When did watches start to feature black dials?
All the pocket and vintages watches that I've seen either have a white or cream/ivory dials. Therefore I'm guessing here that this was the accepted normal, or perhaps the artisanal techniques used in manufacturing watches couldn't cope well with color. IDK really.
But what I do know is that sometime during the 20th century there was a shift and now we have plenty (maybe even an overwhelming majority) of black dials.
How did this happen and why? Is there anything inherently superior about a black dial or is it even easier to manufacture than the old school white dials?
I'm a big fan of watches that are interesting because they are either unique, have interesting features, well designed or simply offer a great value for their price.
Radium was discovered early in the 20th century.
It seems like black dials arose with the military tool watches - the A-11 and WWW (Dirty Dozen) and German flieger watches included it in their specs because it provided good contrast against luminescent radium paint... and continued with the Radiomir, 50 fathoms, Submariner, etc. in the water. Today the darker dials dominate for good contrast with luminescent markers and hands.
My utterly baseless assumption is that it has something to do with WWI or radium.
Radium was discovered early in the 20th century.
It seems like black dials arose with the military tool watches - the A-11 and WWW (Dirty Dozen) and German flieger watches included it in their specs because it provided good contrast against luminescent radium paint... and continued with the Radiomir, 50 fathoms, Submariner, etc. in the water. Today the darker dials dominate for good contrast with luminescent markers and hands.
It does sounds logical.
Quartz probably helped the shift as automatic watches moved more towards an aesthetic choice than pure practicality. I would think military / railroad timepieces wouldn't sacrifice legibility (though I've seen black dial versions of both, so who knows?)
My utterly baseless assumption is that it has something to do with WWI or radium.
That would be my guess too. Contrast and legibility of lumed hands better against a black background.
This article analyses watch dial colour by decade and fashion is a key driver in peaks/troughs in demand. Only goes back to 40s though:
https://goldammer.me/blogs/articles/watch-guide-dial-color?_pos=2&_sid=ccd75e1a6&_ss=r
In 1947 Nathan George Horwitt invented the museum watch with VC and it became a classic. For many, that watch (knocked off by Movado) became a status symbol. I am not sure black is more popular today, but similar with cars, the same basic monotone colors dominate sales.
I love a nicely done black dial and it disappears nicely. I am not sure if it is inherently any more difficult than any other color with the exception of vantablack, which is a special process to make it work on a dial. All that said, I have zero interest in adding another black watch soon, short of Moser’s vantablack.
That would be my guess too. Contrast and legibility of lumed hands better against a black background.
This article analyses watch dial colour by decade and fashion is a key driver in peaks/troughs in demand. Only goes back to 40s though:
https://goldammer.me/blogs/articles/watch-guide-dial-color?_pos=2&_sid=ccd75e1a6&_ss=r
Excellent! I suspected that it had to do with the growing popularity of divers. The article that you linked was very informative indeed.
I did have a black Swatch watch in the 80s, was pretty useless looking back on it, it had a black face and black hands and was fairly hopeless to try and see what the time was but it looked 'edgy' and cool 😄 😄 😄