Welcome to Watches of the Week, where we’ll track the rarest, wildest, and most covetable watches spotted on celebrities.
Brendan Fraser is all the way back. He’s forthcoming film The Whale is generating a hive’s worth of Oscar buzz. And you know what that means: parties! Shindigs! Soirées! VIP dinners! Fancy magazine covers (ahem!)! Award ceremonies! Red carpets! And you know what all of those things mean: he’s going to need a watch.
Fraser has been relying on one watch for these events: an Omega De Ville Prestige (yes, that’s in the name). The watch is simple and elegant, exactly the sort of appropriate-for-all-shindigs piece that Fraser can lean on as a workhorse. Fraser’s De Villa is a timeless watch. How do I know? Because pieces from 1967, when this collection launched, don’t look all that different from the ones being made today. The numerals have been switched out and the placement of text on the dial fiddled with, but the De Ville’s thin, understated design has stood the test of time. Now it will get a front-row seat on Fraser’s wrist to what should be a rollicking awards season.
Well, things could be going better for Lionel Messi, whose Argentina squad lost to Saudi Arabia Tuesday morning in perhaps the biggest upset in World Cup history. So, scrambling for some good news here, let’s try this: that’s a pretty great watch, Leo! Messi’s white-gold Nautilus is a peek into the future of the line. While Patek Philippe axed the very popular stainless steel Nautilus (known as reference 5711), it replaced it with a nearly identical version of the watch made out of white gold, like the one Messi’s wearing. See, I bet he’s feeling better already.
James has never had a problem with a watch hook up. More proof of that this week as the King rocked AP’s new blue ceramic Royal Oak. The most proudly blue entity since Eiffel 65, the ceramic watch’s dial, sundial, case, bracelet, and crown all lean into the shade. AP has been experimenting with monochromatic ceramic watches in white and black, but this blue model might be the best of the bunch.
Suddenly, Tudor ambassador Beckham is flush with watch choices. The brand has spent 2022 releasing banger after banger: the Black Bay Pro GMT with its delightful lemon-yellow hand, the simple Ranger, and the red-line Pelagos all hit the market. But this week Beckham went back to one of the brand’s best releases from last year, wearing the Bronze Black Bay Fifty Eight to the World Cup this week. The Fifty Eight line of Tudor watches is a reference to the year 1958, and the pieces under this umbrella nod aesthetically to the watches from that time. They’re inspired by Tudor’s original dive watch from that era and wear a little smaller on the wrist. That’s combined with a little modern magic: in 2021, nothing was cooler than making a watch out of bronze, which picks up patina much quicker than other materials.
Thanksgiving is over which means we can finally move onto Christmas music season. Lo and behold, we have the king of the noel right here. To kick off the holiday cheer, Groban is wearing Rolex’s beloved Daytona model. Impossible to buy at retail, handsome, and selling for many times its original price on the secondary market—this is the type of watch Groban must be thanking Santa for.