A 70's Seiko With A Mesmerising Dial

Seiko are famous for producing stunning watch dials and improvements in technology have enabled them to up their game in recent years, but I have just received a Seiko watch with a truly mesmerising dial that was made 50 years ago.

The watch is a Seiko model 2002 (3803-7070) produced in 1973, and is quite rare. It is a quartz watch from an era when quartz was king and these watches were more expensive than their mechanical counterparts. Seiko housed these sophisticated and highly accurate movements in chunky stainless cases and decorated them with some lovely dials.

This particular watch has an emerald green dial with a corduroy style stripe that would have been completely at home in the 70’s. And there is a lot going on. I will forgive those who believe the following photos are of different watches, because how you angle the light changes the appearance. 

 In the photo on the left the centre spindle appears to be located on a light green stripe. At a different angle the order is reversed and dark green becomes light green. At another angle the stripes seem to disappear.

To add to the complexity, this watch has a fume dial. Fume (or more properly fumé) dials are gradient dials that slowly transition from a darker color on the outer edge of the dial to a lighter color towards the middle of the dial. If you change the angle of the watch face the darker outer edge creeps in to almost take over the whole dial. Change the angle again and the lighter centre moves out to the edges. 

The bezel on this watch is gold plated although the gold on the top face of the bezel has long since worn away. Gold is soft. Fortunately, under the crystal, the gilt Seiko logo, chapter ring, date surround, applied hour indices, and hour/minute hands are shining brightly. They certainly add a luxury look and complement the emerald green of the dial. The hands and the hour indices are capped in white which makes this a very easy to read timepiece. There are lume dots at the inner end of each indice but the glow no longer occurs at night due to ageing of the lume material.

Yes, I have been caught deliberately twisting my wrist just to get the light show working on this watch, and there is a message here. The 70’s keep on giving - don’t ignore 50 year old watches because the good ones can definitely surprise.