BY HARLAN CHAPMAN-GREEN
Oris’ Aquis Date could well be the quintessential diving watch for those who don’t want to cash out on a Rolex Submariner. The Aquis has been a genuinely good watch for a long time, boasting solid construction, a reliable movement, and a range of sizes and styles to fit nearly all. Such a sturdy base watch makes an ideal platform upon which to launch many different special edition watches, as Oris has done over the years. Today’s newest piece adds to that.
Oris’ new watch, called the Aquis Date New York Harbour Limited Edition II, is the second time Oris has sponsored and worked with a charity called the Billion Oyster Project. This initiative aims to restore oyster reefs which contribute to the biodiversity of the coastal waters around much of the United States, and presumably other areas as well. As the name implies, the Billion Oyster Project aims to home over a billion oysters around New York, as oysters filter water (over 50 gallons a day, apparently) and form ecosystems for other life to thrive in around the coast and harbours. Empty shells are collected from New York’s restaurants, taken to outside storage sites where they’re left for a year, before they’re then cleaned up by hand and placed into tanks where oyster larvae can attach to them and start growing their own shells, before eventually being put back into New York’s waterways.
Oris’ new watch features an ‘Aqua Green’ appearance, although it’s got quite a blue colour to it. The mother-of-pearl dial is coloured Aqua Green, as is the rubber strap. Although it’s hard to say that this is the colour green, it’s easy to see how well this unique colour works on the watch. It looks great. It’s quite large, though, with its stainless steel case measuring 43.5mm x 13.1mm with 300m of water resistance.
Inside the watch is the calibre 733, which began life as a Sellita SW200-1. It has a power reserve of around 40 hours and a 4Hz beat rate. Unlike a lot of Oris’ watches, which have their famous red-painted winding rotor visible through the caseback, the new Aquis Date New York Harbour Limited Edition II features a closed caseback. Instead of the rotor, you get to see a representation of the thankful oysters you’re helping to conserve by purchasing the watch.
This new Aquis brings with it the support of a real world problem, how do we preserve our waterways and protect the thriving ecosystems within them while also expanding ourselves? It’s a question that won’t go away, but with a little help, we can change the odds for marine wildlife. The new watch is limited to 2,000 examples at a cost of $3,000.
