News · Heinrich

Heinrich puts football leather on the Helicoprion's dial

The Football Edition skips team logos for genuine Horween leather, two Sellita movement choices and a properly capable steel sports case.

Hen & Mills Editorial · 4 min read · 13 September 2026

• The Heinrich Helicoprion Football Edition uses genuine Horween football leather for its dial and matching strap, without team graphics or logos.
• Its 40.5 mm steel case is 10.5 mm thick, water-resistant to 200 metres and supplied with a beads-of-rice bracelet.
• Orders are open from A$1,799, with the first 50 numbered watches shipping from late October and a second batch due in 2027.

Sports collaborations tend to announce themselves from the other side of the room, usually with a badge, a team colour and enough branding to make the watch feel like merchandise. Heinrich has taken the more interesting route here. The Stuttgart independent has used the material of the game rather than its graphics, wrapping a familiar 1970s-shaped sports watch around a dial cut from real Horween football leather. Announced on 9 September, this is the Heinrich Helicoprion Football Edition.

A slim sports case keeps the texture in charge

The brushed stainless-steel case measures 40.5 mm across, 10.5 mm thick including its box-shaped sapphire crystal, and 48 mm from lug to lug. Those are reassuringly ordinary dimensions for a dial that is anything but, and the relatively low height should stop the watch feeling like a novelty propped on the wrist. A screw-down crown and 200 metres of water resistance give the Helicoprion proper sports-watch credentials, while the crystal receives anti-reflective treatment on its inner surface.

Heinrich was founded in Stuttgart in 2021, and its catalogue already makes a habit of putting unexpected natural materials inside this same case. Existing Helicoprion models use lapis lazuli, carnelian, tiger's eye and amethyst, so the Football Edition is less a promotional detour than a new answer to an established design question. The angular lugs, broad screw-set bezel and beads-of-rice bracelet are deliberately rooted in 1970s watchmaking, when odd case shapes and expressive dials were not reserved for limited-run experiments.

Moving in from the vertically brushed bezel, its 12 exposed screws frame a burgundy-brown surface with the pebbled grain of a new football. Heinrich says the dial is made from genuine Horween football leather, the Chicago tannery's material used for official NFL footballs, rather than a conventional base embossed to resemble it. Applied baton markers and hands carry white BGW9 Super-LumiNova, and a circular date window sits at six. It is a strange material treated with admirable restraint.

Football leather, without the team-shop treatment

Leather is common on the outside of a watch and rare under the crystal, which makes the execution more important than the premise. Heinrich manufactures the dials itself, selecting and preparing the material before fitting it into a sealed case. The brand notes that natural grain and shade can vary, although it also says its selection process keeps the finished dials visually consistent. That balance matters: each watch gets some material character without turning the buying process into a lottery.

The same Horween leather returns on the strap, made with German strap specialist Fluco, but it is not the only way to wear the watch. Every Football Edition also includes Heinrich's beads-of-rice steel bracelet, whose screw-fastened links combine brushed and polished surfaces. Its clasp has tool-free fine adjustment, a genuinely useful inclusion once summer arrives, and the bracelet also gives owners a sensible option for swimming because Heinrich advises keeping the leather strap away from prolonged exposure to salt or chlorinated water.

Development happens in Stuttgart and production and assembly take place in Pforzheim, while the specially prepared back records each watch's number within the first run. That detail matters because the brand is careful about what the number means: it identifies the initial 100 watches, but does not promise the Football Edition will disappear forever once they are allocated.

Two Sellitas turn reserve into the only real choice

Buyers choose between two automatic Sellita movements, both in Elaboré grade and regulated in four positions. The SW200-1 carries about 38 hours of power reserve, while the SW200-2 Power+ extends that figure to about 65 hours. The first is the cheaper, familiar option; the second gives the watch enough breathing room to spend a couple of days off the wrist without demanding a reset. Heinrich has otherwise kept the case, dial, bracelet and supplied leather strap the same.

I expected the football connection to be the part that wore thin, yet it is the steel bracelet photographs that make the idea click. Without a logo or a literal ball printed on the dial, the grain reads first as an unusual warm texture, and the story arrives only when someone looks closer. Sports-themed watches often ask whether you support the right team. This one asks whether an odd material can survive outside its original context, and I think it does.

Heinrich Helicoprion Football Edition pricing and availability

Heinrich is taking orders now. The first production comprises 100 individually numbered watches in two batches, with numbers 01 to 50 due to begin shipping in late October 2026 and numbers 51 to 100 scheduled for early 2027; the brand says further production may follow demand, so this is not a strict 100-piece limited edition. The first 25 include a collector card signed by German NFL player Marlin Klein. Prices: A$1,799 / €1,199 / US$1,299 (SW200-1); A$1,940 / €1,299 / US$1,399 (SW200-2 Power+).