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The GMT scale that tells you if anyone is awake at home

Trafford’s first permanent collection replaces the 24-hour ring with a day and night split, midnight at the bottom.

Hen & Mills Editorial · 2 min read · 7 August 2026

Trafford Watch Co. Touring GMT from the Core Collection — Image: Trafford Watch Co.

Look at a normal GMT and the home-time ring runs 0 to 24 with midnight at the top. It works, but it makes you do a conversion. Nineteen means seven in the evening, which means yes, you can probably call.

Trafford has done away with the arithmetic. The Touring GMT splits its scale into a daylight half and a night half and puts midnight at the bottom, so one look tells you whether anyone back home is up. It is a small change and a genuinely good one, because it answers the question a traveller actually has instead of giving them the raw data and leaving them to it.

The Trafford Touring GMT dial, cream with printed numerals and a teal arc across the lower half marking the night hours — The night half of the scale, with midnight at the bottom. Image: Trafford Watch Co.

Two watches, and a first for the brand

The Touring GMT is 899 US dollars and arrives alongside the 799-dollar Daytripper as Trafford's Core Collection, the first permanent line-up the brand has committed to. Both are pre-order, with shipping estimated for early October and orders filled in sequence.

A true GMT, with one soft spot

Powering it is the Miyota 9075, a true GMT, sometimes called a traveller's or flyer's GMT. The local hour hand jumps on its own while the GMT hand stays put on home time, which is the right way round if you are the one moving. It runs 24 jewels at 28,800 vph on a 42-hour reserve, and Trafford regulates every one in-house to within ten seconds a day.

Forty-two hours is the soft spot. Take it off on Friday night and it has stopped by Sunday. There are 70-hour movements at this money, and a watch designed around travel is exactly the one most likely to sit on a hotel bedside table overnight.

Build is 316L steel with a hardening coating, sapphire front with interior anti-reflective coating, sapphire back, 10 ATM. The watch ships on leather and the bracelet is a 149-dollar extra: 316L, same hardening coating, quick-release end links, on-the-fly tool-free micro-adjustment, tapering 20mm to 16mm. Tool-free micro-adjust is rare at this price and probably worth the outlay.

The Trafford Touring GMT in low light, the whole dial glowing turquoise — Image: Trafford Watch Co.

Why a permanent collection is the real news

There is a bigger story than either watch, though. Most microbrands work release to release. A batch appears, it sells, it is gone, and by the time you act on somebody's recommendation the watch has stopped existing. A standing collection means holding stock, sticking with a design across runs, and being able to service what you sold two years ago. It is harder and it costs more, and it is what separates a brand from a run of projects.

The Trafford Touring GMT worn on a wrist on a brown leather strap — Image: Trafford Watch Co.

One note on sourcing. The Time+Tide piece announcing this sits in the outlet's "In the Shop" section, which is commercial placement. The prices and specifications above come from Trafford's own site.