BY HARLAN CHAPMAN-GREEN
It’s been a little while since I’ve written about a special edition watch from Seiko. While people often joke about Omega’s seemingly endless limited edition watches, although they seem to have slowed as of late, Seiko is another company that seems to make special edition watches for every day of the week.
This time we’re looking at a European edition of Seiko’s Prospex Alpinist watch, which straddles the border between dress watch and field watch. The new watch has the reference SPB531J1 and is served up in a stainless steel case measuring 39.5mm with 200m of water resistance. There’s also a compass bezel inside the watch’s outer edge, which is set via the crown at 4 O’clock.
The watch has an attractive blue dial with vertical striped finishing. Seiko says the dial’s colour is inspired by the night sky you see when you look up from the peak of a mountain, I suspect if they were inspired by the skies above London or Paris the dial would be coloured yellow from all the light pollution. Nevertheless, it’s a good looking dial that conveys all the information you’d need quite clearly both day and night thanks to applied lume. Behind the dial and on display through an open caseback is the calibre 6R35, which has a 3Hz beat rate and a 70-hour power reserve.
The watch comes with a couple of strap options. There’s a calfskin leather strap for those classier days, but there’s also a nylon strap if you do fancy climbing your nearest peak. Both straps are colour matched to the dial.
Seiko says that they’re making just 3,000 of these watches, and they’re on sale in Europe for EUR 890/GBP 780/CHF 930 a piece.
