The traveller, trendsetter or collector: There’s a Tudor watch to gift each personality this festive season - The Straits Times

The 30mm Tudor Royal steel-and-yellow-gold model has been refreshed with sharper polished notches and and elegant ivory dial.

As the year comes to a close, so begins the annual hunt for festive gifts. Making that list (and checking it twice) may be easy enough but finding something that will still be treasured long after Chinese New Year is another matter.

With this in mind, Tudor has put together a festive selection of four watches for four different personalities: the Black Bay 58 GMT for the frequent traveller, the Black Bay 58 “Burgundy” for the trendsetter, the Tudor Royal for the urbanite and the Tudor Monarch for the history buff.

Tudor’s festive selection of watches make ideal gifts for the different people in your life.

We all know someone whose Instagram Stories seem to feature a different city every other week. For the frequent traveller in your life, the Black Bay 58 GMT could be a fitting companion.

The Tudor Black Bay 58 GMT combines vintage-inspired styling with the practical ability to track a second time zone, making it an ideal companion for frequent travellers.

Part of Tudor’s popular Black Bay collection, the watch comes with a useful feature for those who regularly cross time zones: An additional GMT hand and rotating bezel that allow the wearer to keep track of the time back home while abroad.

Its 39mm case is also slimmer and more compact than its counterpart, the 41mm Black Bay GMT, making it easier to slip beneath a shirt cuff or sweater.

While the Black Bay GMT sports a navy blue and burgundy bezel, the Black Bay 58 GMT comes with a black-and-burgundy bezel with warm gold accents.

This vintage-inspired aesthetic element brings to mind the golden age of air travel, when jet-setting was glamorous and travellers dressed up for the occasion.

Behind the dial is Tudor’s own Manufacture Calibre MT5450-U, which drives the hours, minutes, seconds and GMT functions. The watch is also a Master Chronometer, as certified by the Swiss Federal Institute of Metrology, making it a high-performance, high-precision timekeeper.

Sure, burgundy is an appropriately festive colour, but it’s also a throwback to a prototype of the Tudor Submariner Ref. 79190 from the 90s. While the watch had a brilliant burgundy dial and matching bezel, it never saw production.

Today, the design lives on in the Tudor Black Bay 58 “Burgundy”, with the alluring hue once again gracing both bezel and dial. And in another throwback, its 39mm case draws on the proportions of Tudor dive watches from the 1950s.

The Tudor Black Bay 58 “Burgundy” adds colour to a classic dive watch, pairing a rich burgundy dial and bezel with vintage-inspired styling.

The five-link stainless steel bracelet reinforces its vintage appeal, but the watch still feels contemporary. Under the hood, the Manufacture Calibre MT5400-U makes sure of that. There’s also a T-fit clasp, which enables wearers to make small adjustments to the bracelet’s fit without the need for additional tools.

The burgundy scheme is a unique twist on the classic black dive watch. This is a timepiece for the enthusiast who appreciates a familiar classic, but who yearns for a little more personality and versatility.

Some watches are built for rugged, mountainous terrain, or to withstand the ocean’s depths. Still others are made to look at home in corporate settings, at festive gatherings and family reunions where everyone wants to know what you have been up to.

The Tudor Royal now comes in a 30mm version with stainless steel and gold case.

The Tudor Royal belongs firmly in the latter camp. Now enhanced with a host of new dial colours and sizes, the Royal collection includes a stunning 30mm version with stainless steel and gold case, with integrated bimetallic bracelet. The result? A refined, dressy appearance that lends itself well to anything from client meetings to after-work drinks, dinner dates and special occasions.

The Tudor Royal’s bezel, in particular, has been redesigned with sharp polished notches that add definition, while the bracelet comes with a T-fit clasp and sports alternating brushed and polished surfaces for texture.

Beneath the polished exterior beats an in-house designed automatic movement, the MT5201 with a 50-hour power reserve.

Then there are those whose watch collections seem to encompass just about every brand, model and reference worth collecting. For these collectors, perhaps an unexpected choice is in order.

Cue the Tudor Monarch, a timepiece that draws on several chapters of the brand’s 100-year history, rather than referencing a single watch from its archives.

The Tudor Monarch brings together design elements from different eras of the brand’s history, pairing vintage-inspired details with modern watchmaking.

The dial itself features an unusual combination of Roman numerals on the upper half and Arabic numerals on the lower half, a nod to Tudor dials from the 1930s that were meant to enhance legibility.

The geometric, “snowflake” hands, as well as the integrated bracelet design, are a hat tip to Tudor watches of the 1960s and 1970s.

Even the name has historical roots. Tudor previously used the Monarch name for a collection in the 1990s, although this new timepiece is not a direct revival of those watches.

Adding another layer to the story is the unusual dial colour, officially described as “dark champagne”, which is intended to evoke the appearance of aged papyrus.

Despite these historical references, the watch is thoroughly modern beneath the surface. It houses the Manufacture Calibre MT5662-2U, an automatic movement with a 65-hour power reserve.

For the collector who appreciates the story behind the design as much as the watch itself, the Monarch presents something a little different – and plenty to talk about over festive drinks.

Discover Tudor’s festive selection at the Tudor Boutique by The Hour Glass, ION Orchard, #03-06A, or shop online via The Hour Glass.