176.007 – Omega’s First Bond Watch?

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I tend to sit out most conversations about James Bond when it comes to watches. My understanding of Ian Fleming’s novels is limited, as is my interest. I read a few when I was younger, but always preferred the movies. I apologize to the diehard Bond and Fleming fans but I just can’t bring myself to care that much about a fictional character’s choice of wristwatch. As far as I can tell, Bond wore a Rolex in the novels. The Rolex was inspired by Fleming’s own. Early Bond films featured Submariners. I think that pretty much sums up the chronology, and any deeper into the weeds and I start losing interest.

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if Invicta offered enough money more than Omega, Bond would probably wear Invicta. Or Timex. Or whatever.

Then, at some point when Omega was in the early stages of a staggeringly impressive corporate turnaround under the leadership of Jean Claude Biver, James Bond started wearing a Seamaster Pro. The reality of that partnership is probably quite different from how I imagine it, but I picture someone in a boardroom saying that they just needed some cultural figure with the charm and charisma of James Bond to be seen wearing Omega to help craft the image they were after and Biver dramatically pounding a fist on the table and saying “then let’s call Hollywood and get James Bond!” Large sums of money were handed over and Bond has worn Seamasters ever since 1995’s GoldenEye.

 

I really do appreciate the brilliance of this maneuver and how that odd blue watch with skeleton hands, waves on the dial, and an extra crown at 10:00 ushered in an era of success for the brand. But the cynic in me realizes that if Invicta offered enough money more than Omega, Bond would probably wear Invicta. Or Timex. Or whatever. People can argue all they want about the lifestyle and the image matching the character and the watch, but this was a partnership born out of money, pure and simple.

One conversation about Bond watches I do enjoy surrounds what might very well be the first Omega in a Bond film, the steel 176.007 Seamaster chronograph. I like that it was either the actor’s watch or the prop department just thought it worked for the character. I like that the character in question wasn’t Bond, but was actually a villain. I like that even though this is a circa 1972 watch, it showed up in License to Kill, a 1989 Bond film. And I love the odd coincidence that this watch and Agent Bond share a reference number: 007.

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Long before I was aware of the 176.007’s cameo role in LTK, I was a fan of the style of the 176.007 and often thought that look (colorful, very seventies) was evocative a Roger Moore -era Bond villain. Think Dr. Evil from the Austin Powers films. It was kind of like the wristwatch equivalent of a polyester suit over a turtleneck worn by an older gentleman with an indiscernible accent and bushy sideburns sitting in a grand alpine estate. Not just any 176.007, either, but the one with he blue dial and white subdial at 6:00. How fitting that it turns out that this is the watch, and dial, that actually found its way into a Bond film on a Bond villain. All this happening several years before Omega paid to be prominently featured in GoldenEye.

The dial is either A1 or A2 – it is impossible to tell because the camera never gets close enough to discern the correct text order. Omega would have to pay for that kind of exposure!

 

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