As you know I have reviewed this brand already a couple of times and you probably know that this brand is one of my favourite microbrands. Each watch I review from this company is surprising me more and more. So I won’t talk about the company as I have written many review articles where you can read more about the company. I have reviewed many pieces from them and actually there was one that many of you my readers requested me on Instagram and here to review and that model is Venture. It is a small 38mm field watch and the case is made of Titanium. They have many variations with different dial colours, with 24 hour subdial and even a chronograph model, but that one features a meca-quartz movement, but the non chronograph models are automatic (Miyota 8217 for 24 subdial models and Seiko NH35 for the regular variants.). So I contacted Boldr and they happily provided me a review sample. The model they sent me is the Venture Wayfarer-Khaki which is the 24h subdial variant with Miyota automatic movement.
The watch arrived in a very nice black pelican style case which is a really cool and I like when tool watches put in boxes like these. Also it is quite practical as you can buy foam insert, cut it to size and make a 4 slot watch case for travelling or just for storage. Inside the box you will find the watch, instructions manual, some stickers and warranty card. Also inside you get a cleaning cloth with a pretty funny and cool text on it, as you can see in the photo below. The first impressions of the watch is that it is super light and I especially like the gravel like texture on the dial in white colour. Right away I cut the second loop that goes on the underside of the watch off. That’s what I do with all of my nato straps because this way the watch doesn’t sit so high thus it looks better on wrist and it is more comfortable.
The case is made from aerospace grade titanium. The case is really well manufactured and all the lines are sharp, and straight without any defects. The finishing all over case is sand blasted which also done pretty good without any blemishes. The case shape is very typical for a field watch with partially hidden lugs and having that distinctive field watch shape. The case is 38mm wide, the thickness is 13mm (despite 12mm written on their website), from lug tip to lug tip it measures at 44mm and the lug width is 20mm. Overall the case shape in my opinion is perfect, although I would love it to be a bit slimmerm, closer to 10mm would be really good. At 3 o’clock we have a screw-down crown that is signed on top with signature Boldr logo. It also has a nice grip and nice winding action. The solid screw down case back has an “X” engraved in the center consisting of “boldr” logo, “venture” and some other words. Also around the edge we have specifications of the watch engraved. I especially like the drilled lugs that are kind of dying in the watch world, as rarely a watch brand makes their cases with drilled lugs, it just makes changing the straps much easier if you have regular spring bars. On top of the watch we have a flat sapphire crystal with AR coating. The water resistance is 200m so you can easily take it to all the water activities you can imagine and don’t worry about this piece. I actually believe this could be the ultimate beater watch!
The dial is actually really cool in real life, as on the website it doesn’t look like the dial has texture, but it actaully has one. I quite like the white asphalt like texture on the dial. It gives it more depth. The arabic numerals are raised and part of the dial, the top of the raised numerals are printed in faux patina lume colour with black outline. The inside part is lumed with Japan Superlume which glows quite bright. Around the dial we have minute track that is slightly raised and it features lume dots each 5 minutes. At 9 o’clock we have a 24h subdial that is also raised like the numerals. This one is pretty handy to set the date as you can see when it will change. At 3 o’clock we have a rectangular date window with black frame around it. The date wheel is white with black arabic numerals. At 12 o’clock we have the Boldr logo and at 6 o’clock we have writings “Venture, Automatic, 200m”. The detail I like is the black syringe hour and minute hands with middle portion in faux patina lume. The second’s hand is a stock shaped hand with rectangular detail with lume in the end. The end is painted in orange colour and has similar styling that dive watches had in the 70s. Overall the dial is very easy to read and that’s what the watch is all bout, the function! And Boldr always tend to make very legible and readable dials.
The movement inside the Venture is the Miyota 8217. The 8217 provides the 24 hour complication and is slightly more decorated than a Miyota 8215. While the Miyota movements are one of the best in the market of affordable movements, this one lacks the smooth sweep of the second hand and can be fairly choppy similar to the 8215. If I was building a watch I would actually go for a bit higher end Miyota movement, like 9000s series movements and get rid of the choppy seconds hand. But nonetheless I still think it is a bit better movement than Seiko NH35 as Miyota makes a bit better movements than Seiko when it comes to entry level ones. It is a decent work horse movement that won’t be needy in service and won’t break the bank if something breaks or it needs a service. The accuracy on my example is around +12 to +13 seconds a day which is quite normal for watches at 300$.
The strap that it came on is a sand colour nato strap and actually this is the first watch where I can say that actually looks better on a nato than any other strap, maybe the bracelet option would look cool, but the nato in my opinion is the best! The strap is decent quality with titanium hardware and quite well made. I already cut the second loop that goes under the watch off so it doesn’t sit high on my wrist. I just like to wear my watches like that on nato straps. But yeah, nothing more to add, it is just a nato strap and it functions good.
Boldr Venture Titanium
Overall the watch is really good in my opinion. I wouldn’t change a thing, well.. maybe a movement, but that is debatable. And the price of only 339$ in my opinion is a steal for an all titanium watch, screw down crown, really good manufacturing and build process, great design, sapphire crystal, 200m water resistance, automatic Japan made movement and nice packaging. You really get a lot for that price and that’s why in my opinion Boldr is one of the top10 microbrands in the market and getting more popular with each day. They start in my opinion was strange, but when they switched to these tool watches, they really found their niche in which they are awesomly good at! Can I suggest this watch? Yes, 100%!
- Case: 38mm titanium case
- Movement: Japan Miyota 8217 automatic movement with hacking seconds
- Water resistance: 200m (660ft) / 20ATM
- Crown: Screw-down with custom embossed BOLDR logo
- Dial: Printed matte dial with Japan Superlume
- Hands: Custom with Japan Superlume
- Lens: Flat sapphire crystal with anti-reflective coating
- Strap: Nylon NATO with custom titanium buckles
- Case Thickness: 12mm
- Lug size: 20mm
- Lug to lug: 44mm
- Case Back: Screw-down case back with embossed limited edition designer artwork
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