Not all images were able to load for printing. Please close the print window and try again. The Tudor Black Bay Ceramic Blue Puts A Colourful Spin On This Crowd-Pleaser Of A Watch
A bold blue dial and ties to the Visa Cash App RB Formula One team add a refreshing touch to the retro-themed Black Bay range.
There’s already plenty said about the Black Bay collection and its effect on Tudor as a brand. Yes, it’s a gargantuan success and yes it’s home to countless iterations by now, and more will likely come further down the line. From its humble beginnings in 2012 with the release of the Black Bay Burgundy 79220R to bronze, silver and gold models, we’ve seen it all it seems. But surprisingly, Tudor has managed to keep the Black Bay’s momentum going by introducing new sizes, slightly changing its overall design (here’s looking at you Black Bay 54!) and adding a touch of complexity with GMTs and Chronographs. Recently though, they’ve perhaps launched the ‘freshest’ Black Bay in a long while, the Black Bay Ceramic Blue!
This Black Bay Ceramic Blue is nothing really new under the sun as it’s mostly about the dial colour and of course the connection to the VCARB Formula 1 racing team. Early this year, Tudor announced it would enter the fast-paced world of F1 as a timing partner to Red Bull Racing’s sister team, and it wasn’t long before a special watch emerged on the wrists of Daniel Ricciardo and Yuki Tsunoda. When we first published about this, the watch was not intended to be publicly available. A couple of months down the line, however, things have changed and Tudor has added the Black Bay Ceramic Blue to the permanent collection.
It still has the 41mm wide matte black ceramic case from the existing Black Bay Ceramic launched in 2021. It’s fitted with a black crown, and a unidirectional rotating diving bezel in black PVD-coated steel, finished with a matte black ceramic insert. A domed sapphire crystal is placed over the dial, to keep things safe. It’s funny how the blue tone of the dial, which I’ll get to in a bit, is projected outside a bit due to the strong curvature of the crystal. Under direct sunlight, it throws yet more blue at you, something that the often white or black dials of the Black Bay don’t do.
Speaking of which, the obvious talking point is that bright blue dial. It follows suit with the architecture we know and love of the Black Bay; a domed dial, a mix of triangular, stick and round markers, a snowflake hour and seconds hand, and a sword-shaped minute hand to finish it all off. As always, Tudor uses Super-LumiNova for the hands and indices to aid night-time legibility. The dial also has a white minute track, a shield-shaped logo, the name of the brand, a reference to the brand’s home city of Geneva and the fact it’s a Black Bay and has a Master Chronometer movement.
The first-ever Black Bay Ceramic served as a launching pad for the brand’s in-house METAS Master Chronometer-certified movements, which caused quite a stir in the industry. Over the past year and a half or so, Tudor has been slowly expanding the Master Chronometer certification to other models as well. Think of the Black Bay 58 GMT from this year’s Watches & Wonders, and the Black Bay Burgundy released last year. This in-house-produced Calibre MT5602-1U, made with Kenissi, runs at a rate of 28,800vph and provides a reassuring power reserve of 70 hours. Being a certified Master Chronometer means that it’s regulated to run within -2/+4 seconds of deviation per day, and has anti-magnetic properties up to 15,000 gauss. The sapphire crystal caseback reveals the blackened movement and rotor.
The Tudor Black Bay Ceramic Blue comes on a comfortable hybrid rubber and leather strap, with blue stitching to match the dial. This is closed with a folding clasp in black PVD-coated steel. Alternatively, Tudor supplies a black fabric strap with a blue stripe down its entire length, also finished with black PVD-coated steel hardware. Retailing for EUR 5,200 including taxes, Tudor has added it to the permanent collection.
Priced at just over 5k puts this one at the top end of the time-only Black Bay sub-collection, with the exception of two-tone or full gold models. Despite this, it still feels somewhat fair given the ceramic case and METAS Master Chronometer certified manufacture movement. In all honesty, it’s a very welcome, more youthful and contemporary addition to the Black Bay line-up! It has lost absolutely nothing of its appeal, and in fact I think it found some more. So hats off Tudor, for being a bit bold with this one!
For more information, please visit TudorWatch.com.
