Last year Zenith relaunched their entire Pilot collection with a cool design featuring black dials and a ribbed aesthetic emulating the corrugated fuselage of vintage aircraft. Combined with black ceramic cases, they felt like the most urban and street cool watches Zenith have produced to date. Now, for 2024, Zenith have released the Pilot Automatic Boutique Edition and the Pilot Big Date Flyback Boutique Edition.
Zenith Pilot Automatic Boutique Edition
In short, these are blue renditions of the 2023 relaunches. Starting with the Pilot Automatic Boutique Edition, it has the same 40mm steel case with a wide, flat-top bezel and a combination of brushed and polished finishing. It’s a design that feels a lot more like a generic sports watch rather than a dedicated pilot’s watch, leaving the dial to do a lot of the heavy lifting when it comes to the aviation inspiration.
That dial being a blue version of the horizontal groove design introduced last year. It’s specifically the dark not-quite-navy blue that’s a signature colour for Zenith, seen on models like the Defy Skyline and the bezel of the Chronomaster Sport Boutique Edition. I think it works really well on the Pilot as it’s a bit more playful than the serious black edition with a bit more focus towards being sporty and vivacious.
Powering the Pilot Automatic is the El Primero 3620 SC with hi-beat 5 Hz frequency and 60-hour power reserve. The El Primero name is one you’ll likely recognise because it’s one of the most famous family of movements in the history of watchmaking. For example, Rolex Daytonas housed El Primero movements until 2000. It’s priced at 7,500 CHF (approx. £6,900).
Price and Specs:
Zenith Pilot Big Date Flyback Boutique Edition
The second watch in the Boutique release is the Pilot Big Date Flyback Boutique Edition. It’s slightly larger than its counterpart at 42.5mm in diameter and the broad chronograph pushers make it look even chunkier. However, there’s a tradition of pilot’s watches being large in order to make them easy to read at a glance, so it makes sense for the watch to be correspondingly big.
Interestingly, while the modern Pilot is not the most pilot-y pilot’s watch around, Zenith are in the unique position of being the only brand with the copyright for the term “Pilot”, which they’ve held since 1904. Basically, they’re the only watchmaker who can actually write the word pilot on the dials of their watches, which you can see here below the big date complication at 6 o’clock against the new blue backdrop. Even IWC whose collection is called the Pilot’s Watch don’t use the word on the main display.
Housed inside the Pilot Big Date Flyback Boutique Edition is the El Primero 3652 column-wheel chronograph with flyback function and 60-hour power reserve. As a nice touch, the rotor (visible through the exhibition caseback) is decorated with a pilot’s artificial horizon, based on the iconic cockpit instrument. This one is slightly higher priced than the Automatic, understandably, at 11,400 CHF (approx. £10,500).
Price and Specs:
More details at Zenith.
