By almost any standard, the luxury watch world enjoyed a successful year in 2021 despite the lingering effects of the Covid-19 pandemic and its worldwide economic consequences ? with high-profile retailers reopening and expanding, new auction records set, some large-scale industry events (like our own WatchTime New York) returning, and of course, a host of notable timepieces launched. As we wrap up 2021 and look ahead enthusiastically to 2022, we take our annual look back at some of the year’s notable timepieces in various popular categories. Today we showcase dive watches.

The so-called ?BUND No-Rad? model that Blancpain made for German Navy divers in the 1960s provides the inspiration for this year’s Tribute to Fifty Fathoms No-Rad Limited Edition. Housed in a 40.3-mm-diameter polished steel case, the watch replicates many of its vintage forebear?s recognizable elements ? chief among them the colorful disk above 6 o?clock, whose red segments on a yellow background was designed as visual shorthand to assure the watch?s military users that the timepiece was free of the potentially dangerous radium that had been previously used for luminous elements on its predecessors. Other historically inspired details include the geometrical hour markers, the white frame around the date marker, and the beige-colored Super-LumiNova on the hands and markers. Distinctly modern are the sapphire insert in the dive-scale bezel and the movement, Blancpain’s manufacture Cali...