Skateboarding is one of the most distinct subcultures around, establishing itself during the period of cultural upheaval in the 1960s-80s. It’s a subculture that combines not only the physical act of skating but also fashion, music, art and attitude. Where does this intersect with wristwatches? Well Seiko has just launched their second skateboard themed limited edition, the 5 Sports HUF II.
The standout feature of the watch is the dial, so let’s jump straight there (maybe doing a sick kickflip while we’re at it). It’s based on a 1970s style of display with a transparent dial that reveals some of the inner workings of the watch from the dial side of the watch. Here that means you can see the complete day-date function with its twin disks that rotate one stage each midnight. With the days disk you can set it to either western Arabic or Japanese kanji modes offset by one position.
What makes the transparent display particularly eye-catching is that it has been coloured a vibrant lime green. It’s based on one of the (many) signature colours of the HUF skateboarding apparel brand – a brand established by Keith Hufnagel, a well-known New York skater and fashion designer. The colour works really well in combination with the bright orange seconds hand as well as the dark tones of the black used for the peripheral timing scales, day-date aperture framing and HUF logo at 6 o’clock. It’s bold and disruptive, exactly what you want from a skateboard collaboration.
The other thing you want from a skateboard collab is to be able to actually wear the watch while on wheels. Which you certainly can with the 5 Sports HUF II’s field watch design featuring 39.4mm steel case and 100m water resistance rating. On the wrist it offers a good balance in terms of legibility and size. It’s maybe a little taller than I’d prefer at roughly 13.2mm thick but it’s by no means egregious. I’m probably just spoiled from all the super slim automatics I’ve seen recently.
It’s presented on a steel bracelet with deployant clasp and Seiko’s extra security fastener. While inspecting the bracelet, you can also see the watch’s caseback which is again presented in HUF green with a map of San Francisco over a transparent exhibition window. The movement that’s visible is the 4R36 automatic with 41-hour power reserve. It’s one of Seiko’s true workhorse movements, helping keep the watch nice and accessible as it should be as part of the 5 Sports line.
Specifically, it’s priced at £350 in a limited edition of 7,000 pieces. Normally I would make a comment about how that’s more than the annual production of many independent brands but given that Seiko’s other recent 5 Sports limited edition sold out in a matter of minutes with 9,999 pieces, these numbers don’t mean they aren’t exclusive – that watch was the Pink Panther edition. I’m not sure this skateboard watch will be snapped quite so quickly as that, but given its incredibly solid value, it probably won’t hang around for long.
Price and Specs:
More details at Seiko.
