Neville Southall
Distinguished Member
- Joined
- Sep 10, 2019
- Messages
- 4,460
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I think that it's one of Omega's more charming over-designs. I often wonder whether they have a design team at all, or whether it's just a bunch of regular staff who know various facets of watchmaking, but don't have any formal design training, throwing ideas at a wall. This is not 100% out of the question, btw. I know a number of clothing brands that pretty much do just this, with mixed results. And when I say "mixed results", it's not a euphemism. Not necessarily a bad thing. Sometimes they come out with great designs like the Speedy Tuesday or the Mitsukoshi dial. Sometimes, you end up with Franklin Mint x Omega looking collaborations - which is ugly by any objective standard, and nearly unusable, but it's not going to get lost in the crowd either.
I see a lot of designs, though not usually in watches, and maybe it makes me more jaded than most. At Pitti Uomo, for example, I see so many examples of boring "good taste", that I get really, really, bored.
This watch, it probably requires some editing to be in the "good taste" category. Take away Buzz Aldrin's butt, stick that on the caseback, and get rid of the completely incoherent "11", and you have a watch that pretty much anyone would agree is beautiful. However, I have the feeling that those 100% sensible edits would make the watch much more sterile.
Agreed, especially with Buzz Aldrin's butt in a subdial. At first, I complained about the odd 11, but you honestly can't see it on the wrist. It blends in flawlessly. Ultimately, it's a "fun" piece, the only one in my collection that I can truly say that about. Everything else is, well, pretty ******* predictable.