THE JOURNAL

Like the MR PORTER man, these mechanical timepieces combine supreme style with serious substance .
Based in Hölstein, Switzerland, the more than 100-year-old watch brand Oris is known for its commitment to producing 100 per cent mechanical timepieces (meaning there’s not a single battery in any one of its products), with an attention to detail and quality that you would rightly expect from the “Swiss-made” tag. Still independent and run by its owners, the brand has produced a huge variety of designs since its foundation by Le Locle watchmakers Messrs Paul Cattin and Georges Christian in 1904 – from watches inspired by jazz greats such as Messrs Louis Armstrong and Chet Baker to a limited-edition piece celebrating a partnership with record-breaking free diver Mr Carlos Coste in 2010. All its products, however, are recognisable by the signature bright red rotor of the brand’s self-winding movements, visible through the glass back of each watch. Today, we’re proud to announce the arrival of several of Oris’s high-performance diving watches on MR PORTER. Chief among them is the bronze limited-edition watch dedicated to the US Navy’s first African American master diver Mr Carl Brashear – you can read more about this special piece in The Journal. But we also felt we should gently make you aware of the following three models, all of which offer further elaborations of Oris’s trademark mechanical excellence.
Aquis Date Stainless Steel Automatic

Oris’s Aquis range offers the functionality of a diving watch (with water resistance up to 30 ATM) but with a sleek aesthetic that makes each timepiece ultimately more versatile, should you need to dress it up a little. The Aquis Date in stainless steel is particularly sharp with its deep-blue face (inspired by the colour of the ocean), covered by domed, anti-reflective sapphire glass. The movement inside is the Oris 733, which, as the name suggests, comes with a date window, corrector and stop-second mechanism.
Divers Heritage 65 Stainless Steel and Suede Automatic

The Divers Heritage is a retro-styled diving watch – inspired by an original Oris design from 50 years ago – that offers a lower level of water resistance than its Aquis cousins, but more than makes up for it in vintage charm. Particularly appealing is the domed bubble glass that covers the face and is also coated on the inside with an anti-reflective layer, optimising legibility even while underwater. The case is made from anti-corrosive steel and is nicely offset by a strap in soft brushed suede.
Aquis Depth Gauge Stainless Steel

Though equally easy on the eye as the Aquis Date, this model has slightly more to offer in terms of performance, coming as it does with Oris’s remarkably accurate mechanical depth gauge – a patented mechanism that, somewhat incredibly, provides a reading by allowing water actually to enter the timepiece. (In this respect, it’s the first of its kind.) In short, it’s a serious diving watch that, thanks to its clean steel strap and simple, graphic face detailing, will also look suitably smart on dry land.