The most ringing endorsement for the Hamilton Ventura, the world’s first electric watch, is that it was a personal favourite of the King himself when it was debuted in 1957, Elvis Presley. The unusual triangular shape of the case and the cutting edge movement made it incredibly cool and genuinely industry changing, heralding a new age of watchmaking. However, it’s been a while since Hamilton have given the Ventura collection any love but for 2024 it is well and truly back in the spotlight with a special edition for the Lunar New Year and now the new Hamilton Ventura “Blue Suede Shoes” collection dedicated to the model’s most famous collector.
There are three watches in the collection, each presented on a choice of bracelet or strap bringing the total number of new references to six. The first of the new watches is the stainless steel time only edition, the second is a yellow gold PVD time only edition and lastly there’s a stainless steel chronograph version. All three have the same proportions, measuring 32.3mm x 50.3mm x 9.2mm in that signature shield/triangle shape oriented on its side with stylised lugs. It fits into that mid-century style of futurism where people were trying to create things that felt new and exciting and to distance themselves from the austerity of the previous decades.
All three watches also have dials that share the same aesthetic design, a blue fumé gradient with sunray brushed finishing. This is where the “Blue Suede Shoes” connection comes into play, inspired by the opening track of Elvis’ self-titled debut album from 1956 – the year before the first Ventura was released. Blue suede has an intense blue colour with that soft suede texture that catches the light in interesting ways and making it look like the colour shifts slightly across its surface, which is an effect perfectly captured by the Ventura’s dial. The other nod to the blue suede comes from the fact that the strap option of all three watches is blue Alcantara, a synthetic textile designed to be as suede-like as possible.
For the two time only models, the rest of the dial consists of stud hour markers with long lines reaching in towards the centre of the dial where a zig zag line denotes the rapid frequency of the quartz movement. The chronograph is similar but has the addition of a trio of subdials for small seconds, 30-minute timer and 12-hour timer as well as featuring a more detailed scale between the hour markers for the minutes and chronograph seconds. It also goes sans electronic frequency wave in the centre.
Hamilton haven’t disclosed the exact references for the quartz movements housed inside except to say that they’re highly precise 23-jewel ones. As Hamilton is part of the Swatch Group, they’re almost certainly ETA quartz similar to those found in watches like the MoonSwatch. It would be nice if the movement was a little more of a highlight since the Ventura has such a significant place in the heritage of electric watches. But still, it has all the benefits of quartz including accuracy and accessibility.
In terms of that accessibility, the standard Ventura Quartz “Blue Suede Shoes” is £870, the yellow gold PVD edition is £895 and the Ventura Chrono Quartz is £990. It’s nice to see an icon that hasn’t been updated in a while receive fresh dial options, especially ones that look great and have a strong connection to Elvis. I think these will quickly become the most popular version of the Ventura in the current range.
Price and Specs:
More details at Hamilton.
