The Ultimate Shark Week Watch: 2022

If you’re like me, Shark Week kinda snuck up on you on this year.  Ok, sure, ambush attacks are their thing.  But fortunately — like the crafty gray seal pup — we noticed just in time.  Because in addition to cage diving, breach baiting, and the classic contest Pig vs. Shark (oink?!), this week gives us a chance to talk watches.  Specifically awesome dive watches.

Let’s set our bezels to 20 minutes and dive in.  No, for real, it’s about a 3-minute read.

For the last few years we’ve celebrated our love for watches and fascination with summer’s biggest splash by naming an Ultimate Shark Week Watch.  After all Shark Week remains cable televsision’s longest running show, now entering its 34th season of Discovery Channel swimming laps around the summer competition.  When you sink your teeth into it you find a rather deep connection between the diving, dive watches, and marine protection — including for its essential apex predators.

From Jacque Cousteau’s Calypso team, to Sean Connery’s wetsuit turned tuxedo, to modern profiles in the life aquatic with diver-journalist Jason Heaton — the mythology of the dive watch still goes hand-in-hand with a readiness for adventure and a conservationist lens to ensure the hunt continues.

Which brings us to the criteria for the Ultimate Shark Week Watch:

1. A dive watch, obviously;
2. It should convey the underlying ethos of ocean discovery and sustainability; and,
3. The ultimate feature, its connection to ocean conservancy should be as meaningful as possible.

In 2020 that nod for ultimate commitment went to the Lorier Neptune — a 1960’s style diver that not only pays tribute to the golden era of SCUBA and the original diver watches but quite literally pays it forward with each sale contributing proceeds to the Oceana foundation.  Coming from a micro brand, that investment goes far beyond virtue signaling, and we’re here for it.  So it became the inaugural Ultimate Shark Week Watch — and I’ll mention theat the Lorier Neptune version 3 will be released again this summer.

In 2021 the British microbrand Clemence netted the prize of Ultimate Shark Week Watch with their initial release Photic Diver (reviewed here).  Again, the water worthiness and modern-vintage features like tastefully applied gilt accents and a diamond-shaped lollipop were a good start, but the real story lurks a bit deeper.

About 80 meters deeper, as it turns out, where you find the namesake photic zone — the layer of water that receives sunlight, allows for photosynthesis, and therefore becomes teeming with the majority of aquatic life.  To that end, Clemence builds climate positivity into their brand ethos and, with each watch sold, plants a tree in their native United Kingdom.  Well done, Sons of Scotland.

So which brand sits atop the sustainability food chain in 2022?

Well, to be perfectly honest, I was looking for something a little different.  Not to sleight the now sea of brands with recycled plastic in cases and straps, or to take away from the almost-routine contributions to some sustainability cause.  Every bit counts.  But to be ultimate you have to separate from the shiver.

And one brand has propelled themselves in and out of the water: Vaer.

Now you probably know the Venice Beach brand from their successful line of tool watches built for rugged outdoor trailblazing to surfing safaris.  No coincidence they chose the Instagram handle @vaeradventure.  The Time Bum has even dubbed their D5 Tropic Diver as “my favorite new diver.”  Clearly higher praise than a recent Rolling Stone feature.

But you might not know about their investment in cinema.  We’re talking about the original video production quality of 6-10 minute shorts taking you into the life of a surfer in Reykjavik exploring the Iceland wilderness, an artful profile of a California surfboard shaper and the community he serves, and most relevant to ocean conservation, the plight of a second generation urchin diver bracing against diminishing kelp beds that sustain his livelihood and the coastal ecosystem.

Now I have no idea how much this costs, but if you’re looking for skin divers with skin in the game — look no further.  For this year’s honor, we’ll take note of an additional nature-friendly feature in the Vaer diver line: the perpetually powered solar quartz movement of the DS4 Meridian.  Currently available for pre-order.

There you have it: the Ultimate Shark Week Watch 2022.  A solar-powered dive watch spreading ocean conservation and fisherman’s tall tales across the metaverse.