Fl 23883. The crown and pump pushers are not overly exaggerated as found on some other flieger style watches like those from Longines. Instead, the Classic Pilot Chrono remains slightly more austere in appearance, following authentic German norms and certainly maintains Stowa’s classic DNA. Of course, when you buy a German watch you want to keep some of that traditional national pride, it’s part of what will allow the watch to stand out in a watch collection that consists mostly of Swiss watches. This watch is fun and different, but in a serious way, and I really like that about their entire range of watches.
Dial
I want to dedicate this small section entirely to the dial and hands of the watch, it deserves it. While at first glance the dial can appear ordinary, an elongated examination reveals an array of design detail in its subtlest forms. Again going back to German design, the dial reflects this probably the most out of the entire watch. The pigment of the lumed markers and hands are not white, but rather a very indirect off white, perhaps just a touch lighter than cream. They are very visible against the matte charcoal background, which by the way has such a similar hue to the Rolex Explorer I 39mm Ref. 214270 (yes a very random thought). The subtle earthy tones of the dial play harmoniously with the tan color of the leather strap, although it is offered on other strap variations.
The flieger style minute and hour hands are actually heat blued, which is a neat touch on a watch at this price point. The seconds hand is very long and thin, expanding the entire length of the dial to reach the outer end of the minute markers. To the right of the dial is a single large minutes subdial that reminds me very much of the Longines Big Eye, just in a more subdued fashion with a slightly less pronounced border.
The arabic numerals only span about 3/4 of the dial due to the large subdial, but the overall implementation is so seamless that it doesn’t draw attention to itself and appears impressively integrated. This is a very well executed dial, one of my favorites for a flieger watch in this affordable price segment – and the cherry on top is the absence of any text based logo.
Final Thoughts and Affordability
As you’ve probably already concluded, the fit and sizing of the watch may not be the most ideal for me personally, but it could be perfect for you if you have a medium to large size wrist. That’s probably my only personal gripe, besides that I really love everything else about it – especially its authentic German design language. Perhaps one other nitpick could be the use of a Swiss movement inside a German watch, but sometimes the brand really has no choice if they need to meet the needs of a specific market segment.
The Stowa Flieger Classic Pilot Chrono has a retail price of 2,092.44 euros, it’s not the most affordable watch out there but it offers a lot of value for the money. Microbrands can exceed the materialistic and spec value of this watch, but they’d be hard pressed to match the heritage and tradition that comes from owning an original Stowa watch.
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