In the recent past, Glashütte Original has enjoyed significant success with brightly colored dials. Thus, it makes perfect sense for the German arm of the Swatch Group to roll the dice once more on this trend. By releasing the Glashütte Original Seventies Chronograph Panorama Date Limited-Edition watches in gray and green, the company spruces up a successful collection that could always use more variety. Gray dials have been used before, but only with a sunray finish. This degradé fade is not only very current and a strong look for the quasi-square watch, but it also backs-up its more exciting green counterpart while offering a muted alternative.
Five years after the Seventies Chronograph Panorama Date was launched, Glashütte Original is once again enjoying one of its rather more creative periods. Those who remember the Senator Diary or the Sport Evolution will know what I mean. More recently, the Sixties collection has lightened up the brand’s occasionally stuffy exterior and encouraged a suddenly curious audience to explore what else one of Glashütte’s “big two” has to offer.
Apparently, the new Glashütte Original Seventies Chronograph Panorama Date limited-edition watches are inspired by the landscape and sky that surrounds the small Saxon town GO calls home. Having worked in Glashütte for three years, I can attest to the greenery (which is rife, thanks to a weird microclimate that is quite happy to throw four seasons at you in 24 hours for no good reason at all). The gray is found in the rocky bluffs of the Ore Mountains that encircle the town and stretch southward toward the nearby Czech border. That, and the town’s rich history of tin and silver mining, the traces of which still litter the environment.
As per usual, these beautiful dials are made in “Gold City” (Pforzheim). Transparency has never been as important in our industry as it is today, and Glashütte Original’s willingness to talk about where it has its dials made and why the brand is proud of it is one of the most refreshing aspects of the whole company.
What’s extra special about Glashütte Original’s open-door policy here is how the brand explains how the dials are made, often in great detail. For the Glashütte Original Seventies Chronograph Panorama Date watches, dial makers use rotating brass brushes to apply an elegant sunray finish. After the dials are galvanized, green or gray lacquer is applied multiple times. Finally, black lacquer is applied to the edges of the dial by a very steady hand, indeed. The lacquered dials are then fired to fix the color in place.
The stainless steel case is 40mm-wide and 14.1mm-thick and is water-resistant to 100 meters. It plays home to caliber 37-02, an automatic flyback chronograph beating at 28,800vph and running for an impressive 70 hours on a full wind. That impressive power reserve is indicated by the tiny cutout in the upper lefthand quadrant of the going seconds sub-dial at 9 o’clock. The chronograph 30-minute counter can be found at 3, the dual-disc panoramic date at 6, and a really neat chronograph hour counter in the crescent-shaped aperture beneath the brand’s wordmark. The prices for the new Seventies Chronograph Panorama Date models are $12,700 USD (for the versions with the calf nubuck leather strap), or $13,900 USD on the optional stainless steel bracelet. To learn more, please visit glashuette-original.com.
