When Tudor was founded in 1926 as a modestly more affordable alternative to Rolex—they remain sibling brands to this day—the relationship offered hugely helpful synergies in research and development. But it also left the fledgling watchmaker with an ambiguous identity. During its first quarter century, it produced only a trickle of watches, mostly simple yet functional dress models. Tudor had yet to discover its own raison d’être.

It was waiting to be discovered beneath the waves.

The sea change came in 1954, when Tudor created its first dedicated dive watch, the Oyster Prince Submariner, a ruggedly engineered piece with an impressive (at the time) depth rating of 100 meters. The launch was particularly (ahem) timely. After World War II—thanks in no small part to the underwater experienc

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