A solar-powered Cartier, smaller watches and green dials

The watch fairs might be mostly online affairs and a majority of brands are yet to get their sales revved up, but the Swiss watch industry is moving things along.

And the big boys, too, are not immune to the trend.

Earlier this year, Panerai showed the way forward for the watch industry with its Submersible eLAB-ID that is almost entirely made of recycled material.

Its Tank Must collection features a new quartz piece that is powered by solar-charged photovoltaic cells, but loses none of its famed elegance.

Its NATO strap is made from recycled bottles, but if that is not quite your scene, Alpina also offers a black vegetable leather strap that is created out of apple waste.

Over the last 20-odd years, men with large bank balances but small wrists have often wrestled with a question: is my watch too big? Thankfully for them, the oversized watch trend appears to be fading.

Other watchmakers who’ve similarly shrunk their watches include IWC whose Big Pilot now comes in a 43mm stainless steel case as opposed to the original watch’s 46mm case; Rolex, whose Explorer has reverted to its 36mm original size; and Tag Heuer, which has resized its Aquaracer.

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