Pre-Owned Blancpain Blancpain Fifty Fathoms Bathyscaphe Day Date Desert Edition 40991212

WHY WE LOVE IT

In the history of dive watches, a few names tend to stand out as pioneers and innovators: Rolex. DOXA. Blancpain.

The latter changed the world with its Fifty Fathoms, a timepiece that many consider — and rightfully so — to be the world's first true diver's watch. However, the Fifty Fathoms wasn't the only diver that the maison from La Brassus produced. There was also a scaled-down version called the Bathyscaphe, named after the manned submersible of the Swiss explorer-diver Auguste Piccard. More recently, Blancpain has revived the Bathyscaphe nomenclature, offering an entire line of sophisticated divers that pay homage to their vintage counterparts. 

The particular Bathyscaphe that we have here is a Day Date Desert edition dating to circa 2020. Housed in a 43mm stainless steel case with a sapphire crystal, a signed crown, and a unidirectional, rotating bezel with a brown dive timing insert, it features a sunburst, sand-colored Super-LumiNova dial with matching, fat ‘syringe’ handset, a day-date display at 3 o’clock, applied indices, and printed outer 5-minute indices. Paired to a brown fabric sail canvas strap with a Blancpain-signed pin buckle, it’s powered by the automatic Blancpain Calibre 1315DD with a whopping 120 hours of power reserve and a silicon balance.

This limited edition of 500 pieces is one of the coolest contemporary divers we’ve seen from a brand that was present at the beginning of dive watch mania. Surely, with its good looks, excellent pedigree, and bulletproof design, it won’t last long. 

Grab it while you can!

OVERALL CONDITION

The case is in outstanding, as-new condition overall showing only faint signs of wear from careful handling. Luminous sunburst brown gradient dial with applied indices is in as-new condition with matching handset. Signed crown. Caseback numbered 65/500.