Stay tuned: fellowships between cars and watches

The Japanese love tuning cars – 50 years ago, two who loved it more than most started Tachi Oiwa Motor Sport, later shortened to TOM’S. They started out small, but an early project was the high revving Toyota KP47 Starlet that went on to dominate its touring car class in Japan.

That car made the company’s name and TOM’S went on to become official tuner to Toyota’s many racing teams. Casio’s sub-brand Edifice is a long term partner of TOM’S and has produced a watch to celebrate the tuner’s half century.

The watch shares the car’s colour scheme of a white base with red and yellow details. It also has a mesh dial echoing the car’s grille and two subdials that look like its distinctive alloys.

Switzerland’s Tissot celebrates its own long background in motorsport with a 1970s style sport chronograph. And fellow Swiss brand Breitling has a very fancy new chronograph that pays tribute to Carroll Shelby’s fearsome Cobra. The only sticking point before you get too excited is that the Cobra watch has a tourbillon and will cost you nearly £40k.

Of course Japan doesn’t have a monopoly on loving cars, or expressing it through watches. But it does know how to give you a lot for your money, and the two Japanese watches on this page are the most affordable by some margin.

Pro tip

Although Japanese brands have watches in lower price ranges, they also sell posh ones costing many thousands of pounds. Buyers don’t mind the lack of snob value, because they are paying for the quality of the watch more than the name. If you think like a Japanese buyer and put watch before brand, you are more likely to be happy with your purchase.