Blancpain has certainly been making the news this month. After the launch of the Swatch X Blancpain Scuba Fifty Fathoms collaboration, the brand has hardly had time to do its press clippings before launching yet another important model – The Blancpain Fifty Fathoms Act 3 – a cult timepiece that has been seducing scuba divers and watch lovers alike for over 70 years now.
The collection’s 70th-anniversary celebrations have already welcomed the Blancpain Fifty Fathoms Act 1 and Act 2, and now a new Act 3 is being released during an exclusive event on France’s Côte d’Azur this weekend. WorldTempus’ Brice Lechevalier and Suzanne Wong are currently there, so stay tuned for more diving action over the coming days.
But to keep you up-to-date with this special edition Fifty Fathoms Act 3, here are a few photos of the new model with its eye-catching 9K bronze case and NATO strap made of recycled fishing nets. The big news for this Act 3 is its new alloy case that is made up of 37.5% gold, 50% copper and a mix of silver, palladium, and gallium. Developed for its attractive pink hue, this type of bronze is patented and has two major advantages. The first is that it can be worn directly on the skin, and the second is the addition of gold, which stops the oxidization that causes a green tarnish on bronze over time.
The sport that created the watch
Since its debut in 1953, the Fifty Fathoms was designed out of a real need to protect divers venturing underwater. It is important to remember that the 1950s were a time when scuba diving was in its infancy with rudimentary breathing apparatus and zero safety standards. This didn’t stop the brave pioneers fascinated by the world under the sea from diving deeper and deeper. One of these adventurers was Blancpain Co-CEO Jean-Jacques Fiecher who, when he wasn’t running a watch manufacture, could be found exploring Europe’s waters.
Inauspicious beginnings
During one of his dives off the coast of Cannes in the South of France, Fiecher suddenly found himself with an empty tank of air, giving him the fright of his life. Luckily, he came to no harm, but the experience made him realise that there was a real need to be able to monitor the amount of breathing time spent under the water. Back in the company’s workshops, he started work on a time-measuring instrument specially for scuba divers to monitor the remaining air in their tanks.
He called it the Fifty Fathoms after the depth it could descend to – a fathom is an old nautical unit of measure used to denote the depth of water – and 50 of them equates to 91 metres in today’s terms. To reach such a depth, he equipped the watch with an automatic movement (involving less wear on the crown gaskets than a manually wound movement), double watertight crown gaskets, resistance to magnetism, highly legible luminescent hour-markers that he contrasted with a black dial, a case back sealing system, and a lockable rotating bezel.
The watch quickly caught the attention of the world’s navies in France, Germany, the United States, and Norway to name a few. In 1957 the US Navy commissioned a number of timepieces with the addition of a moisture indicator on the dial. This display came in the form of a small circle on the dial that was split into two halves, the lower half in orange (the reference colour) and an upper half in white that would turn red (and stay red) if water entered the case. This allowed military divers to be sure of the water resistance of their watches before embarking on dives. Today, these pieces are highly sought after at auction.
Of course, you don’t need to go trawling the auction market to find one now, as there are 555 pieces available in this brand-new limited edition Act 3 that will not only make sure that you never run out of air but will give you real watch enthusiast credibility too!
