Oris Big Crown

Oris Big Crown – Pilot watches since day one

As early as 1910, just six years after the company was founded and when modern aviation was still in its infancy, Oris dedicated itself to the construction of special watches for the aviation industry. The brand’s efforts soon paid off, when Oris created its very first aviation collection in 1938: the Oris Big Crown.

The very name of the collection already indicates the profession in which these watches feel most at home: aviation. The reason for this was that pilots had to wear thick gloves, which made the handling of a watch with a regular, filigree crown considerably more difficult. But Oris was adept at making a virtue out of this necessity and soon developed a watch with an extra-large crown – the Oris Big Crown was born. The new crown fitted by Oris was finally big and handy enough to be used under difficult conditions. This collection was groundbreaking in that aviation became one of the company’s leitmotifs and one of the four “Oris worlds” (alongside diving, culture and motorsport).

Over the years, the traditional Swiss brand Oris has incorporated several new pilot’s watches into the aviation range, always highly functional and reliable. The Big Crown ProPilot Altimeter even has a mechanical altimeter. Another interesting detail in this context is the date by hand complication introduced in 1938 (hence the name “Oris Big Crown Pointer Date“), which displays the date via another hand at the edge of the dial instead of the otherwise so common date window.