Once again, we have been privileged enough to work with a brand to bring another Hands-on review to all of you. This time the topic of conversation comes in the form of the new Delbana Rotonda. We have now spent two weeks with this piece, and I want to give all of you my honest thoughts and opinion on this timepiece. We have already created a history article outlining the history of Delbana, to which I will link here. But I will give a short recap of the story so far to give a tiny bit of context.

In 1931, a man by the name of Goliardo Della Balda founded Delbana, a company made to provide the luxury quality time pieces that Goliardo had always wanted to own at an attainable price. This came only a few years after Goliardo relocated his family from San Marino to Switzerland, where they settled in Grenchen, where Delbana was eventually founded.

The company followed a similar trajectory as many others, getting into chronographs in the years surrounding the Second World War and getting into divers and lifestyle watches as we got into the 50s and 60s. In between the chronographs and divers, we received the Voltige collection. This was a very successful collection that aimed to bring in fun designs and colorways to capture the essence of life at the time. Here we saw things like Cowhorn lugs, which can be found on today’s Furlan Marris.

Now, the Rotonda collection we speak about today is directly based on the Voltige models of the 50s, and looking at side-by-side pictures, it is evident that they opted to reinvent this stunning line. The only thing missing is the Cowhorn lugs, but that is more of a personal interest. The Rotonda range comes in a multitude of different dials and colorways. The one that I have to showcase for you today has a blue-on-blue colorway with a brown strap and a well-fitted red second hand.

Sizing is decent but could be improved in my opinion, as it comes in a 40 mm case with a lug-to-lug width of 48 mm and a case height of 11.5 mm. It does, for that reason, wear a tad large on the wrist. If it were in 38 or even a 36 mm, this would easily be one of my favorite watches from a microbrand, but as it stands, I am left hoping for a smaller version in the future. Despite the slight negativity that just came forward, I am pleased to say that it is the only negative thing I have to say about this watch.

The blue dial is abselutely beautifull and the way it catches the sunlight is amazing. The one I have comes on a brown calf leather strap which is extremely comfortable and with the strap the watch is ridiculusly affordable. For a watch with sapphire glass, with an open caseback, showing the Swiss made Sellita Sw 200-1 Claiber. All of this for just 710 euros with the leather strap and 825 euros with the steel bracelet. This watch is fantastic for the price, thus sticking true to the original as well as current phylosophy of the brand in providing quality timepieces at a higly attainable price. Overall this watch is a definete buy for me, only thing that knocks it down from a 10/10 to an 8/10 is the size, so if it were to come smaller that would easily be raised to a 10.

I want to sincerely thank Delbana again for the chance to review a piece of theirs. I highly recommend taking a look at the product page for yourself and overall immerse yourself in the brand even more. Which I will link to here. I want to kindly thank each and every one of you for reading this article, as it means a lot. As always, until next time.