Since 1959, Certina has adorned its timepieces with a turtle shell emblem as a sign of ruggedness and water resistance. As a result, Certina’s divers have always had a passing connection to turtles among enthusiasts, and the brand itself has been eager to trade on this association, maintaining a sponsor partnership with the Florida-based Sea Turtle Conservancy (STC) conservation group since 2017. For summer 2024, Certina ramps up this sea turtle connection even further, creating a new specialty edition of its ultra-capable DS Super PH1000M diver which will support STC with part of the proceeds of each sale. Bold, impressively well-appointed, and sporting a charismatic, summery new colorway, the Certina DS Super PH1000M STC delivers a shell-tough vintage diver-wearing experience with a wealth of personality.
There’s a muscular, old-school-diver feel to the Certina DS Super PH1000M STC’s stainless steel case on the wrist. Measuring 43.5mm wide and 14.2mm thick, it’s far from demure, but Certina uses some Seiko-style case geometry to ensure the design works for a variety of wrist sizes. Like the rest of the DS Super PH1000M family, the overall form is a suitably ‘70s cushion design, complete with broad, short lugs and a continuous C-curve from lug tip to lug tip. Thanks to a sharp, sloping case side undercut, the overall footprint of the watch on the wrist is significantly smaller than the figures would suggest, and the brightly polished mid-case further helps to de-emphasize the sense of bulk here. Speaking of de-emphasized bulk, the 9 o’clock helium escape valve is an impressive addition at this price point, and it’s rendered small enough to keep its disruption to the lines of the case at a minimum. But it’s the tall, tapering, gear-toothed bezel that truly grabs the eye here. With a polished surrounding accent ring and brightly polished edges, it’s a natural visual highlight, and Certina keeps the overall look charmingly vintage with a full-scale dive insert in matte teal aluminum. There’s been a push among some enthusiasts to render virtually every bezel insert in ceramic, but the old-school charisma of anodized aluminum gives this piece much of its overall character. This bezel also gives the watch Certina’s most unique feature – the press-down bezel lock mechanism. Rather than simply relying on unidirectional turning (which Certina also includes), the brand makes accidental bezel rotation nigh-on impossible by locking the bezel in place unless it’s compressed into the case beforehand – think of the safety lid on a pill bottle, but pleasingly heavy and paired to a crisp, weighty ratcheting mechanism. Around back, Certina abandons its usual sculpted turtle-shell caseback in favor of another, far more basic engraved turtle shell. The simple, stylized turtle emblem of the Sea Turtle Conservancy stands out in a mix of matte and polished finishes here, topping a deep caseback that helps the watch to reach an immense 1,000 meters of water resistance.
Although the dial of the Certina DS Super PH1000M STC shares its design with the rest of the series, the brand gives this piece a distinctive character through its color palette. The overall look here is classic ‘70s dive watch — polished square dive indices, a combination of Roman and straight sword handset, and a chunky square-tipped central seconds hand – but the more modern color palette removes this colorway from the disco era visually. There’s been a wave of turquoise-hued designs across the watch industry in recent years, but the darker gloss teal shade Certina uses here is still something of an outlier. Coupled with the orange minutes hand and the matching orange accents on the minutes track, it’s a vibrant, summery look. That said, it also instantly reminds me of a Miami Dolphins jersey, but that’s entirely subjective. Less subjective is the cutout date window at 3 o’clock, which markedly disrupts the otherwise smartly balanced symmetry of the dial.
Inside the Certina DS Super PH1000M STC beats the Powermatic 80.611 automatic movement made by Certina’s Swatch Group sister brand ETA. While the Powermatic 80.611 shares structural similarities with the familiar ETA 2824 family, this powerplant is substantially modified, including a reduced 21,600 bph beat rate to allow for its hefty 80 hours of power reserve. To complete the design, Certina pairs the watch with a soft, plush sculpted black rubber strap. There’s an impressive amount of visual detail throughout this strap design, from the recessed woven texture on the outer edges to the deep orange accent stitching that echoes the dial. It’s an immediately flexible, comfortable strap right out of the box, although the unique locking nub on the inside of the floating keeper does tend to create strap end protrusion on some wrists.
The turtle motif has been an enduring symbol of Certina for over 65 years, and the brand has been especially eager to promote this image in recent years. To this end, the Certina DS Super PH1000M STC delivers not just a vibrant, charismatically ‘70s take on a heavy-duty diver, but also helps to support the ongoing effort to save at-risk sea turtle populations. The Certina DS Super PH1000M STC is available now through authorized dealers. MSRP for this watch stands at 915 CHF as of press time, a concerningly unspecified portion of which will support the Sea Turtle Conservancy. For more information, please visit the brand’s website.
