The MB&F LM1 EVO brings back the watch that started the brand’s Legacy Machine line. It revives 2011’s Legacy Machine N°1, keeping its two fully independent time zones and its floating balance wheel, and moves it into the brand’s sportier EVO case—42mm across, water-resistant to 80 meters, and fitted with interchangeable rubber straps. It arrives in grade 5 titanium and in a 5N+ rose gold edition limited to 33 pieces.
The MB&F LM1 EVO revives 2011's Legacy Machine N°1, with two fully independent time zones and a floating 14mm balance, in a 42mm EVO case water-resistant to 80 meters. It has a 60-hour hand-wound movement and comes in titanium or 33-piece 5N+ rose gold.
The original earned its comeback. When it launched in 2011, Legacy Machine N°1 gave MB&F—until then known for its sculptural Horological Machines—a round-cased counterpart inspired by the great innovators of 19th-century watchmaking that was still unmistakably three-dimensional. Its in-house movement, developed with Jean-François Mojon and finished to specifications set by Kari Voutilainen, won LM1 both the Public Prize and the Best Men’s Watch Prize at the 2012 Grand Prix d’Horlogerie de Genève. We covered the original LM1’s farewell edition back in 2017, and we didn’t expect to see it again.
Founder Maximilian Büsser describes the idea as a thought experiment. “What would have happened if I had been born in 1867 instead of 1967? In the early 1900s the first wristwatches appear and I would want to create three-dimensional machines for the wrist, but there are no Grendizers, Star Wars or fighter jets for my inspiration,” he says in MB&F’s account of the watch’s origins.
“But I do have pocket watches, the Eiffel Tower and Jules Verne, so what might my more traditional machine look like? It has to be round and it has to be three-dimensional: Legacy Machine N°1 was my answer,” Büsser continues. Fifteen years later, MB&F has updated that answer and kept its premise intact.
Introducing the LM1 EVO
The architecture is familiar at a glance. Two separate subdials sit side by side, and the 14mm balance wheel, with its four traditional regulating screws, still seems to hover above the movement at the center of the stage, beating at a stately 2.5Hz, or 18,000 vibrations per hour. “But this is no exercise in nostalgia,” MB&F says. The brand describes the LM1 EVO as re-engineered for a different kind of life: “longer-running, easier to live with, and protected by the performance-driven EVO case.”
What has always set the LM1 apart is the purity of its second time zone. Its two subdials aren’t tied together by a conventional GMT mechanism. Each shows its own hours and minutes, so the two can be set completely independently, including to places that sit 30 or 45 minutes off the hour. MB&F suggests a second use, too: leave one dial on the time and use the other to measure elapsed time. The crown at 4 o’clock winds the movement and sets the right-hand display, and the crown at 8 o’clock adjusts the left.
The most visible change is at 6 o’clock. The original LM1 showed its remaining energy on a dramatic vertical indicator rising from the movement. The LM1 EVO lays that function down as an inclined dial in the lower part of the composition, and it has more to report: the power reserve climbs from 45 hours to 60. The movement is still wound by hand, which, on a watch built around the pleasure of mechanics, we count as a feature.
The regulating organ gets an upgrade, too. MB&F has fitted the balance with a Straumann double hairspring, two matching hairsprings mounted in opposing directions. It’s a rare setup, and the brand says it cancels out the shifting center of gravity and lateral friction on the balance staff, improving positional accuracy and isochronism. A redesigned titanium bridge keeps it all in the foreground. The finishing stays resolutely traditional—gold chatons with polished countersinks, polished bevels with internal angles, Geneva waves, and hand engravings—now set off by darkened bridges.
Built for Real Life
The EVO half of the name is where the LM1 changes most. MB&F’s EVO platform has already toughened up other Legacy Machines, including the Legacy Machine Perpetual EVO, and now the LM1 gets the whole treatment. The case shrinks from the original’s 44mm to 42mm and measures 16.8mm tall and 52mm lug to lug. It adds screw-down crowns, 80 meters of water resistance, and FlexRing, MB&F’s patented ring-shaped dampener between case and movement that adds protection against shocks.
There’s no traditional bezel, which leaves an unobstructed view of the Super-LumiNova-enhanced displays under a high-domed sapphire crystal. Integrated rubber straps in gray or black swap out at both the case and the clasp, finished with a folding buckle in titanium or rose gold to match. MB&F pitches the LM1 EVO as an active-lifestyle piece for collectors who love traditional watchmaking, and the spec sheet backs it up.
The two editions take the same architecture in different directions. The titanium version stays bright and technical, with a silver-toned, rhodium-plated dial plate, black displays, and blue hands. The 5N+ rose gold edition, limited to 33 pieces, sets its black displays against a deep green dial-side surface, with rose-gold-toned details that echo the warmth of the case.
In our view, the titanium is the one to have. The whole point of the EVO treatment is a Legacy Machine you can wear every day, and the lighter metal and cooler palette, blue hands included, suit that brief best. The rose gold is the louder statement, and at 33 pieces it will be the harder of the two to find.
MB&F’s website lists the LM1 EVO from CHF 82,000. Fifteen years after it sent MB&F back to tradition, the first Legacy Machine is finally ready for everyday life.
| Specification | Detail |
|---|---|
| Model | MB&F Legacy Machine N°1 EVO (LM1 EVO) |
| Editions | Grade 5 titanium with rhodium-plated dial plate; 5N+ rose gold with green dial plate, limited to 33 pieces |
| Case | 42mm diameter, 16.8mm height, 52mm lug to lug, 18mm lug width; FlexRing shock protection |
| Crystals | High-domed sapphire on top, box sapphire on back, anti-reflective on both sides |
| Water resistance | 80 meters (8 ATM); screw-down crowns |
| Movement | Three-dimensional manual-winding movement developed in-house by MB&F with Jean-François Mojon; finishing specifications by Kari Voutilainen |
| Power reserve | 60 hours, single slipping mainspring barrel |
| Balance | Bespoke 14mm balance wheel with four regulating screws; Straumann double hairspring |
| Frequency | 18,000 vph (2.5Hz) |
| Jewels | 25 |
| Finishing | Gold chatons with polished countersinks, polished bevels with internal angles, Geneva waves, hand engravings, NAC black bridges |
| Functions | Two independent time zones, each with hours and minutes; inclined power reserve indicator |
| Strap | Quick-change gray or black rubber strap with titanium or rose gold folding buckle |
Timely FAQs
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