Longines has kicked off 2024 with a pair of new GMT watches sporting gold cases and a chunky price tag. Called the Longines Master Collection GMT, the watch is available with a case made from yellow or rose gold, with each variant limited to 500 pieces worldwide.
This timepiece unusually blends the GMT and dress watch genres into one, mixing the functionality of a second hour hand (to keep track of another time zone) and the refined smartness of a gold dress watch. It also mixes Roman and Arabic numerals, with the former used to tell the time of the wearer’s time zone, and the latter used to read a second time zone on a 24-hour scale.
As with all such watches, the second hour hand is intended to stay on GMT. However, it's often more convenient to set this to your home time zone, then adjust only the primary hour hand to your local time zone when travelling. Such a watch can also be used to keep track of colleagues or family in a different time zone to your own.
The 40mm, 18K gold case features an exhibition case back for viewing the automatic Longines calibre L844.5 movement, made by ETA and with a power reserve of 72 hours. An unguarded, screw down crown sits at the six o’clock position while the frosted silver dial is protected by a sapphire crystal. Water resistance is a fairly modest 30 metres, but this clearly isn't intended as a sport watch.
A date window is found at the six o’clock position and both versions of the watch are supplied with an anthracite-grey alligator leather strap with soft-touch finish and a buckle made from the same gold as the case.
At £14,200 this is considerably more expensive than other contemporary Longines watches. It is also somewhat pricey for a GMT, but I like how Longines is experimenting by bringing a GMT function to a gold dress watch. I’m also curious to see if this is a sign of Longines heading up-market, and I’m keen to see what else the brand has in store for 2024.
