Description

The ‘Royal Oak’ overturned the prevailing codes in 1972 during a period of existential crisis for the watch industry due to the boom of the cheap Quartz watches made in Asia.

The company had to come with a bold, solid stainless sports steel luxury watch, they gave the mission to Gerald Genta to design it.
He got the inspiration from a deep-sea-diving helmet, the result was an octagonal bezel, visible mounting screws, a large case of 39mm with an integrated bracelet, a very futuristic design for the seventies.

Within 2-3 years they sold about 1000 watches establishing a new segment within the industry and pioneered the popularity and desirability of the steel sports luxury watch.

– In 1993 the standard Royal Oak being already 20 years old, the brand looking for a younger generation clientele came with a very polarised design with the “Royal Oak Offshore” people in the industry calling it “The Beast”.

The shocking 42mm for that time, with apparent rubber seal on the bezel, the rubber pushers were in contrast to the elegant Royal Oak but the Offshore turned out to be a great success.

This timepiece has a stainless steel case of 37mm with a black bezel set with 32 diamonds. It surrounds a black dial with ” Mega Tapisserie ” pattern and white arabic numerals. Central hands indicates the hours & minutes. The chronograph hand can be activated and stopped by the black rubber push-pieces next to the crown. The 30-minute counter is at 3 o’clock and the 60-minutes counter at 6 o’clock while the 12-hour counter is at 9 o’clock. A date window is visible between 4 and 5 o’clock.

The self-winding movement is hidden under a solid case-back and has a power-reserve of 40 hours.

An elegant rubber strap will hold this beautiful watch around your wrist comfortably.

Audemars Piguet – bio

Audemars Piguet is a Swiss manufacturer of mechanical watches founded in 1875. They began in the Vallée de Joux. Jules Louis Audemars formed a partnership with Edward Auguste Piguet. Audemars created complicated blank watch movements for other manufactures to use. Piguet specialized in the final regulation of watches. They then split responsibilities when they began their own company. Audemars was in charge of production and technical aspects while Piguet focused on sales and management. One of their first achievements was creating the first repeater wristwatch in 1892 and in 1972 the iconic steel “Royal Oak”.