Vintage Omega De Ville 191.0044 Quartz Watch 1977 UK Warranty

SPECIFICATION

Reference: Omega De Ville 191.0044
Movement: Omega Calibre 1330 quartz, 3 jewels
Age: 1977
Case Size: 34mm
Case Thickness: 7mm
Lug to Lug: 37mm
Lugs: 18mm
Condition: Used vintage Omega watch
Box & Papers: No
Case Material: Stainless steel
Warranty: 12-Months Warranty UK only

POINTS TO MENTION

• In great preowned condition with light signs of wear from use
  
• Silver vertically brushed dial with applied baton hour markers
• Clean two-hand display with no date
  
• Sapphire crystal
• Movement inspected and tested
• New battery installed
• Paired on an unworn black leather strap

THE WATCH

There is a lovely contradiction in this De Ville. Look at it and almost everything says traditional Omega dress watch: a quiet silver dial, slim baton markers, two hands and very little else. Then, sitting beneath the Omega name, is one word that changes the whole watch: QUARTZ.

That matters because this was not Omega quietly replacing an old mechanical idea with something cheaper. In the late 1970s quartz was the new technology, and the 191.0044 shows Omega trying to make that technology feel completely at home inside the restrained world of the De Ville. The watch remained elegant; what was happening underneath had changed completely.

A BIT OF TRIVIA

Calibre 1330 has a wonderfully period way of setting the time. Rather than simply turning the crown in the familiar mechanical-watch fashion, the movement uses a crown corrector to advance the hands. It is a small detail, but one that makes an early quartz watch feel genuinely different to use rather than merely being a mechanical watch with a battery inside.

OUR THOUGHTS

We like this one because the interesting bit is almost hiding in plain sight. Without QUARTZ on the dial it could pass as a beautifully restrained 1970s Omega; with it, the watch becomes a little snapshot of the moment Swiss watchmaking was learning what came next. That quietness is exactly what makes it work for us.