Welcome to Rapture – A review of the Lorier Safari

The Lorier Safari origins are rooted in the concept of an alternative Explorer inspired by an obscure and discontinued Lord Sanford watch. That at least is the explanation given by TGV, but to my eyes the end result looks more at home exploring the undersea city of Rapture rather than ascending the peak of the Everest. To be fair, it does have a 369 dial and its 36mm diameter is a good match for an Explorer – one that was designed by an Art Deco atelier for the opening of the 1933 World’s Fair in Chicago.

The watch arrived in a fairly standard box and bundled with a very nice soft travel pouch together with a tube of polyWatch (more on that later). The immediate impression is one of a retro inspired vintage with a strong influence of Art Deco. This is reinforced by several design decisions that further widen the gap between the Safari and an Explorer.

The finish of case is the first thing that catch the eye because it so shiny. There is not a single brushed facet and everything, including the case back, is polished to a gloss. Unfortunately this polish turn the safari into a smudge and scratch magnet and contribute to give an impression of delicacy instead of ruggedness. It’s somewhat balanced by the short and relatively thick lugs, however the thickness of the lugs resulted in narrowing the lug’s width to 18mm and forcing the use of narrower straps, which in turn reinforce the impression that the Safari is more of a dress than a field watch.

Despite featuring a uniform high gloss polish the Safari doesn’t feel that it was done to cut corners. The flow of the lugs around the case is accented by a chamfer running along the upper edges, and despite the case being more angular than a typical oyster, I could not find sharp edges or overly pointed tips when I ran my fingers along its contour and underside. The lugs are drilled, which is a blessing, and the crown is signed with the Lorier chevrons. Said crown will provide a good grip due to the lack of guards and being slightly over-sized. On top of the case reside the thin fixed bezel that is angled just so to match and meet the case’s upper chamfer. It’s an elegant case and at 11.7mm it’s also quite thin, considering that the crystal itself is 2mm thick. Personally I think that it’s charming in an old world way.

The back of the case is engraved with a coat’s of arms and some text commemorating the collaboration of TGV to this project. Both the case back and crown are screw down which contributed to the respectable 100m WR of the safari.

The dial is undeniably the star of the show. The copper is showing circular polish lines and the dial is divided with thin cross-hairs. The 369 layout was done in a sector dial style where the indices and Arabic numerals are held between concentric lines with the minutes track at the very edge. The dial is printed and the text is kept to just the brand and model names on top of the dial and “Automatic” at the bottom. It’s a very good clean and stylish dial that catch the eye without being overburdened.

Keeping with the retro and eschewing the current trend of using applied markers the Safari painted dial is very legible at dark. It use C3 Super-LumiNova that glows in a vintage green and looks slightly off white during the day. The same compound is also applied on the hands that are blued in the old fashion of heat treatment.

The Lorier Safari crystal is made of good old acrylic. It features a nice rounded dome and like all acrylics, it’s superbly clear and free of reflections. Lorier bundled a tube of polyWatch and a polishing cloth to ease the fears of those who are convinced that acrylic is the tool of the devil. The truth is that acrylic is very tough and keeping it free of scratches is extremely easy. I approve whole hardheartedly of the decision to fit the Safari with an acrylic crystal as it’s both keeping with the retro style of the watch and in many ways it’s a superior material even to sapphire.

Despite the claim that the Safari has a bubbleback case, I found that as bubbles goes, the one on the Safari is extremely shallow to non existent. This probably can be attributed to the Miyota 9039 movement that is known to be slim. It’s also beat at 28,800 and has no ghost position. The only downside I found to using it is the action of the crown for hand winding as it feel notably less smooth than a counterpart from Seiko. I know that the Miyota rotor movement tend to be noisier, but I spent too much of my life near things that go boom and therefore I’m completely unable to hear any difference, which means that I can appreciate the smoothness of the second’s hand without being bothered.

I’m not going to repeat myself because I already wrote what’s my opinion on the strap that is bundled with the Safari. Do yourself a favor and change it to something else, anything else will be better, just note that the full high gloss polish of the Safari make it a bit challenging to find a suitable metal bracelet or strap. I tried both a generic bracelet and a mesh from Strapsco and in both cases it turned the safari into a blingy accessory. Experimenting with other straps led me to find that the grey suede leather from Nomos was a good fit that added a lot of class to the stylish look, but I finally settled on an orange stripped strap from Erika’s Originals fitted with an optional bronze buckle. It’s a very good match for me, but unless you already have an 18mm strap that fit you’ll have to go shopping and this is why I’m sorry that Lorier opted for a strap that is so frustratingly bad instead.

My final conclusion is that the Lorier Safari is charming. It has an undeniable Art Deco vibe with a dial that manage to keep the legibility of a 369 layout and combine it with a vintage looking sector dial style, and while it look more like a dress watch rather than a field watch, it’s still rugged enough to be a fine daily companion, especially if your daily routine include touring Rapture. It wears on my wrist as well, or even better than an Explorer, provided that it’s not on its original strap.