At the end of last year we published a story about how Omega had blown up 2022. Not just with its headline-making MoonSwatch collaboration but with a series of technically dazzling and leftfield releases, including a Seamaster with an animated James Bond on its caseback and a Speedmaster made of 18k gold that chimed elapsed time.
This year, the watchmaker has continued to flex both its expertise and unpredictability, from setting a new bar for accuracy to colourful new Eddie Redmayne-approved entries into its Aqua Terra family of hybrid dress/sports watches.
Its third release of 2023 is an update to its Worldtimer range comprised of three versions, including one made of titanium with a dial created entirely by laser blasting – meaning the shapes and textures on the dial, itself a single piece of titanium, have been etched solely by laser.
The Seamaster Aqua Terra Worldtimer 2023 – to give it its full name – can track every time zone on Earth, with 24 cities displayed around the circumference of the dial, including Omega’s home city of Bienne in Switzerland, as well as a miniature model of our planet as viewed from above the North Pole. Circling the globe is a 24-hour indicator, split into night and day.
The whole thing is encased in a domed design that mimics the curvature of the Earth – a detail Omega says is so subtle it is ‘impossible to see with the naked eye’.
The new watch comes in three versions.
The titanium, laser-etched model has a black and grey dial, a brushed black ceramic dial and blackened hands and indexes filled with white Super-LumiNova that glow bright blue in the dark. It comes on a black rubber strap with grey stitching, matching the dial.
The two other models are made from steel with sun-brushed green PVD dials. One comes with a matching steel bracelet and butterfly clasp, the other has a green rubber strap with grey stitching. Omega’s favoured 18k ‘Moonshine Gold’ – recently applied to the second hand of a controversial update to the MoonSwatch – is added to the hands and indexes.
As per the existing Worldtimer family, all three models measure a substantial 43mm – a size that has already split the vote on Instagram. But then each one does have to find room inside for tiny planet Earth.
The steel models are £9,900 and £10,100. The titanium version is £11,500. omegawatches.com
