Thursday 3 October 2019

FIRST IMPRESSIONS: TAG Heuer Aquaracer HMS Limited Edition Automatic Watch

WAY2016.BA0927

Finding out about this one has been HARD! I've even resorted to searching the Korean TAG Heuer website but to absolutely no avail. Thankfully I did manage to find some information on it and Aneta at the Oxford Street boutique helped me out with the part number (thanks Aneta) which I hoped might unlock some more Google searches. It didn't, but at least I could list it on my Gallery Blog with it's correct part number.

I'm afraid this is also the only decent photo I have of this watch, and I don't even know for sure if it's 41mm or 43mm. The watch is made for a Korean footballer called Son Heung-Min, who apparently plays for Tottenham Hotspur in the Premier League and also captains the Korean national team (my knowledge of football stopped around 1981 so I admit I had to look it up).


The piece is limited to 777 pieces with number 7 being given to Son Heung-min himself, while numbers 77 and 777 have been auctioned for charity in Korea with the proceeds being donated to youth footballing teams. The significance of the number 7 is not, as I thought, because that number is significant in Korea (as number 8 is in China), but because Son Heung-min wears the number 7 on his football shirt(s). 

(Unfortunately, the number '7' has taken on a new significance in the past couple of days when it comes to Totenham Hotspur, as they were rather humiliatingly beaten 7-2 by Bayern Munich. Awkward!)

As such, as you can see in the photo above, the number 7 on the date dial is marked in red instead of black, which is quite cool, and the dial colour has been specially designed for Son, and designated HMS Blue. Why you ask? Well, I wasn't entirely sure, and after wasting much time searching for an answer (I came up with 2 highly implausible reasons relating to HMS Hotspur and HMS Flying Fish*, my friend who actually likes football pointed out that HMS is Son Heung-min's initials. 

Erm, okay!


Anyway, I think it's a nice looking watch, I really like the red/blue marker at the 12, which gives it a real point of difference compared to so many other blue dial Aquaracers, and it's good that they've given it a matching red second hand as well. Hard to give an opinion on the special blue dial color from this picture, it doesn't really look any different to me, but I'm guessing it does when you see it up close. Also, it's pretty unusual to see an Aquaracer with blue printed numerals on the bezel, it would have been super easy to just slap on a regular bezel so I think that shows they've put some extra thought into this one.

Where I would have expected to see the text 'Calibre 5' on the dial of this watch, we see HM7 and 'Automatic'. I believe TAG Heuer are in the process of phasing out calibre names on dials, so this is clearly a foretaste of Aquaracers to come and... well, frustratingly, that's really all I can tell you.  I guess TAG Heuer don't see tremendous worth in publicising watches in markets where they aren't available, and I can understand that, but it makes it jolly difficult for me! 

One thing I would say though, wouldn't this look great on a blue rubber strap, or even a rubber strap where one side was blue and the other side red, eh???

*HMS Flying Fish, was apparently the ship that took sailors to Korea and who then introduced soccer to the Korean people. I did say it was a bit implausible!

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