BY HARLAN CHAPMAN-GREEN
With all the recent fanfare of the recent LVMH Watch Week concluding, you would be forgiven for not noticing that Omega released some new boutique-only watches recently. It might seem a little odd that they’d do that, but when it comes to boutique watches it seems to be quite regular.
Sometimes, a brand will make a big fanfare about special edition watches like that, while other brands see little point in going over the top for watches that are only going to be sold in some physical locations, which may or may not be limited to one country. In fact, if it wasn’t for our friends at ABlogToWatch, we wouldn’t have known about these watches at all; well, I wouldn’t have.
Omega’s Seamaster Planet Ocean 600m is, in my view, inarguably their best-looking watch. Some people whose names might just begin with J and end with -ovan Krstevski might tell you that it’s the Seamaster 300m Diver that’s the best looking watch Omega makes, but you just listen to me, I won’t steer you wrong.
Seamaster Planet Ocean 600m
Omega has, essentially, split its new watches into two groups of three, or three groups of two depending on how you want to look at it. I’ve split it into the former, with the first group of watches being the three-handed model. The Seamaster Planet Ocean 600m is a diving watch with a bit of class, and these three models continue that trend.
All three of these watches come in the largest-sized case for this watch, which is 43.5mm across and 16.2mm thick, yeah, these won’t hide under tight cuffs so well but they make better dress watches than you might think. In case you’re wondering, the smallest Planet Oceans are 39.5mm across, while the largest are 45.5mm, but they either have a complication or are the 6000m watch.
These three watches come with dials coloured in gunmetal grey (ref 215.32.44.21.01.002), which is my favourite, brushed steel (ref 215.32.44.21.06.001) and sand-blasted beige (ref 215.32.44.21.09.001). It’s quite refreshing to see that the brushed ceramic bezels that used to adorn all Planet Oceans have returned; although the glossy ones do look a bit classier, these are also restrained and work well.
All three watches have the self-winding calibre 8900 inside them. This movement is made in-house by Omega and features a co-axial escapement, an independently-set hour hand, a 60-hour power reserve and 3.5Hz beat rate plus METAS Master Chronometer certification guaranteeing accuracy and magnetic resistance (up to 15,000 Gauss).
The price for the gunmetal and brushed steel watches is $7100, meanwhile, the beige one is priced at $7500.
Seamaster Planet Ocean Chronograph 600m
The other three watches are the chronograph versions of the three-handed models mentioned above. All of these watches follow the trend of the other Planet Ocean Chronograph 600m watches and that is by being absolutely massive. At 45.5mm x 19.0mm there’s no missing any of these bad boys, but these have been on sale in one form or another for years and they’ve always been big watches, so it’s no real change from the norm. Fun fact, the central case of a Planet Ocean Chronograph 600m (by this I mean excluding the bezel and caseback) is thicker than an entire Rolex GMT-Master II, including the Cyclops.
Thankfully, these watches come on the same style of rubber strap as the three-handed watches. Although there’s no ability to swap with those ones, these watches have 22mm wide straps while the others are 21mm. The lug-to-lug distance is 52.3mm on these chronograph models and on the 3-handed models it’s 49.3mm. It’s odd how I’m able to tell you all this information, Omega’s website used to be quite sparse on the data but now there’s loads of stuff, it’s very handy.
Anyway, these watches also use an in-house movement from Omega; this time, it’s the calibre 9900 and comes with a 60-hour power reserve and a 4Hz beat rate, plus a column wheel for better control with less juddering. As with all Planet Ocean Chronogram 600m watches, these new ones are able to have their helium crown opened and their chronograph operated while underwater, it’s most certainly not the norm nor a requirement for a chronograph to be able to do this, so I’m glad Omega put the extra effort in. Just like the three-handed watches, the brushed steel (ref 215.32.46.51.06.001) and gunmetal (ref 215.32.46.51.01.004)watches cost $9000 while, weirdly, the beige model (ref 215.32.46.51.09.001) costs $9700.
All of these watches are boutique-only editions, but, luckily, Omega happens to have a fair few of those around, so it’s possible to get to see and purchase one. There’s no word on whether these are limited in production, so it’s likely that they’re all permanent additions to the collection. I for one welcome them into the world of horology, and am glad to have them here.
