Continuing the 52 (Crystal Seven) movement family, which last time featured the Cutlass, this week is the quirkily named Dandy Seven Custom. I’m not sure where this name came from, maybe it was designed to appeal to younger buyers since the models are characterised by non-traditional case designs and the use of colour on the dials.

As far as I know the Dandy Seven uses only the 5204 movement with 27 jewels, and probably had only a short production run. They are fairly scarce on the Japanese auctions and are hardly ever seen outside Japan.

My example has a grey dial in a nicely sculpted cushion case, with split day and date windows, and orange highlights on the hour markers:

The Dandy Seven models have a unique applied logo, with crossed swords and shield:

The 5204 movement runs at 18000 beats per hour, with hand winding:

The case back on this one is typical – although some are marked ‘Dandy Seven’ – and shows production in July 1969:

The Dandy Seven Custom, first produced in 1968, trailered some of the design trends later seen in the 1970s, and forms an interesting and unusual part of the collection.