BY HARLAN CHAPMAN-GREEN
Every year around this time, Oris makes a special-edition watch in tribute to its hometown of Hölstein in the Canton of Basel-Landschaft, one of Switzerland’s most northerly cantons. The Hölstein Edition watches are usually very creative pieces and are highly regarded by collectors, so the 2026 edition should be no different.
Built on the new Artelier range, Oris has produced a chic dress watch designed to appeal to a younger audience. That’s fitting, because the product design engineer, Lena Huwiler, is 24. What we have here is a clean, unfussy dress watch with minimal accoutrements and maximum class. With its stainless steel case measuring 39.5mm x 11.1mm, and with 30m of water resistance. The steel case is polished all over, which is quite effective for a dress watch, but perhaps a little simplistic. It does, however, fit in with the style. There isn’t exactly a lot of case anyway, with the dial taking up most of the space and a thin bezel around it.
The Artelier Hölstein Edition 2026’s grey dial is immaculately clean, with very little on it. Instead, we get hand-applied markers and a small second indicator with a red hand and a mirror-polished finish to boot. It doesn’t use the clean, straight lines of the Bauhaus design language; instead, it has its own “Swiss” look.
There isn’t much to see through the caseback, though, with Oris’ signature bear mascot laser-cut into it to create a mirrored look with a rainbow effect depending on how light hits it. Underneath that case back is Oris’ in-house-made calibre 401, which is based on the proprietary calibre 400, with the 401 indicating that it’s the calibre 400 but with a small seconds display. It’s a self-winding movement with a 120-hour (5-day) power reserve and a 4Hz beat rate.
Presented on a grey coloured suede strap with a stainless steel butterfly clasp, the new Oris Artelier Hölstein Edition looks great. In a way, it looks too great to be limited to just 250 watches. It would be good to see them experiment with this style again in a few years, perhaps with different colours, but with the same polished sub-second indicator; it’s something not often seen on watches. It’s different, and it’s totally Oris. The price is CHF 3,800/USD 4,200.
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