This Affordable Seiko-Powered Watch Has a Surprising High-End Feature
The dial of the Viajero is obviously not produced through such a meticulous and painstaking process, but it still isn’t anything to sneeze at. Designed to resemble a watercolor painting, the printed dial showcases an image of the world. What’s more, the dial is executed in a type of 3D relief and offers up a heavily textured topographical map of the world, providing a surprising amount of depth.
Metallic hour markers adorn the world map, while the hands are protractor-shaped to drive home the old-school cartography theme. Surrounding the map on the dial is a chapter ring featuring a 24-hour scale separated into day and night sections, like a GMT bezel. Finally, the 24 cities of the world appear on the watch’s rotating inner bezel.
Protecting the dial is a sapphire crystal with five layers of anti-reflective coating on its underside, meaning you should have a pretty clear view of all the intricacies below. That’s important, as world timers can be notoriously difficult to read.
The case is in stainless steel and is very well-sized at 38.5mm across, 12mm thick and 45.5mm lug to lug. Haim describes the case as “hand-finished” and most of it is mirror-polished, with the bezel being brushed. The strap is a handmade Epsom leather affair with a tang buckle in an art deco-inspired design that matches the traditional aesthetic of the watch.
Powering the watch, again, is a modified Seiko NH34A automatic movement, but Haim did more than turn the GMT into a functional world timer. The brand also added a custom rotor that looks spectacular. Viewed through the sapphire caseback, the bronze-toned rotor depicts a globe showing longitude and latitude and covers the entire pedestrian-looking movement.
Source: www.gearpatrol.com
