The Defy collection stems from the same era as Zenith’s El Primero chronograph calibre. This pioneering phase in Zenith’s history still echoes through the watch world. 1969 was a year of firsts in watchmaking and the Zenith Defy Diver was among the revolutionary quartz and automatic chronographs.
The rugged diving watch with angular facets and a dodecagonal (12-sided) bezel embraces the era’s radical designs. But without getting bogged down with the past, Zenith reintroduces the Defy Extreme Diver to modernise the concept with contemporary features.
Crafted in grade 5 titanium, the Defy Extreme Diver’s 42.5mm x 15.5mm case maintains strength with relative lightness. While pure titanium boasts a dull grey aesthetic, Zenith utilises a titanium alloy to achieve a lustrous sheen. Emphasising the sharp angles and intricate facets with the mixture of polished and brushed finishing techniques. Running along the bevels of the case and crown guard edges is mirror-polishing, which is made more difficult to achieve due to titanium’s hardness.
Titanium watches typically attract a premium over stainless steel variants due to the robust tooling and manufacturing overheads. All this effort assists in creating an arresting design, but titanium also offers corrosion resistance for saltwater diving excursions
While the intricate case grabs your attention, the bold dial design and prominent hands keep you returning. This is a dive watch through and through, and Zenith reminds us of this in all the details. The striking orange minute track stands out for readability in the murky depths. Complementing the inner, fixed portion of the bezel, this inner minute scale also follows the dodecagonal pattern — a nod to the 1960’s Defy.
To contend with modern dive watch sensibilities is the outer, ratcheting, ceramic, unidirectionally rotating dive scale bezel. On the bezel, the extraneous grooves are interspersed with smooth edges to offer excellent grip, especially when wearing dive gloves. Complementing the legibility in low light conditions is the X1 grade Super-LumiNova infills for the 60-minute scale.
The oversized applied indices also serve a purpose with angled facets emphasising the luminescent material. To accentuate it further, the markers at 12, 6, and 9 feature a white outline following the contours of the indices. At 3 o’clock is the colour-matched date window with a similar white edging. The main dial surface features the Defy’s signature four-pointed star with a sunray pattern delivering a metallic lustre.
If anything about this watch defies the “Extreme” moniker, it’s the semi-skeletonised hands and liberal application of lume and orange accents. Competing for the “Extreme” claim is the 600m depth rating or, rather amusingly, 1,969 feet. This level of water resistance is double the 300m standard. The Zenith even includes the helium escape valve on the case side, primarily for saturation diving.
Powering the Zenith Defy Extreme Diver is the 5Hz El Primero 3620-SC automatic calibre with 60-hours of power reserve. I suppose the least dive-focused aspect of the watch is the sapphire caseback, which allows you to view the movement. However, I would prefer Zenith to stick the landing and opt for a solid titanium caseback While the movement is pleasant to observe, the rest of the watch has gone to the extreme to make it rugged, which the atypical sapphire window goes against.
The Zenith Defy Extreme Diver has a matching titanium bracelet and two complementary straps — the FKM rubber strap affixes to the lugs directly with a quick-release button. However, the fabric strap crafted from recycled fishing nets comes with bespoke titanium end pieces. The Zenith Defy Extreme Diver comes in blue or black dials for £10,200.
Price and Specs:
More details at Zenith.
