1960s Zodiac Olympos

The History

There are brands from all eras of watchmaking that exist completely within the set norms for the watch industry. That is to say that their designs, color choices, branding, etc don’t cause any waves. We are fans of the brands who create waves intentionally and Zodiac is definitely one of those brands and the Olympos is definitely one of those watches. The Olympos was first introduced in the early 1960s with a design that could only be described as space age. Following the launch of Sputnik in 1957, space age design was influencing everything. Cars grew fins, logos incorporated starbursts and satellite shapes, and free-form boomerangs became the motel sign shapes du jour. Zodiac wasn’t going to let this design movement pass up watches.

The Reference

The Zodiac Olympos is a beloved model for its unique “manta ray” case which looks like it could come directly from the pages of a comic book. This particular watch also sports a dial that can be considered the predecessor to the Zodiac Mystery Clock that we also have in the watch shop although this one only incorporates a rotating disk for the hour hand rather than the full hand stack. Zodiac just wasn’t ready to fully commit yet. What draws us to the Olympos range is that even though they push the boundaries of design they are not novelty watches. They were built as serious watches with high-quality components and movements. Just because a watch is fun in its design language does not mean that it cannot be a good watch at the same time. Just look at De Bethune DB series. In fact, we would bet that their designers are fans of the Olympos.

The Case

The 38mm stainless steel case is in good condition. There are minor scratches throughout the case and the watch has most likely been polish at some point but it still retains its bevels very well. The case is fairly thin and the curvature of the lugs allows the watch to wear very nicely on the wrist.

The Dial and Hands

The silver dial is in fair condition. There is a fair bit of degradation that is resulting in small pit marks around the outer edges of the inner rotating dial. While fairly apparent in the photography, taken with a macro lens, the issues are not readily visible while on the wrist.

The Movement

This watch is powered by an automatic Zodiac calibre 70 movement. The watch is running and the service history is unknown.

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