While I’m a big fan of the Spirit Zulu, if I were to add a Longines to my personal collection, it would probably be a Legend Diver. The retro vibe is immaculate and the super compressor style case and dial work well as a backdrop to some interesting colours. For example, there’s the lovely fumé 36mm series. However, until now, the 39mm model has only been available in black and blue, lagging behind the colourful offering at 36mm and 42mm. Fortunately, for the Legend Diver’s 65th anniversary Longines have expanded the range of colours available at 39mm to include green, terracotta and anthracite.
Jumping right to the colours, they’re an attractive bunch. The green is a lovely forest shade, which is my personal favourite, not so bright and brilliant as emerald but more intense than olive. The terracotta edition has a copper-like tone that faithfully emulates the actual colour of terracotta. Lastly, there’s the anthracite grey edition, which is the most restrained of the three new colours. Because they are matte without any gradients, they have consistent tones across both the central dial and peripheral internal rotating bezel.
Beyond the new colours, the style and structure of the watches are the same as we’ve come to expect. The Arabic numerals have retro, angular shapes and coated with Swiss Super-LumiNova so that they emit light in dark conditions. The cases are well sized at 39mm in diameter with a thickness of 12.7mm in steel, which feels like the perfect Goldilocks zone between the 36mm and 42mm editions.
Beneath the new coloured dials is housed the Calibre L888, a really solid movement that has automatic winding and a 72-hour power reserve. It’s protected by a solid caseback that features a depiction of a diver and also the inscriptions “Chronometer Officially Certified” and “Magnetic Resistant” which relate to the COSC certification and the movement’s silicon balance spring. You can also see that the watch has 300m water resistance, giving it professional dive watch specs.
One of the other notable feature of the 65th anniversary Legend Diver 39mm collection is the fact that it’s presented on a seven-link beads of rice style bracelet for the first time. In fact, the existing blue and black editions of the watch have also been updated to have this bracelet as an option in addition to the NATO and leather strap options they had previously. Due to the steel bracelet, these are the most expensive Legend Divers in the current range, all priced at £3,200. Although I think that’s a justified reflection of the level of quality on display here.
Price and Specs:
More details at Longines.
