Rolex Submariner Date Ceramic, 2012

Dealer description — Analog/Shift

Why We Love It You're looking at the next collectable Submariner! This model, the just-discontinued Submariner Date model Reference 116610LN, was the first date model Submariner to feature the now-famous ceramic dive timing bezel and 'Maxi Case' configuration. Introduced in 2012, this model has become the gold standard for steel diving watches, and was just updated slightly in September 2020. This example, bought new in Hong Kong in October of 2012, features a sapphire crystal, glossy dial, and stainless Oyster bracelet with Glidelock clasp. Coming complete with its original inner and outer boxes, books and guarantee card, this beauty remains in excellent condition throughout with only faint signs of wear from careful use. This piece is not only an essential model for the contemporary collector, but is now a future collectable! The Submariner Story Rolex first debuted the Submariner at the 1954 Basel Spring Fair. It shared the stage with already-established offerings: the Explorer, the Turn-O-Graph, and a ladies' Oyster Perpetual with a chronometer certification. Compared to these other watches, the Submariner - with its oversized crown and chunky dive-timing bezel looked slightly out-of-place, and yet would become one of Rolex's most enduring models. Rolex's quest to produce a waterproof wristwatch has its roots in the First World War, when a need arose for soldiers to have a watch that could withstand the wet, dusty conditions on the battlefield. Rolex's Oyster case of 1926 represented the culmination of a decade of development. It gained notoriety in 1927, when Mercedes Gleitze became the first British woman to swim across the English Channel. She took with her an early Rolex Oyster, in what may have been the very first example of sports marketing by a luxury brand. A series of advertisements followed this feat, featuring smiling flappers dunking their Rolex Oysters in fish tanks. The Submariner hit the market at a time when oceanographer and explorer Jacques Cousteau exposed the world to the wonders of undersea exploration. With the advent of SCUBA (Self Contained Underwater Breathing Apparatus) in the late 1950s, skin-diving as a sport became accessible to amateurs. Since a mechanical timepiece was an essential piece of equipmeny for divers in a pre-digital world, the race was on amongst Swiss manufactures to produce a professional grade timepiece. Rolex was fortunate in that René Jeanneret, one of the company's directors, was a skin-diving enthusiast, giving Rolex a unique insight into the development of their diving watch. The resulting watch was an overnight success, and has been in continuous production ever since. The Oyster Perpetual Submariner, in all of its forms, is an icon amongst icons, a pinnacle of horological design, and a statement piece aspired to and worn by people the world over.