An Obscure French Dive Watch History Lesson, Unpacking “Commando”, & An Impressive Value Proposition
Watch microbrands have grown by leaps and bounds over the past ten years or so, with a myriad of upstarts looking to Kickstarter and other crowd-funding platforms to bless the watch world, typically with yet another bland Submariner homage. In the absence of history, these startups are forced to either pen some spin from scratch, hope the design and/or value is enough, or go looking for some existing history to adopt, i.e. the “zombie brand” approach. While all can work if the sauce is there, I will argue the third method is one of the more challenging but also potentially the most impactful for fans.
(Photo Credit: Jacob Van Buren)
Look at Doxa, Nivada-Grenchen, Jacques Bianchi, or Tornek-Rayville, all names that have risen to prominence in our community after decades of somnambulism. In each case, the names were purchased by special individuals combining genuine passion with enough watch industry know-how to tastefully revive these decades-old names in what is, to quote Aladdin, “a whole new world”. In the past few years, one of the more obscure brands that has received the revival treatment is HGP. While it’s understandably a name you may not have known beforehand, it’s one you’re going to want to know now if affordable dive watches are your thing.
In this edition of the Dive Log, I’ll share my experiences living and diving with the HGP Diver 200m Automatic Commando, a vintage-inspired diver leaning just a bit on history while making an impressive value proposition under $500.
Acronyms Save Lives
An original HGP sold by the Parisian dive shop of the same name. Note the Monnin case. (Source: HGP)
The original HGP was a dive shop in Paris established in 1970, serving as one of the French capital’s premier scuba suppliers for over two decades. All but unpronounceable to non-native French speakers, HGP stands for Hommes Grenouilles de Paris or “Frogmen of Paris”. Thank goodness for acronyms. As was so often the case in that era, the shop sold dive watches—still essential equipment in those days—produced by other makers and branded with “HGP” on the dials to sell in its showcases alongside regulators, masks, and knives. Like a lot of third-party produced “dive shop watches”, many HGP models utilized the popular Monnin case produced by MRP SA and familiar from TAG Heuer, Aquadive, Zenith, Zodiac, and numerous other brands.
When HGP the dive shop went under in the 1990s, the watches went with it, lying dormant until 2023 when the name was purchased and relaunched as a microbrand, which brings us up to speed.
For The Commando In All Of Us, I Guess?
While the first few modern watches from HGP were clean and cool, nothing got me excited until I saw the, ahem, Commando version of the Diver 200m Automatic. One of the more popular variants of the old-school Monnin case divers that you’ll see with a wide variety of different names had the same format, with geometric indices and a smaller 24-hour sub-register in red. Like the old watches, the text at six was also charming, with “200 METRES” and “AUTOMATIQUE” spelled the French way. I love a good old-school Monnin, and I have actually owned two examples, one signed Rodania and another signed Comtex, back in the day.
While it’s most famously associated with Heuer, many brands used a similar dial in Monnin cases with a 24-hour sub-register that often aged to a pink color.
Above the French text, the HGP says “Commando”, which deserves some unpacking. I’m certainly no commando, and I don’t believe HGP claims any military caché, but other than making fun of it, the commando text doesn’t bother me. Maybe there’s a commando in all of us? Probably not. Moving on…
Beyond the dial, another interesting note with HGP is that they’ve bothered to use a “real” Monnin case, with one of the inner lugs sporting a GM logo for George Monnin, pretty cool. Like the OG watches, the HGP measures 42mm in diameter, around 47mm lug to lug, and 13.5mm thick. If you’ve never worn a Monnin, it’s one of the most universal and comfortable dive watch cases on the market, with sculpted lugs and swooping integrated crown guards. The modern HGP is no different and great on the wrist.
(Photo Credit: Jacob Van Buren)
20mm lugs mean almost all of my straps work, but I mostly wore the HGP on its bracelet, which was surprisingly nice, with a beads-of-rice format and a significant taper to 16mm where it meets the retro-feeling clasp. There’s no folding extension or other means of getting some extra length for use with a diving suit, but quick-release pins at the lugs meant it was easy enough to swap over to a nylon pull-through strap or the W.O.E. FKM Rubber I used to dive with this watch. You just have to remember to bring some spare spring bars as those on the bracelet are built-in.
Beyond those major points, the build quality and specs are frankly solid for a watch costing under $500. The crystal is sapphire. The luminescent material is C3 Super-LumiNova and works impressively well across the dial, hands, and bezel, which while we’re here rotates with great action for the price. The crown is unsigned like many Monnins but screws down easily and with enough turns to feel warm and fuzzy. You don’t typically have this conversation in this price range, but the finishing is also respectable. The mix of brushing and polishing on the case is achieved by hand and the dial stands up well to macro inspection so the QC is also there.
Inside, HGP avoided the traditional “ghost date” pitfall with a dedicated non-date Seiko NH38 that beats at 3 Hz or 21,600 VPH while being regulated to a not impressive ±15 seconds per day standard though this example ran much better. If you care, the watches are assembled in France and it says “France” in relatively large letters at six on the dial.
I hate it when people say “value proposition” over and over, but there’s no way around it with this HGP, which offers a lot to like for around the price of a Seiko Turtle. With all of the nerd stuff out of the way, let’s go diving.
A Diving Commando With A French Accent
(Photo Credit: Geoff Gerrits)
When it was the HGP’s turn to go diving, I opted for an OD green FKM rubber strap from W.O.E. to suit the commando theme. I also saved this watch for a deeper dive on a wreck resting in around 130 feet of water off the coast of Pompano Beach, South Florida. Descending along the down-line, I immediately noticed the luminescent material popping as the Florida sun dimmed through the depths. Even if you dive, sometimes you take for granted how helpful great lume is underwater even during the day.
Given the depth and my no decompression time limit, it was always going to be a relatively quick dive. Breathing Nitrox enriched to 30% oxygen also meant my maximum operating depth was only around 100 feet so I was left to swim around the superstructure of the large 324ft wreck laid out on the sea floor beneath me. A few menacing but docile barracudas hovering around the pilothouse added to the ambiance.
(Photo Credit: Geoff Gerrits)
To be clear, nothing I did resembled anything commandos do underwater, but the watch would likely make a great companion for that kind of work as well. Between the red 24-hour sub register which essentially disappears at depth, the no-date format, and the baton-style hands, the HGP was extremely legible as any solid dive watch should be.
After around 25 minutes including a safety stop, it was time to go back to the boat. If you’re someone who appreciates watches and also dives, you know the feeling of sitting on a line 15 feet underwater lovingly staring at your watch for precisely three minutes. It gives you a chance to reflect. Above and below the waves, the HGP is a solid dive watch making a niche yet interesting argument.
Final Thoughts
(Photo Credit: Geoff Gerrits)
Recapping here, the HGP is well-finished, reasonably priced, has great lume and a great bracelet, and is powered by a Seiko movement, all good points. The design won’t be for everyone, but a Monnin case always looks amazing and the dial is inoffensive if nothing else. If you’re triggered by the Commando signature, which I would understand, there are models without. At least for me, the question with a watch like this becomes, with so many dive watches in this price range, how would a person end up here? HGP is about as an in-the-weeds name as you could hope to find, likely to resonate with only the most passionate French-speaking watch nerds, right?
I’ve told a lot of people at this point that if you’re shopping for a dive watch under $500, the places you start are Seiko (I’m looking at you, SRPE93) or Citizen (Aqualand, Fugu, etc…), and I stand by that argument. However, every watch meetup will illicit several if not lots of wrists bearing both names and some simply want to do something different with their $500. If the resurgence of French watchmaking means something to you, maybe you’re a big Jacques Cousteau guy, or you just love a good Monnin case dive watch, the HGP does a lot of things just about exactly right, or très bien if you will.
Great microbrands feel like opportunities for personal expression. They say something, have a deeper meaning, or illicit some kind of feeling. All great watches do this, of course, but micros typically do it at price points that allow for more experimentation. The people behind HGP could have easily made watches just about this good and sold them under another made-up name, but they bothered to look for a story, choosing the obscure tale of a defunct Parisian dive shop that produced a few watches even fewer have ever seen, which means connecting the modern watches to actual diving was a key aspect of said story.
Around here, it’s the kind of storytelling we can get behind, and luckily, the watches are great as well.
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Thanks to Geoff Gerrits (underwater) and Jacob Van Buren (topside) for the incredible photography in this piece. For more underwater antics and watches (and cows) from Geoff, check out @watchcowsdive, and be sure to check out @sea_vue for vintage diving history and even more watches.