Vanity Fair UK - 10.2019

COURTESY OF OMEGA

Left, from top:

Omega Seamaster

300, 1957; Omega

Seamaster 1000,

1971; Omega

Seamaster 600

(The Ploprof),

1970

Above, from left:

an early

non-professional

Omega Seamaster

Ref. 2846, 1958;

American Omega

“Captain” advert

AUTUMN 2019 VANITY FAIR ON TIME

a guaranteed depth-rating of 200

metres, which made Omega

competitive in one of the fastest

growing markets for sports

watches. Today’s Instagram

influencers would kill for the

kind of popularity enjoyed back

then by Jacques Cousteau (and

other notable explorers) while

commercial diving began taking

off thanks, in great part, to

Cousteau’s invention of the

twin-hose Aqua-Lung.

The watch’s attractive and

functional attributes—including

its large “Broad Arrow” hands,

rotating bezel and screw-on

caseback with integrated O-ring

gasket—combined with a highly

reliable and precise automatic

movement were extremely well

received by professionals, and

would later serve as a base for a

superior military version issued

to members of the British Army

and Royal Navy, including the

Special Air Service (SAS). Models

made in that configuration are

extremely rare—only a small

batch of mil-spec Seamaster

300s was made between 1967

and 1970—and highly sought-

after by watch collectors.

Meanwhile, Omega was

busy developing its next great

diving wristwatch, still aimed at

watches would later be

associated, although the brand’s

original objective—to challenge

its historical competitor, Rolex,

on land, air and sea—was

already immense.

The Omega Seamaster 300

Ref. CK2913 was not the

company’s first Seamaster.

Another watch whose water

resistance was deemed

reasonable enough for the name

had previously been launched in

1948 to commemorate the

manufacture’s 100th

anniversary. The first of its

name, made for civilians with

technology developed and used

by British sailors during the

Second World War, the

Seamaster would become

Omega’s longest-running series

of any Omega wristwatch and

inspire a recent limited

edition series of the

original 1948 model,

currently available in

the manufacture’s

catalogue.

However, the

new and

improved Omega

Seamaster 300

CK2913 was the first

to be sold proudly to

professional divers with

E

arlier this year,

Omega announced

that one of its

watches had broken a record that

had appeared invulnerable.

Omega had sent three models of

its latest Seamaster for a dive

10,928 metres below the ocean’s

surface, attached to the arm of

Limiting Factor—a highly

advanced submersible built for,

and operated by, the explorer

Victor Vescovo (see page 86).

The latest record means that

Omega finds itself in the unique

position of having made both of

the watches that have travelled

the furthest away from the

surface of the Earth: the

Speedmaster, worn by Buzz

Aldrin on the moon in 1969, and

the most recent (and yet to be

commercialised) Seamaster,

brought to the deepest point

of the Mariana Trench by

Vescovo’s submersible.

The previous record (of

10,916 metres) had

been held since 1960

by the Rolex Deep Sea

Special, following one

of the earliest dives to

that same trench.

Born in 1957, the

Speedmaster and the

Seamaster form two thirds

of a collection of watches

made for the professional

market known to watch

collectors as “the Holy

Trinity”. The set is completed

by the Railmaster, a watch

designed to withstand magnetic

forces and reduce any ill effects

on the watch’s movement—a

challenge that hasn’t inspired

the same quest for records as the

Space Race or the exploration of

the ocean’s greatest depths.

Omega could not have

imagined the incredible human

achievements with which its

Omega Seamaster

By ARTHUR TOUCHOT

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