Omega Constellation Accessories 1952 75: Part One A Potted History of the Watch Strap The wristwatch came of age in the nineteenth century when the military value of wearing a watch on the wrist was recognised. Watches were used to coordinate attacks and other field operations, and the warriors of the time, hindered by the inconvenience of having to store pocket watches under their heavy military clothing, began attaching watches to their wrist by a number of means. The first examples of bands and bracelets as accessories to watches were fairly crude: covered by protective leather cocoons on strong leather, especially made chains soldered to the watch head and, later, custom-made straps attached to wire lugs. Early wristwatch. Photography Girard Perregaux It can be claimed with some certainty that Girard Perregaux of La Chaux de Fonds formalised and indeed stylised the wrist watch beyond the various ad hoc means of strapping lumbering pocket watches to the arm. Germany s Kaiser Wilhem 1, grasping the operational value of Perregaux s gold cased and thus corrosion proof timepieces shielded by protective metal grilles with chained bracelets, ordered a thousand of them in 1879 for the German Navy. The fledgling Omega company was also an early adopter. In around 1892, working in collaboration with Audemars Piguet, the Brandts created an exquisite repeater watch that was worn on the wrist and could be adjusted to ring on the hour, quarter hour and minute if required. After eight years of development and the invention of a truly remarkable system of automation, the first industrially produced wristwatch was released by Louis Brandt & Fils in 1900. Soon after, the name Omega was coined and ultimately became standard on all Brandt watches. First series of industrially produced Omega wristwatches with fixed central attachments for bracelet-strap. Courtesy the Swatch Group. True to form, its military potential was grasped quickly and Omega wristwatches saw service in World War 1 on the arms of many of the poor wretches who fought this senseless and particularly brutal war. Indeed it was the returning heroes of WW1, sporting their battle-worn wristwatches that dispensed forever the wristwatch s association with foppery and unmanliness. By the 1930s wrist watches were the dominant timepiece for men, although it was many years before pocket watches became simply a curiosity. Norms of the 1950s and 60s During the 1950s and 1960s, the Omega brand was not reserved for a handful of upper market watch chain stores. It was stocked by both big and small retailers, from exclusive outlets catering for silver tails and their imitators, to long established high street and up-town jewellery stores, through to modest family businesses that served the hoi polloi. In those two decades it was a very different retail environment than experienced today. Many outlets were owned by watchmakers and jewellers who offered a range of brands and whose word about what was quality and what was not was highly respected.
Omega shipped most of its in-house manufacture Constellations as watch heads accessorised with leather straps and Omega buckles. It was at the point of sale that decisions were made about how to add ornament to the watch. The current obsession with brand symmetry where many watches either come with a metal bracelet, or buyers are encouraged to accessorise with genuine Omega bracelets and straps, was often the exception rather than the rule in those days. 1959 German catalogue illustrating the standard of the time: The Grand Luxe was the only Constellation that came with a designated bracelet When walking into the premises of jewellery/watchmaker outlets in the 1950s and 60s one would see a range of famous-name watch accessories, such as Speidel Twist O Flex, Tessuflex, the West German Expandro, Champion and countless other national and international brands. The end-result was that many Omega Constellations left the store sporting solid gold, gold filled and stainless steel bands with a brand name other than Omega on them. A quandary in which collectors may find themselves today is whether to retain these old non-omega bands so as to respect their historical connection with the watch or opt for pseudo originality by matching an Omega branded strap or band with a vintage Omega. If you can establish beyond doubt that a Constellation left the store with a particular aftermarket bracelet, you have the option of keeping the watch and bracelet together. If you have papers and receipts that prove an instore marriage, then the sensible course may be to respect its historic connection and wear the watch with pride. For example, I know a collector who has a stainless Constellation Calibre 561 with a beautifully made West German Expandro bracelet. The watch came with the receipt for both the watch and point of sale bracelet, along with the original box and certificate. In the box, the first owner had deposited the original leather strap and buckle that was attached to the watch when sold. Here, the practices of the time were fully preserved in this one package: a far better find, I believe, than a Constellation that has been accessorised with a new beads of rice bracelet by an entrepreneurial vintage dealer wishing to maximise his selling price.
Buckles During the Decades Straps and buckles are the most common accessories of all Omega Constellations of the 1950s and 1960s Below is a photo-spread of Omega buckles from various decades. Because buckles were manufactured in various home countries, there are quite significant variances that make determining the correct buckle difficult. Also, very few Omega 1950s 70s advertisements actually show the buckle of the watch Examples of buckles available from the late 1940s through to and including the 1960s Swiss made stainless steel buckle form the 1950s US made 14k gold Omega buckle from the 1950s with no Omega Symbol 1960s 70s Swiss buckle front and rear Text: Desmond Guilfoyle/2007/ http://omega-constellation-collectors.blogspot.com/ 3
1970s U.S. made buckle Swiss made buckles from the later 1960s going into the 70s. 1970s waterproof strap buckle Swiss Buckles from the 1970s Omega buckle from the late 1980s Swiss buckle possibly from the late 1970s Contemporary gold plate buckle Text: Desmond Guilfoyle/2007/ http://omega-constellation-collectors.blogspot.com/ 4
Text: Desmond Guilfoyle/2007/ http://omega-constellation-collectors.blogspot.com/ 5