Blancpain Fifty Fathoms Rose Gold 5015 3630 52A

This watch is in excellent condition, with some light scratches on the caseback.

Watch comes with original box (slightly worn inside), outer box, booklets and dated warranty card.

It may come as a surprise to many, but Blancpain actually released its Fifty Fathoms roughly at the same time as Rolex debuted the Submariner. Both highly technical tool watches, they were made with the sole purpose of providing divers with a quick and convenient tool to measure time. While early Rolex Submariners were mostly civilian, Blancpain created the Fifty Fathoms for the French Navy divers, and the watch has retained its military heritage throughout many subsequent iterations.

BLANCPAIN

Blancpain traces its history back to the 1735, which makes it amongst the oldest watch brands currently in operation. It has a rich history, but by the early 1990s had fallen on tough times as a result of SSIH (the Swatch Group's predecessor) focusing more on quartz, rather than mechanical watches. The company was sold to F. Piguet, whose leadership at the time included Jean-Claude Biver.

Biver then did something completely unexpected - he dug his heels into Blancpain's experience as a mechanical watchmaker, boldly proclaiming that the brand had never made a quartz watch and would never do so. This contrarian approach, rather than condemning the brand to the history books, actually worked in favour of Blancpain and led to a resurgence in the company's popularity. Since then, Blancpain has been producing high-quality mechanical wristwatches, and true to Biver's word, has yet to release a quartz timepiece.