The Seiko Gyro Marvel is a piece of Seiko’s (very illustrious) history.

It might look just like another small gold plated Sixties dress watch. But this little gem has features that reflect its heritage and can be seen in far more expensive Seikos. The clean crisp dial, those gold hands (look at a Grand Seiko’s hands to see what we mean). Anyone who follows us at The Chrono Duo knows we love Seiko’s, old and new. To us, no other brand covers such a wide range of price points with such great timepieces. They represent some of the best value for money you can buy today.

This watch was made in 1961. It retains its original signed crown, is almost in new old stock condition and comes with an original Gyro Marvel box (try finding one of those on the internet!). It has been worn, but the signs are only light and insignificant.

It all just…works. The gold hands on the simple, classy dial, the partially hidden crown, the retro Sixties typeface. For the money, you are getting tons of style.

In 1959, Seiko introduced the Marvel line of watches, and those with an automatic movement were called Gyro Marvel. Perhaps it is no coincidence that it’s introduction in 1959 coincided with the hiring in the same year of Taro Tanako who introduced the now famous “Grammar of Design” to the SEIKO brand. For its day, nearly sixty years ago, this was sophisticated watchmaking. To see the influence of this watch on the wider watch world, take note of the final sentence in this excerpt from Seiko’s own museum’s description of the Gyro Marvel:

“This is the first self-winding watch equipped with Seiko’s proprietary “magic lever” system. The magic lever is an innovative self-winding mechanism that uses the simple “claw lever system” efficiently to transmit the power of the oscillating weight in both directions. Magic levers are still used in SEIKO’s self-winding watches on the market today. This low-cost mechanism with excellent winding quality instantly dominated the world market, pioneering the popularization of self-winding watches.”

So if you’re looking for a watch that might have all the makings of a mid-century classic, with an elegant silver dial and applied gold markers, look no further.

What a marvel!