MAEN X IFL Manhattan Graffiti, Ref. IFL.01

I knew 37mm would be too small. Ordered it anyway. Here's what happened: I saw the dial in a product photo and couldn't stop looking at it. Hand-painted graffiti spelling out Manhattan, Queens, Brooklyn, Harlem. Each watch different. 500 pieces total. The rational part of my brain said the case would wear like a dress watch on my wrist. I bought it.

Two Swedish companies, one hand-painted dial

MAEN exists because Sebastiaan Cortjaens got annoyed. He was a tax lawyer in Stockholm with a watch brand as a client. He watched them sell thousands of mediocre watches and thought he could do better. His friend Jules van Helvoort had been thinking the same thing. They started MAEN in 2017.

They're Dutch. The name is old Dutch for "moon." They sell direct, skip the retail markup, and put the savings into the watches. The Manhattan 37 came out in 2022. When Patek released the Cubitus in 2024, people noticed the octagonal case looked familiar. MAEN was there first, for what that's worth.

IFL Watches came later, 2019. Karar Aimer and some friends started it in a Stockholm suburb. They sold other people's watches, then made their own accessories, then started painting Casio G-Shocks by hand. The "CasiOak" customs got attention. Painting dials is now their thing.

So: MAEN makes the watch, IFL paints the dial. Two small companies in the same city. It makes sense they'd find each other.

The dial

White base. Graffiti tags painted on top in black and red and whatever colors the artist felt like using that day. Mine says MANHATTAN across the center, BROOKLYN below, other borough names scattered around. The arrangement on my dial doesn't match the marketing photos. That's the point.

I can't tell you who painted it. IFL doesn't say. The paint is flat, no visible texture, sits flush under the sapphire. The applied indices poke through the painted areas. Legibility is fine. The dauphine hands read against the white sections without trouble.

In photos, the dial looks busy. On the wrist, your eye adjusts. You stop seeing chaos and start seeing a composition. Or maybe I'm justifying a purchase I made with my gut. IFL also recently released a follow up called MAEN Manhattan After Dark.

The case

Thirty-seven millimeters. Octagonal bezel. 9.3mm thick, which is slim for an automatic. Lug-to-lug is 47mm. Polished chamfers catch light along the edges. Brushed flats everywhere else. The bracelet integrates into the case and tapers toward the clasp.

The clasp hides under the bracelet. You don't see the folding mechanism from the outside. Sizing is pin-and-collar, which I hate, but the half-links help. This is a small watch. On my wrist it looks like something from the 1970s, which I don't normally wear. The size limits when I reach for it.

The movement

Sellita SW200-1, Top Grade. That means regulated in five positions instead of two. 26 jewels, 28,800 vph, 38-hour reserve. Hacks and hand-winds.

Sellita started making these after ETA cut off third-party supply in 2003. The design is basically the same as the ETA 2824-2. Sellita now produces around 800,000 per year. You'll find SW200-1s in watches from dozens of brands. It's not exciting. It works. Closed caseback, so you never see it.

On the wrist

The 47mm lug-to-lug helps. Short lugs mean the watch doesn't overhang my wrist despite the small diameter. The integrated bracelet curves instead of sitting flat. At 121 grams it has weight but doesn't drag.

Still too small. I keep coming back to that. On anything over a 7-inch wrist, the proportions look off. The dial deserves a bigger canvas. I wear it anyway. Not often.

Verdict

Hand-painted dial, Swiss automatic, under a thousand dollars. I don't know another brand doing that combination. The size is wrong for me. I knew that when I ordered it. The dial won and I don't regret the purchase, but I wish IFL Watches would paint one of these on a 40mm Manhattan instead.

{ "title": "MAEN Manhattan Graffiti", "score": 3.9, "recommend": true, "ratings": { "Movement": 4.0, "Case": 4.2, "Dial": 4.5, "On the wrist": 3.2, "Value": 4.0 }, "pros": [ "Hand-painted dial, each one different", "Sellita SW200-1 Top Grade, regulated in five positions", "9.3mm slim for an automatic", "Hidden clasp keeps the bracelet clean" ], "cons": [ "37mm too small for larger wrists", "Closed caseback", "500 pieces, hard to find now" ] }