About the Watch
Announced this July from Gaydon, the Top Time B01 Chronograph 41 Tribute to Aston Martin DB5 is the first timepiece to come out of the two brands’ official partnership, and it wears its inspiration properly rather than just naming it. It comes in three distinct editions, each built on the same design language but finished quite differently — more on those below.
The case itself is cushion-formed, grooved at the corners, finished with mushroom pushers — a direct callback to the original 1960s Top Time this whole collaboration is named after.
On the dial, twin “squircle” subdials sit where you’d expect a chronograph’s registers, shaped deliberately to echo a classic dashboard gauge rather than a standard round counter. Around the edge, a wood-inlaid inner ring draws its line directly from the DB5’s own steering wheel. The strap is hand-coloured leather, graded through tone rather than left flat, matching the depth you’d find in genuine automotive upholstery.
Breitling CEO Georges Kern put it simply: “The Aston Martin DB5 is one of those rare designs that never fades.” Aston Martin’s Executive Vice President and Chief Creative Officer Marek Reichman described the collaboration as producing “something truly distinct from anything we’ve created before,” while Breitling’s Head of Product Design Pablo Widmer summed up the whole approach in one line: “This chronograph blends form with true function.”
What’s Under the Case
Behind the design work sits a genuinely serious piece of watchmaking. The movement is Breitling’s own Manufacture Caliber 01 — a COSC-certified chronograph engine built around a column-wheel architecture and vertical clutch for buttery-smooth pusher actuation and true precision timekeeping, backed by a substantial 70-hour power reserve. Turn it over, and the open sapphire-crystal caseback reveals the whole mechanism on display, finished with an Aston Martin wing engraved directly onto the rotor — rhodium-plated on the steel editions, cast in solid 18k red gold on the flagship. It’s the kind of finishing detail most watches this price only gesture at.
The stainless steel version sits closest in spirit to the original 1960s Top Time ref. 2002 — the same reference Connery wore. The steel-and-platinum edition adds real weight and contrast, the platinum bezel sitting against a high-gloss black lacquer dial. The 18k red gold edition goes furthest of all: its onyx dial is the first time Breitling has ever used the stone, cut to bring out a depth and luster no other material on this watch quite matches.
Price
In stainless steel, £8,650 — limited to 1,022 pieces
In steel and platinum, £14,400 — limited to 315 pieces
In 18k red gold, £35,100 — limited to 250 individually numbered pieces
Why It Matters
There’s a real difference between a brand collaboration built purely for marketing and one built from an actual shared moment in history, and this is clearly the latter. Breitling and Aston Martin aren’t inventing a connection here — they’re returning to one that already existed, on Sean Connery’s wrist, in one of the most famous cars ever put on screen, and building something new from the same DNA rather than just borrowing a logo. That’s the kind of heritage-first thinking we look for in everything we cover at Classic Is Key, and this watch earns its place on that list properly.
