Hands-On: Finally Exploring the MoonSwatch
The Omega x Swatch collaboration has surely been 2022’s most talked about watch, being featured in endless podcasts and every watch enthusiast’s Instagram. It even won Hodinkee’s watch of the year. Now that the hype around the MoonSwatch has started to die down, we thought it’s about time we got our hands on one…
Ready for launch
The first thing to note about this watch is that it is a genuine collaboration between both brands. The launch of the MoonSwatch even happened on Omega’s side, not Swatch, and present at the event was Omega’s CEO Raynald Aeshlimann, head of Brand Heritage Petros Protopapas, and watch industry superstar Mr Hayek. Omega unveiled the watch just one week before the biggest tradeshow on the industry’s calendar, Watches & Wonders, practically stealing the show without even being there (I’m told that it was more of a flex to be donning a Moonswatch at Watches & Wonders 2022 than any Daytona, 5711 or any other highly coveted piece).
Where did the MoonSwatch come from? For Swatch, some have been saying that because 2020 saw the brand’s lowest sales on record (unsurprising given that a Swatch is usually an impulsive airport purchase, and that year saw a lack of global travel for obvious reasons), the brand needed a new star. The MoonSwatch is another of Swatch’s reinvigorations, just like the introduction of metal-cased Swatches had been and how the Jellyfish had been before that. But what’s in it for Omega?
Omega CEO, Raynald Aeshlimann, is famed for expressing the need for the Swiss watch industry to appeal to younger markets - millennials and gen-z. Under his leadership, Omega collaborated with Fratello Watches to create two special edition Omegas inspired by the Instagram hashtag #speedytuesday to peak the interest of the social media generation. Which Omega model got the treatment you ask? … the Speedmaster.
The Omega x Fratello #speedytuesday 2 ‘Ultraman’ - Omega
The MoonSwatch could be considered another step in that direction for Omega, evident in that many of the people I saw lining up outside the Edinburgh store on the day of the launch were young adults and even teenagers.
strapping in
This particular colourway – Mission to Jupiter – combines a muted desert case and dial with orange hands, which not only alludes to the iconic Speeedmaster ‘Ultraman’ from 1968, but is also reminiscent of the use of orange found on classic tool watch models such as the Doxa Sub-300 Professional and the original Rolex Explorer II.
Left: 1968 Omega Speedmaster Ultraman; right: stills from the Ultraman TV series first aired in Japan in 1966 - Omega
On the wrist, the watch wears fantastically, but that comes as no surprise, its bio-ceramic case being a one-to-one copy of its £6000 older step-sibling. The overall quality, however, is more Swatch than Omega-level, with a general plasticky Lego-like feel. But perhaps this is reasonable given the £218 price point. In fact, since the bio-ceramic material is, I suspect, injection moulded, the case has a crisp-edged sharpness comparable to the real thing.
At The Tool Watch Project, we like to consider watches for everyday use, so how well would the MoonSwatch fare as a beater? We suspect not too well, given its cheaper construction and lack of water resistance (the real thing now has 50m, whereas the Swatch claims to be ‘water resistant’, but I expect for nothing beyond washing your hands).
But it’s not as if there’s no usability in the piece at all. The chronograph works very well and is, as far as I know, the only Speedmaster to show you a 10ths of a second register. It also features a kind of split-second function without having the additional hand. If you stop the chronograph using the 4 o’clock pusher, the hand will catch-up to where it would have been if it kept on going, thus making it easy to record running laps and interval times. And for timing my boiled eggs in the morning, the watch works a treat.
As for accuracy, the quartz movement is bound to beat any COSC-citified chronometer and will run for months without winding or expensive servicing. These attributes make it a nice addition alongside a more hard-wearing everyday piece. I’ve even been told that Swatch, as well as crunching the words ‘Swiss watch’, also gets its name from ‘second watch’, and the MoonSwatch gives the enthusiast the opportunity for that second piece to be quite a lot like the icon we all know and love.
The only real nit-pick is a one second delay when first engaging the chronograph, but that same problem has been seen on mechanical chronograph movements until relatively recently anyway. Another small problem is the strap, which, although pretty good, I imagine will wear out quickly and has a clumsy fit around the keeper. That being said, the strap does offer a NATO feel without having material between your wrist and the caseback, and therefore shows off the caseback engraving and planetary image (which incidentally come straight from NASA).
Overall, the fit and usability are nice, but the quality is lacking, perhaps even at its relatively low price. But sure, you could get a better-quality piece at a similar price (say, a Seiko 5 or Hamilton Khaki Field), but I think the MoonSwatch makes a great second buy alongside an everyday beater. It’s meant to be fun, frivolous, cheap and cheerful; what more do you really watch from a Swatch anyway?
moonspiracy
Was the moon landing faked? Is the MoonSwatch a fake Speedmaster? The answer to both is a resounding ‘no’.
I understand that part of the appeal is that it’s not quite the Speedy. In the flesh, the Speedmaster Pro gives you this I-could-just-die-now feeling which you just won’t get with the Swatch. But it comes close. It’s like dipping your toes in the idea of owning the real thing. You find yourself saying ‘this is what the hands look like’, ‘this is how the case wears’, ‘this is what using the chronograph function feels like on the real thing’. And maybe that’s just the tentative toe-dip younger enthusiasts need to then consider dropping a small fortune on the real thing.
Though I believe it’s a massive misconception to think Swatch are trying to get as close to the Speedmaster Professional as possible. It’s clear that this is a genuine collaboration which features the DNA or both brands. The bright colourways and clever designs are undoubtably Swatch, and we couldn’t see in-your-face red, blue or yellow cased Speedmasters any other way. And yes, the subdials aren’t quite like the real thing, but this is part-and-parcel of this watch featuring the OG Swatch chronograph movement, for which there’s loads to love. Thank God the long queues are Swatch, and not Omega, because being able to actually go get a Speedy at the retail price is what gives the brand the edge over Rolex sometimes. Put short, it isn’t a Fiat Dino (Google it).
It’s for these reasons I imagine Omega’s in-house historian, the aforementioned Petros Protopapas, reportedly didn’t like the idea at first, but then came to sincerely venerate the watch by the time of its launch. The MoonSwatch is the kind of watch where you find yourself undulating between loving it and hating it, wanting one then not wanting one, and your judgment can be clouded by hype along the way. But now that the buzz has dies down and we can see the watch for what it is, it’s safe to say I love it.
