With summer at our doorstep, I thought it might be apt to plunge into the depths of the most popular of the tool watches, the dive watch. From the outset, dive watches were companion life savers, vital tools in allowing divers to track time to survive. Today, diver’s watches top the list of the sports watch category, packing a punch for their distinctive design features and as polished statement pieces, whether worn bayside, countryside or about town. In Goldfinger, a dive watch is even paired with a tuxedo, quelle horreur! When James checks the time by the light of his cigarette lighter, he reveals a Rolex Submariner on his wrist. But hey, that’s James Bond, who has a licence to kill let alone defy sartorial style rules.
For many collectors the quintessential dive watch starts in 1953 with the launch of the Blancpain Fifty Fathoms and Rolex Submariner in 1954, but some water would pass under the bridge before we would see the shift from water-resistant to ‘waterproof’ in the dive watch sense of the word (as no watch on the planet is 100% waterproof.)
As early as the 17th Century, efforts were made to create bespoke water and dust resistant watches for scientific exploration and discovery endeavours during the Age of Enlightenment. By the 19th Century, standard diving dress divers were placing common pocket watches on the inside of their metal helmets and sealed hermetic cases, with the first patent by Gruen in 1919. This advance proved effective but impractical as the watch could not be adjusted or wound while inside, and the frequent unscrewing severely limited the life of the case. In 1926 Rolex revealed its revolutionary Oyster case, a streamlined and technically improved solution to water resistance. The case back, crown, and bezel – all chief points for water to enter the watch case – all screwed into a solid middle case and these remain signature features of Rolex watches today.
Even in the 1920s, shrewd marketing and Rolex were in lockstep. In an ingenious publicity stunt, the firm’s founder Hans Wilsdorf, asked Mercedes Gleitze, a stenographer vying to become the first British woman to swim the English Channel, to wear an Oyster on one of her attempts. Although not able to complete the distance, Gleitze emerged from the icy waters with a Rolex worn around her neck, ticking. You might say the feat went the equivalent of ‘viral’ and the Oyster was now synonymous with submergible watches, but the quest against water entry was not over yet. In 1931 Rolex would release yet another innovation, it’s perpetual motion mechanism. The Oyster Perpetual could now ratchet its water resistance up a notch by autonomously and continually winding, as such the durability and security of its components were notably improved.
Continuous innovations in diving watches and the need to go further, deeper and for longer kept pushing the boundaries of what could be possible in the ocean’s alternate universe. It wasn’t long before Omega released the first dive watch, the Marine, for commercial use in 1937, the watch had a water-resistant rating of 135 meters. Their aptly named Seamaster followed in 1948, however, as legible and water-resistant as both were, they were not equipped with the features that truly defined a dive watch as a genuine, practical underwater tool. That was soon to change when in 1953 Blancpain released their Fifty Fathoms watch, with a game changing rotatinga bezel, distinct Arabic numerals and clear indications, technically laying claim to the first dive watch.
Blancpain may have beaten Rolex to the true dive watch post, but Rolex would respond with a watch that had a capability in reaching depths over 300 meters (1,000 ft), the Submariner. Further developments in collaboration with DOXA saw an ‘improved’ Submariner version in the guise of the Sea-Dweller, the first watch to be fitted with a helium escape valve and a water resistance of 610 metres (2001ft). The Sea-Dweller would morph into the Deepsea Sea-Dweller with a case size of 44mm and depth rating increase to 3900m (12800 ft), ten times that of the original Submariner.
Today, we take water resistance for granted, with most watches being safe from accidental water exposure in everyday life. What has evolved has to go down as one of the great scientific marvels of the modern world, with these incredibly intricate, fragile, high precision instruments once cossetted in a waistcoat pocket now having the capabilities to plunge to depths that seem to defy not only logic but the imagination as well.
By Patricia Kontos, Senior Jewels & Timepieces Specialist
Top Image(Detail): Blancpain Fifty Fathoms automatique watch advert, 2008 / Alamy
November 2024