Hodinkee
Reference Points: Understanding The Rolex Submariner
We go as deep as you can on the most legendary watch of all time.
420 articles · 10 videos found · page 5 of 15
Integral case projections protecting the crown from impact; introduced on Rolex Submariner ref. 5512 in 1959.
Every Rolex Submariner from 1953 ref. 6204 to today: years, dials, bezels, movements, nicknames.
Seventy-two years, one silhouette, and the single most recognised watch on earth. The Submariner survived James Bond, Steve McQueen, the quartz crisis, the wait-list era, and its own ubiquity. Time to answer the question everyone tiptoes around: is it actually the most iconic watch ever?
The 1953 Rolex diver. James Bond's watch and the template every dive watch copies.
Hodinkee
We go as deep as you can on the most legendary watch of all time.
Hodinkee
There was no diving, but there was plenty of pizza.
Hodinkee
Brett Gilliam's Rolex has gone on over 17,000 dives.
Hodinkee
And the complications of bringing a watch back to life.
Hodinkee
Merriam-Webster defines patina as "a surface appearance of something grown beautiful, especially with age or use."
Hodinkee
A lower-key white-gold Sub with clean black dial.
Hodinkee
A variety of vintage watches, now up for grabs in the HODINKEE Shop.
Hodinkee
A watch you don't see every day.
Hodinkee
The more complicated Sub gets the same upgrades as its no-date sibling – plus, it's available in some fun new colorways.
Quill & Pad
If John Keil was to recommend a brand-new functional diver’s watch to a friend who was looking to spend within a certain price range, these would be his suggestions. Or, more specifically, here is what he would purchase himself in a variety of price categories.
Revolution
Revolution
Revolution
Revolution
A quarter-mile offshore and 80 feet below the surfaceof Lake Superior, my friend, Chris, and I found the Madeira’s pilothouse - standing upright, its compass binnacle still intact, belying the violence of the ship’s demise. The rest of the wreck is strewn over an acre of lakebed - twisted bollards, winches torn free and the […]
Monochrome
Let’s be honest, virtually no one who buys a Rolex Submariner or any 300m dive watch actually dives below 50 metres. In fact, the majority of dive watch owners today rarely, if ever, engage in diving. Most serious scuba divers use wrist computers, so traditional dive watches are often fashion statements as watch enthusiasts like […]
Teddy Baldassarre
Generally speaking, most watch consumers tend to prefer watch designs that are - for lack of a better term - approachable, the kind of style that can be worn every day without drawing an undue amount of attention. Class is often associated with being understated, after all. For most enthusiasts, design, craftsmanship, mechanical complexity, and value for dollar are all subjectively weighed in an effort to determine the most appropriate timepiece decision. Naturally, the result is that the watch industry focuses a great deal of its effort on practical designs intended to please a large percentage of the population in an ultimate effort to sell. Outliers and more novel designs are considered risky and are often left behind in the race for mass-market appeal. But what if, some independent watchmakers ask, you’ve simply had enough of brands cutting-and-pasting each other’s designs? We’ve all noted, “That’s more or less a Rolex Submariner,” one too many times when seeing the latest "new" piece. Let's say that sometimes you may want something different and maybe even a little bit crazy. And for the sake of argument, and for a more comprehensive list, let's also say you have a nice chunk of money to spend. Sure, you could take your cash and make an informed, reasonable decision to keep on fitting in with all the other watch nerds on your Instagram feed, but this list is for enthusiasts interested in the road less traveled, searching for different, interesti...
SJX Watches
Topping A. Lange & Söhne’s 2025 line-up is the Minute Repeater Perpetual. Featuring a compact platinum case and black enamel dial, the new flagship watch of the Saxonia line marks the first time Lange has combined these two classic complications on their own. Limited to 50 pieces in platinum, the Repeater Perpetual is positioned near the top of the current catalogue. Beyond the technical complexity, it’s been endowed with an exceptional white gold and black enamel dial crafted in-house, and features the frosted movement finish that’s often reserved for the brand’s special editions. Initial thoughts It’s always nice to see a brand cover new ground, especially when that ground is the tried-and-true combination of a minute repeater and perpetual calendar. It’s an extravagant, decadent watch that combines one of the most legible perpetual calendar layouts with one of the industry’s most technically sophisticated minute repeaters. Beginning with its compact form, the Repeater Perpetual packs 640 components inside a platinum case that’s just 40.5 mm wide and 12.5 mm thick; roughly the same dimensions as a Rolex Submariner. It features an enamel dial in deep black, which is always a risk, since even the tiniest imperfections tend to stand out vividly. A cynic might point out that the new calibre L122.2 is largely a mashup of a Langematik Perpetual and Richard Lange Minute Repeater, but to do so would be to miss the point. The movement is everything Lange does be...
Fratello
Working at Fratello has its perks. One of them is that, on rare occasions, we get access to our absolute grail watches. I had such an experience just a few months ago when I spent time with a Rolex Submariner ref. 5508. Today, I get yet another such opportunity. It’s my pleasure to go hands-on […] Visit Meeting My Grail: The A. Lange & Söhne 1815 Chronograph to read the full article.
Fratello
Due to my smaller wrists, I tend to wear custom-size straps and adjusted bracelets. However, there are other options. The Artem nylon watch straps are a cut above typical offerings. I’ve paired one with a vintage Tudor Submariner for today’s review, and I’ll answer why it’s worth selecting a premium nylon strap over a flimsy […] Visit Hands-On With Artem Nylon Watch Straps to read the full article.
Worn & Wound
I’d be hard-pressed to name a watch more iterated upon in the last few years than Zodiac’s Sea Wolf. The retro-inspired diver has been at the heart of a true brand renaissance and was at the forefront of the vintage revival movement that has so characterized the watch world over the last decade. Today, Zodiac is looking back to one of its earliest dive watches with the new Zodiac Super Sea Wolf Ref. 691. There is, as with most things watch-related and pre-internet, some debate as to the initial launch date of the Zodiac Sea Wolf, but regardless of the date, there’s no doubt that Zodiac released the Sea Wolf as part of the first wave of dive watches back in the 1950s, but while watches like the Blancpain Fifty Fathoms, Rolex Submariner, and Omega Seamaster 300 soared (or dove), the Sea Wolf fell into the background - obscured to all but the most devoted watch enthusiasts alongside other early generation dive watches like the Eterna Kon-Tiki and Enicar Sherpa-Dive. By the time I got into watches in the early 2010s, the Zodiac Sea Wolf was one of the great secrets of the enthusiast world. Great examples could be had for a few hundred bucks, so for not much money, you could have a great-looking vintage dive watch with some real history. That all started to change when Zodiac, under the larger umbrella of Fossil Group, revived the Sea Wolf in 2015. The Zodiac Sea Wolf was immediately brought to the center of the horological world and has continued to stay relevant in t...
Teddy Baldassarre
A watch complication, by definition, is any function offered by a timepiece that is in addition to its primary function of keeping the time. Despite the name, watch complications don't really have to be, well, all that complicated: that date display you glance at before signing a check qualifies as a complication even though it's not nearly as complex and dynamic as, say, the split-seconds chronograph you use to time racing laps or the world-time function you consult before making a call home on an international business trip. Here we run down the major watch complications from the simplest to the most mechanically sophisticated, and provide an example of each. Date Complications: Date Window Probably the most common of “small complications,” this is simply a display of the date via a numbered disk that passes under an aperture in the dial, usually positioned at 3 o’clock, 4:30, or 6 o’clock. Unless the watch is an annual or perpetual calendar, this date will need to be manually adjusted forward at the end of any month shorter than 31 days. Some watches, like the Rolex Submariner, enlarge this display by placing a magnifying lens over the window. Large Date This one also goes by “big date” “grande date,” or “panorama date,’ and is essentially just a larger version of the standard date display, though it usually uses two date disks (one for the tens numeral and the other for the ones) rather than one, and a double window, with each numeral appearing in...
Time+Tide
Once upon a time, when Chat GPT made its debut and artificial intelligence became a point of mainstream discussion, we decided to let former president of the USA Donald Trump take a stab at writing a review of the Rolex Submariner. Well, an artificial intelligence pretending to be Trump that is. We do not have … ContinuedThe post We asked Chat GPT to review the Doxa SUB 300 in the voice of Matthew McConaughey appeared first on Time+Tide Watches.
SJX Watches
One of the more intriguing watches debuted by an independent watchmaker in the year to date is the Bexei Dignitas Pure “Project XX”, a collaboration between Hungarian watchmaker Aaron Becsei and American knife maker Todd Rexford. Conceived at the behest of a Thai collector living in Japan, the Project XX is based on Bexei’s time-only model but its case, dial, and movement plates in zirconium, a resilient metal with properties similar to titanium. Mr Becsei is already known for his high-quality movements and regular readers will remember the Vox Vinum grande sonnerie wristwatch he completed in 2019. His partner in his project is a leading artisanal knife maker whose one-off knives regularly sell for more than a Rolex Submariner, Todd Rexford. An artisan who works with metal in ways similar to a watchmaker, Mr Rexford uses the many of same tools found in a watchmaker’s workshop, like lathes, jig borers, and drills; he even makes his own screws. And he clearly works to the same tolerances since he produced the movement bridges for the Project XX. A defining element of the Project XX are its “hot hammered” zirconium components, namely the dial and movement bridges. It’s the signature material of Mr Rexford’s that he often uses for the handles of his knives. The zirconium dial and movement parts were produced and then hot hammered by Mr Rexford, resulting in a textured finish that sharply contrasts with the lustrous movement decoration applied by Mr Bexei. I...
Time+Tide
Ever since Sean Connery’s Jame Bond emerged from the ocean in Goldfinger and peeled off his wetsuit to reveal a tuxedo beneath, the question has always been there: should you wear a diving watch with formalwear? (Bond was wearing the Rolex Submariner ref 6538 by the way.) The question arises following the recent launch of … ContinuedThe post Have dive watches just received official formalwear approval? appeared first on Time+Tide Watches.
Hodinkee
Diving for 40 years with a solid gold Rolex Submariner 1680.
Hodinkee
How a Tudor Submariner reunited two veterans 50 years after they last saw each other in Vietnam.
Hodinkee
He helped make James Bond and the Rolex Submariner what they are today.
Quill & Pad
Ashton likes vintage watches so much that his prized possession is a 1978 Rolex Submariner Reference 1680. Why does he love this watch so much? Not because it looks like it’s from 1978, but because it is from 1978. So, he asks, is the current vintage trend something we should be wholeheartedly embracing?
Time+Tide
I still get lost in the details of the Rolex Submariner that was my first serious watch. The proportions of its features seem divinely inspired, everything ideally sized and placed. Its glossy black dial is startling to look at, somehow bottled essence of the pure void. When I put it on, the oyster bracelet, in … ContinuedThe post In defence of obvious watches appeared first on Time+Tide Watches.
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