A Review Of The Oris Big Crown Pointer Date Watch

The pointer date was first used in Oris watches in 1938 and though one or two other manufacturers employ a pointer date in some of their watches, the pointer date is almost a trademark of Oris. The use of this feature in their Big Crown collection is a beautiful amalgamation of pointer date and crown.

All the Big Crown Oris watches come with an automatic movement with a screwed back and see-through mineral glass - personally, I like a being able to see the inner workings of the watches movement.

The casing of the Oris Big Crown Pointer Date watch comes in four sizes: 40mm, 36mm, 32mm and 28.5mm. It's constructed in stainless steel and comes with a fluted bezel - the bezel can optionally come in rose gold.

There are two different dials available: silver guilloche or black. The design features are different for each dial. With the silver guilloche dial, there are rose gold Arabic numerals at the 12, 2, 4, 6, 8 and 10 positions with rose gold markers at the odd hours. The hour, minute, second and date hands are also in rose gold, with the hour and minute hands in Superluminova material. The black dial of the Oris Big Pointer watch comes Superluminova Arabic numerals for each hour and all hands are stainless steel in colour.

I really like the black dial, more so than the silver guilloche. My taste in watches is very simple; I like my stainless steel watches to be just that. I don't like the mixing of gold and silver and I really do wish Oris had designed a third design for their dial on the Big Crown; one that used Superluminova Arabic numerals and stainless steel hands on a silver guilloche dial. Having said that, I can easily live with the rose gold finishing on the silver version of the dial.

Depending on the size and particular model, the Oris Big Crown Pointer Date Watch comes with either 25 or 17 jewels.

There are four different straps to complement the Big Pointer watch by Oris; black leather, mid-brown leather, stainless steel and stainless steel with plated rose gold. As I said earlier, I don't gold/silver combinations and I also don't think that the brown leather strap suits the look of either the silver or black dials.

Finally, lets talk about the pointer date hand. Whether it's gold or silver coloured, the pointer date hand comes with a red curved end that points to the date on the outer rim of the dial. However, on the 40mm case the pointer date end piece is slightly curved, forming a quarter circle, whereas on the smaller cases the end piece forms the shape of a horseshoe. I much prefer the horseshoe shape as it, in my opinion, highlights the date more clearly. Why Oris chose to use a different shape on the largest casing I don't know but I wish it hadn't.

I really like the Oris Big Crown Pointer Date watch. My preferred piece from this collection would be the 40mm silver guilloche case and black leather strap - despite my reservations about the use of rose gold hour markers. The big case just carries the big crown better.

Robin O'Brien is founder of a website dedicated to beautiful watches that he and his wife own. You can get wristwatch reviews on such leading classics like Oris watches, Longines, Rado and Panerai watches among others.