ON THE WRIST: Oris TT1 Automatic Watch

 

73576514764RS

Peter Stephan / Leamington Spa, 16th October 2021

A slightly random, opportunistic try-on this one. My wife wanted to look at the necklaces in 'Peter Stephan's' window and I happened to notice that along with several 'fashion watch' and lower echelon watch brands (Certina, etc) they also stocked some (slightly out of date) Oris pieces. This TT1 caught my eye, so while she tried on some jewellery I had a look at this quirky looking thing.

First thing to note is that officially this seems to be regarded as 43mm (at least on all the websites I've found - this model no longer features on Oris' website) but I think that is incorrect. I was wearing my Calibre 16 Carrera and this was 1-2mm smaller on the diameter. I've tried to see if they made this watch in more than one size, but I can't find that they did - so I am going to say this is more like 41.5mm than 43mm.

It actually reminds me somewhat of the TAG Heuer Executive I bought recently, if only because the strap fixes directly to the case without the use of 'visible' lugs. This helps the watch wear slightly smaller but of course with no lugs to blend the case and strap together it does end up looking very 'round'.

The rubber strap is pretty nice actually, and I appreciate that they've moulded the 'ORIS' logo into it. It features a deployment clasp which worked nicely and the tail of the strap is hidden inside so there's no need to cut the strap to size.

Okay, so let's discuss the styling. Hand on heart, if this didn't have the 'Oris' logo on the dial I probably wouldn't look at it twice. In fact, if I glanced at it I would probably think it was made by BOSS or a similar 'fashion' brand. This is unfortunate as this is quite cool looking, but it does not look 'expensive' and it does not really look like something you would expect to come from a Swiss watch manufacturer.

Also, I'm rather disappointed to report, that red stripe is a cool idea, but it is not anything like as red or vibrant as it appears in the picture above, which is a real shame as that for me is the money shot feature (not dissimilar to the original Heuer 01 Carrera incidentally). Now I don't know if this isn't quite the exact same model that I tried on, or maybe the red has faded in the window... surely not, but it certainly didn't look like this. If anything it was more of a burgundy kind of colour. Still, if I was going to pick up a TT1, then this is probably the way to go. The extra detailing on the dial is nice compared to the more basic model and the blacked out hands look much cooler to my eyes. 

I can't recall the original list price for this one - I think it might have been £1100, but Peter Stephan had it on offer for £810 IIRC. So if you are interested it might be worth giving them a call. Personally I think be more inclined to try the Aquis, but for some reason this shop didn't stock the newer models, so I wonder if they are an 'ex' Oris dealer that just has some left over stock?

The website also mentions Maurice Lacroix, but I never saw any ML product in the store. They did have those cool Mondaine' railway clock' watches and wall clocks which were quite tempting but the large one on the wall was £300 which I thought a bit much for an impulse buy, especially as I don't really have a spare wall to put it on!