SBDB013
Seiko Boutique / Knightsbridge, 9th March 2019
Much like Rolex, I've never really been sold on the whole 'Seiko' hype thing... but since I was visiting Harrods anyway and the Seiko boutique is literally a two minute walk along the street, I figured I might as well visit again and perhaps try something on. Worst case scenario I figured I might get to try on an SKX and could then make an informed comment on whether it really is the watch icon that it's made out to be or not.
There were quite a few watches that look like SKXs in the shop, and that also seemed to be about the right price... but I couldn't see any that actually were SKXs. I find with Seiko there's a lot of this, a lot of very similar looking pieces, sometimes at vastly different price points. They had a couple of gold/black (well, kinda grey actually) Tunas next to each other, one admittedly a couple of millimeters smaller than the other and one was quartz and one was Spring Drive I believe, but to the untrained eye they looked incredibly similar. One was £2200 and one was £379, which is not great, but to put them right next to each other in the display cabinet is really poor selling in my opinion. Who really wants to pay £2200 for a watch that looks almost exactly like one that costs a fifth of the price?
Looking around the rest of the shop I was completely underwhelmed by the Grand Seikos on display, admittedly I had seen some nicer ones in Watches of Switzerland a few hours earlier (the snowflake dial in particular) but the ones in the boutique looked rather like overpriced Citizens if I'm honest. So I moved back to the front of the shop, and perhaps because I'd rather enjoyed trying on the Oris Dive Control Limited Edition earlier in the day, I thought I'd give this £3100 Marine Master Pro a go.
I'd love to be able to tell you something about it, but to be honest it wouldn't be fair as my perception of the watch was rather skewed by the attitude of the guy who served me in the shop. It seemed like me asking to try on a watch, any watch, was a bit of an inconvenience, and the fact that I had chosen this particular watch seemed to be taken as a personal affront!
"Why do you want to try on THAT watch?" He said, which admittedly may have been a particularly rubbish and misguided attempt at humour.
"Because I'm.... curious?" I replied, unsure as to what the 'correct' response was and not really expecting to be grilled over my choice of watch by the guy on the other side of the counter!
"It's JDM, do you know what that means?" He continued, in a manner so patronising it made me want to punch him in the face.
JDM, or 'Japanese Domestic Market' is a big thing for Seiko, they make many models (the most desirable ones it seems) solely for the Japanese market and these are only sold through their own boutiques or by private import. So the SDBD013 is some pretty hot stuff apparently, containing as it does a Grand Seiko spring drive movement.
But I knew that anyway, so eventually I did get the watch on my wrist and in all honesty it was seriously underwhelming for a £3100 watch. It was surprisingly light, given it's size and height, and no doubt most Seiko fan boys would be soiling themselves just to be in it's very presence, but I really couldn't have cared less. Which is why I can't really review the watch with any degree of fairness. I will say this, the strap was a bit tricky to do up, but the silicon rubber was super smooth and very comfortable for the short time I was wearing it. That aside, as you can see from the pictures it's quite an attractive piece, but considering it was within £800 of the pretty awesome Oris Dive Control I tried on the same day there's absolutely no way that I would choose this over that.
On a day when I experienced superb levels of service from Aneta in the TAG Heuer boutique and Lin Lin in the Regent Street Omega boutique (among others), this clown manged to completely turn me off the Seiko brand in less than a minute.
Undaunted I enquired as to whether they had any SKXs that I hadn't seen...
"We don't sell that range in here," said Charlie Chuckles, making a face like he'd just smelt something particularly nasty. "And anyway, I think it's been discontinued..."
Okay then, a watch forum icon it may be, but it seems the SKXs name is mud in the brands own boutique!
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