With the Heritage line, Longines has been leveraging their design history to produce some supremely cool watches, including the Legend Diver, Avigation (reviewed here), and the Heritage Diver 1967 (hands-on here). Adding to that collection with the brand new Longines Heritage Military COSD, Longines has designed a watch in reference to a model used by the British Special Forces in the 1940s. With a clean field watch aesthetic, accessible sizing, and the option of a nato strap, the Longines Heritage Military COSD plays to the same appeal established by its siblings.
The Longines Heritage Military COSD’s 40mm steel case can be had with either a matte black or opaline (off-white) dial. Both dial options have bold railway minute scales, legible arabic numerals, and a 24-hour scale in red (in reference to the original design, seen below). With luminous elements at each hour, the black dial has a rhodium-plated handset while the opaline dial uses a blued steel handset. The dials also sport Britain’s broad arrow symbol, in reference to the military equipment nature of the original Longines Heritage Military COSD.
Finished with a screw-down solid case back and anti-reflective sapphire crystal up front, while the Longines Heritage Military COSD mimics the look of a watch that is some 75 years old, I think it stands as an example of timeless design rather than a simple bid towards the trend of “vintage-inspired.”
The movement is a fitting choice for a military-inspired watch; the simple but massively effective ETA 2892/A2 (dubbed the Longines caliber L619.2). With 4Hz, 21 jewels, and 42 hours of power reserve, the 2892 was used by Omega for movements like their 1120 and was even the basis for their early co-axial movement, the 2500. In short, the 2892 may not be flashy, but it is reliable, easy to service, and more than capable of excellent timekeeping.
The 40mm sizing makes the COSD accessible to a lot of wrists and, with a thickness of 9.95 mm, the Longines Heritage Military COSD should wear well. The 2892 is an impressively thin movement, so it’s certainly possible that the Longines Heritage Military COSD will sit low on wrist. Judging by the images, the lugs appear to be quite long and it’s hard to judge how sloped they are – more on that when we get a chance to go hands on with the COSD. I rather like the look of the blued hands and raised luminous elements on the opaline dial.
Coming from Longines and being ETA-powered, the Longines Heritage Military COSD is attractively priced from US$1700 on the nato strap or $1900 on a black leather strap. With a casual nato-happy style, wearable proportions, a reliable movement, and some military history for good measure, the Longines Heritage Military COSD looks like a winning formula from Longines. longines.com