I take a look down at the Seiko 6309 Turtle, the lume long since faded. I turn the Seiko towards a window. I am almost in complete darkness, my camera seeing more than I can. The Seiko’s bezel indicates that my hour is almost up. I retrace my steps from empty room to empty room and find our fixer and our driver smoking cigarettes at the entrance to the hospital.
Where I once thought of my Seiko Speedtimer 6139 as the anomaly in my Rolex-centric collection, I’ve since started to see that it actually plays an important role somewhere near center stage. The 6139 has somehow managed to work its way through my tangle of collecting rules and straight onto my wrist with nearly the frequency of any other watch I own.
Seiko will claim that waterproof watch production started in earnest in 1965 with the 150M 62MAS, however in the years prior to the 62MAS, Seiko did experiment with water proofing other models. Many collectors will agree that Seiko’s first waterproof watch was the manually-wound Seiko Cronos ‘Sea horse’ from the Daini factory, released in December… Read more »
An essay exploring the confusing meanings of In-House in regards to watch movement production, and how to clarify the use of the phrase in-house
The Skinny Extending Seiko’s Heritage (Not Regurgitating It) I’m done with Seiko’s reissued dive watches. They’re never just like the original, the large Prospex logo announces that fact, and I’ve just grown bored with the whole enterprise. Seiko was always a forward-looking brand, and I think advanced design and technology celebrates Seiko’s heritage more than… Read more »
The Skinny Reference: SSC819P1 Dimensions: 39 x 45.5 x 13.3mm Material: Stainless Steel Water Resistance: 100m Movement: V192 Strap: Steel Bracelet Price: $675 USD Seiko, like many other watch brands recently, has been busy releasing fresh takes on their classic, historical designs. I was excited to hear in 2021 that the Speedtimer branding was returning… Read more »
In 1960, Seiko’s Suwa factory launched a brand of luxury dress watches known as the Liner. The Liner range was to fit just below the newly launched Grand Seiko range, providing much of the style and luxury without the high precision of the Chronometer-rated Grand Seiko model. However, by 1964, the brand was no more,… Read more »
In my last King Seiko Guide I described how the the King Seiko brand was conceived by the Daini Seikosha factory in 1961 as a luxury watch brand to rival Suwa Seikosha’s Grand Seiko line established in 1960. We also saw how the unnumbered movement from that first King Seiko model would go on to become… Read more »
Just admit it: you, like me, give more than two shits about what people think of your watch collection, and the reason is clear: our collections represent us. Every little detail that we’ve allowed past the velvet rope into our personal horological disco is out on the floor for others to judge. We really wouldn’t give two shits about that judgement if we didn’t understand that what’s being judged is not watches but our most intimate expression of our mostly solipsistic and, thus, often lonely subjectivity inner lives. You, dear reader of horological essays, like me who writes them, give two shits about how people judge you if not your watches, I’m sure of it.
Here at Beyond The Dial, we give each other a fair amount of shit for our respective favorite watches. Allen goes on and on about his 1972 Rolex Datejust 1603 as if this fairly common watch were special to anyone but himself, and David has become something of a Seiko Pogue pusher-man here in the… Read more »