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Blancpain Marks the Bathyscaphe's 70th With a 300-Piece Reissue of a 1968 Model

A 37.40 mm steel diver on chocolate calf, with the reference and caliber on Blancpain's own spec page and the price nowhere on it.

AI-generated illustration based on a source photo. See the actual watch at the vendor’s website.

Blancpain announced the Bathyscaphe 70th Anniversary Limited Edition on 20 August, a 300-piece reissue of a 1968 Bathyscaphe. The release traces the lineage: the Fifty Fathoms debuted in 1953, and the Bathyscaphe followed in 1956 as its “civilian counterpart.” (The name was registered in 1953 by then chief executive Jean-Jacques Fiechter, a diver himself.)

The number collectors will notice: 37.40 mm. Blancpain says the steel case was designed around the movement, not the reverse, which explains the modest diameter. The rest of the specs are on Blancpain’s product page for reference 5903-1110-063A: 10.60 mm thick, 18 mm between lugs, 300 meters of water resistance, a sapphire caseback, and the automatic Caliber 1150 (3 Hz, 28 jewels). The strap is hand-stitched chocolate calf leather.

The bezel is where the reissue departs from its ancestor. Steel carries up into a ring beneath the domed crystal, and the insert is ceramic with lacquered numerals in place of the hesalite the 1968 watch used. Durability wins; patina loses. That’s the trade-off.

Two things Blancpain does not publish anywhere we could find: a price and a power reserve. Hourstriker, WatchCrunch and Gear Patrol all report $18,300, but the maker has not said so, and neither will we.

Source: announcement

And at Spot.Watch, that's always worth noticing.