ON THE WRIST: TAG Heuer x Hodinkee Carrera 'Seafarer' Calibre TH20-00 Limited Edition Chronograph

TAG Heuer Boutique / Meadowhall, Sheffield, 30th November 2024 

I'll be completely honest... when the Hodinkee Seafarer was announced I didn't want to like it. 'Here we go,' I thought, another bloody vintage-inspired Carrera that's guaranteed to find favour with the Council of Considered Opinion... and a dead cert for the Watch of the Year! 

And yet, to my immense surprise, it turned out not to be as popular with the Council as I presumed it would and as we all now know the Seafarer ultimately lost out to the 'Time & Tide' Limited Edition Aquaracer. Praise be; finally a WOTY that wasn't a Carrera... and a solar quartz at that!

I know. As the organiser I really should be more 'neutral' shouldn't I? And I can't pretend I wasn't happy when the Time & Tide Aquaracer took the crown, but clearly my influence has little to no effect, you only have to look at the previous years' results to see that!

But Rob, you might say, how could you not get behind this wonderful release, harking back to the glory days of Heuer (and Abercrombie & Fitch, of course) and peddled furiously by everyone's favourite fashion magazine Hodinkee? 

Well, it wasn't that I harboured a particular grudge against the Seafarer (although the patronage of Hodinkee is the kiss of death for me), I just didn't want yet another 'vintage inspired' WOTY on the books. Of course back in November the WOTY voting was yet to get underway, so as I slid the watch onto my wrist it was still very much 'the enemy'... and with that in mind it's surprising that I liked it more than I thought I would. 

You see, it is possible to have an opinion, yet still remain open minded enough to appreciate watches that are not particularly 'your thing'. 

Sometimes...

Did it change my mind completely? No, it's still a vintage inspired Heuer after all and that's just not my cup of tea. But the 42mm case certainly helped and the 'Tide' button that looks stupidly large in photos doesn't seem quite so big (or as intrusive as feared) in person. The subdial surrounds are way too blingy though, a strange choice for a 'heritage inspired' piece one might think and the subdials themselves are surprisingly loud and obnoxious.

You know I can't help but think that we've reached the point now where, having used up a lot of the classic Heuers as inspiration, we're now reaching for more obscure models that look good on paper and that people might initially get excited by, but when it comes down to it won't automatically find an endless queue of buyers. True, the watch market has cooled, we know that; but back in 2021 a heritage inspired Hodinkee Carrera would sell out in a matter of days, whereas this one is still freely available several months after its release. Or maybe 968 pieces is just more then the market can take right now?