Rolex
Rolex is the largest brand in this library after Omega: 3,659 watches across 30 collections, every one of them automatic. The catalogue is built on 42 movements, and five of them, the 2236, 2235, 3155, 3135 and 3255, power 78 per cent of it.
Collections
Explorer
Born from Rolex's partnership with Himalayan expeditions. The watch that conquered Everest.
Oyster Perpetual 41
Datejust II
Oyster Perpetual 34
Date
Day-Date II
Explorer II
Land-Dweller
Oyster Perpetual 28
Perpetual 1908
Milgauss
Oyster Perpetual 39
Oyster Perpetual 26
Air-King
Submariner
The Submariner is the Rolex dive watch, introduced in 1953 as the first wristwatch rated to 100 m, and the design most other dive watches descend from.
Datejust 31
The Datejust 31 is the mid-size Datejust: a 31 mm Oyster case between the 28 mm Lady-Datejust and the 36 mm original.
Day-Date 36
The Day-Date of 1956 was the first wristwatch to spell out the day of the week, and it has only ever been made in gold or platinum.
Datejust 36
The Datejust is the watch Rolex built its catalogue around, the first self-winding wristwatch with a date window, launched in 1945.
Lady-Datejust
The Lady-Datejust is the smallest Datejust, introduced in 1957 at 26 mm and enlarged to 28 mm in 2015.
Day-Date 40
The Day-Date 40 is the 2015 Day-Date: a 40 mm case and the caliber 3255, the first of Rolex's current generation of movements.
Daytona
The Cosmograph Daytona is Rolex's chronograph, introduced in 1963 with a tachymeter on the bezel and named for the 24-hour race Rolex has timed since…
Pearlmaster
The Pearlmaster is the gem-set Datejust, introduced in 1992 with its own five-piece bracelet of rounded links and made only in gold and platinum.
Sky-Dweller
The Sky-Dweller is Rolex's most complicated watch: an annual calendar and a second time zone in a 42 mm Oyster case.
GMT-Master
The GMT-Master is the pilot's Rolex, made in 1955 for Pan Am crews with a fourth hand reading a second time zone against a two-colour bezel.
Datejust 41
The Datejust 41 is the largest Datejust, introduced in 2016 to replace the Datejust II, with a slimmer case and the caliber 3235.
Cellini
The Cellini is Rolex's dress line, named after Benvenuto Cellini and rebuilt in 2014 as a 39 mm gold watch on an alligator strap.
Oyster Perpetual 31
The Oyster Perpetual 31 is the plainest Rolex at 31 mm: a steel Oyster case, a domed bezel and no date.
Oyster Perpetual 36
The Oyster Perpetual 36 is the plain Rolex at the Datejust's size: a steel Oyster case with a domed bezel and no date.
Yacht-Master
The Yacht-Master is the Rolex sailing watch of 1992, made at first in yellow gold only.
Sea-Dweller
The Sea-Dweller is Rolex's saturation diver, made in 1967 with a helium escape valve and a 610 m rating.
About Rolex
The company began in London in 1905 as Wilsdorf & Davis, registered the Rolex name in 1908 and moved to Geneva in 1919. Its two founding patents define the catalogue to this day: the Oyster of 1926, a screw-down case and crown that made the watch waterproof, and the Perpetual of 1931, the self-winding rotor that kept the crown screwed down. Ninety-eight per cent of the Rolex watches here are rated to at least 100 m, because almost every Rolex is an Oyster; the exceptions are the Cellini dress watches and the Perpetual 1908 that replaced them.
The Datejust, the first self-winding wristwatch to show the date through the dial, arrived in 1945 and is the centre of the library. Its five collections, from the Lady-Datejust at 28 mm to the Datejust 41, hold 2,184 watches, 60 per cent of the brand; the Datejust 31 alone is 1,171, the largest collection of any brand here. The Datejust piece sets out what each size changes. The Day-Date of 1956, made only in gold or platinum, is the next largest at 681, and the professional watches follow: the Daytona chronograph of 1963, the Sky-Dweller annual calendar of 2012, the Submariner of 1953 and the GMT-Master of 1955.
That mix makes Rolex, in this library, a gold brand. Half of its watches are solid gold or platinum, a further 36 per cent are Rolesor, steel with a gold bezel and bracelet centres, and only 8 per cent are plain steel. The median case is 36 mm, and 36 mm and 31 mm together account for two-thirds of the catalogue.
Rolex changes a movement rarely and then everywhere at once. The 3135 of 1988 served for three decades before the 3235 replaced it with the Chronergy escapement and a 70-hour reserve; the 3135-to-3235 piece walks through the difference, and the 2236 piece explains why a ladies' movement with a silicon hairspring is the most common caliber in the whole library. Every current Rolex carries the Superlative Chronometer certification, redefined in 2015 as the brand's own test of the cased watch to two seconds a day. Rolex makes no limited editions, and only 1 per cent of the watches here have a display back; the rarity signal, a median of 5 with 14 per cent of scored watches at 8 or above, comes from gem-set dials and the Pearlmaster rather than from numbered runs.