Baselworld 2016: TUDOR Heritage Black Bay Dark

Baselworld 2016: TUDOR Heritage Black Bay Dark

A steel divers’ watch entirely in black steel tted with a mechanical movement, developed, manufactured and assembled in-house by TUDOR, the Heritage Black Bay Dark model is a new addition to the Heritage Black Bay family.

The characteristic elements of the Heritage Black Bay Dark’s personality have been drawn from TUDOR’s history. It inherits the general lines, as well as the domed dial and crystal from the first TUDOR div- ing watches. It features the particularly prominent winding crown from the famous 7924 reference of 1958, known as the Big Crown. It borrows the characteristic angular hands, known as snowflake, from the watches delivered in large quantities to the French National Navy in the 1970s. The indication of guaranteed water depth engraved in red on the dial, and the red triangle on the rotatable bezel can both be added to the list of important historic design fea- tures that reappear in this new model.

BLACK COATING

The characteristic features of the Heritage Black Bay Dark model centre on the 41 mm wide steel case, nished with a black PVD-treated (Physical Vapour Deposition) coating. Directly derived from the thin lm technology originally developed by NASA for its various space programmes, PVD or physical vapour deposition enables practically any inorganic mater- ial to be bonded with metals. The Heritage Black Bay Dark has an entirely satin nish, giving it the appear- ance of black military utility equipment.

THE TUDOR IN-HOUSE MOVEMENT MT5602

This is a variant of the movement manufactured by TUDOR and developed for the Heritage Black Bay model. It displays hours, minutes and seconds, and bears the reference MT5602, in which “MT” stands for “Mouvement TUDOR”. In 2015, TUDOR announced the rst mechanical movement in its history to have been developed, manufactured and assembled in-house. A high-performance calibre of excellent precision and proven robustness, it o ers a 70-hour power reserve meaning that its wearer can, for example, take o the watch on Friday evening and put it on again on Monday morning without having to wind it. Beating to a frequency of 28,800 beats/hour or 4Hz, the movement is reg- ulated by a variable inertia oscillator with silicon balance spring, held in place by a traversing bridge - a guarantee of its robustness. Furthermore, the movement is certi ed by the Swiss O cial Chronometer Testing Institute (COSC).

SUPPLIED WITH TWO STRAPS

With a choice of black PVD-treated steel bracelet or an aged leather strap with a black PVD-treated steel folding clasp, each Heritage Black Bay Dark model is also supplied with an extra grey fabric strap. Made in the Jacquard technique according to traditional methods by a hundred-year-old family business from the St-Etienne region of France, this strap is a signa- ture feature of TUDOR’s Heritage line.

THE TUDOR DIVERS’ WATCH

The history of the TUDOR divers’ watch dates back to 1954 and the launch of reference 7922. The rst in a long line of ergonomic, legible, accurate and robust divers’ watches, it perfectly embodies the approach formulated by the American architect Louis Sullivan, according to whom the form of an object must follow its function. Furthermore, it laid down the aesthetic and technical foundations of an ideal divers’ watch, those of an understated, functional and reliable tool. The sixty years that followed the launch of the origin- al 7922 saw the constant improvement of the TUDOR divers’ watch and each model gained unanimous ac- claim from professionals in the eld, including some of the greatest military navies in the world.

THE HERITAGE LINE

A key characteristic of the TUDOR Heritage line is the unique creative process that began in 2010 with the presentation of the TUDOR Heritage Chrono model, a free interpretation of the brand’s rst chronograph dating from 1970. Since then, some of the most im- portant references in the history of TUDOR have been reworked within the Heritage line. Far from simply being an identical re-release of a classic, the models in this line bring together the past, present and fu- ture, with the aesthetic codes that contributed to the reputation of historic models instilled into con- temporary timepieces. In line with this approach, the Heritage Black Bay Dark model is a new take on the iconic aesthetic codes from the TUDOR diving watch’s history.