Vostok Commemorative
Something a little special arrived in the mail this morning...
A #vostok #amphibia that celebrates the 80th anniversary of the founding of Ukrainian football club Dynamo Kyiv.
If you know anything about Vostok you'll know of the infinite number of dials available on the large current and past catalogue. What you might have missed, is the huge number of commemorative dials they have produced (and sometimes reissued) over the years.
Some of my favourites include the Gagarin:
Various incarnations celebrating the end of World War II (especially the 50th anniversary):
The older commemoratives were screen printed and don't hold up very well to sunlight. Which brings me to another source of randomness in Vostok-world: watches commissioned by companies. Compare these two dials:
Manufactured at the same time for a run of about 8000 pieces (combined) to celebrate the 30th anniversary of the Kazan Organic Synthesis Factory. Some of my other favourites include Lada:
And Ukranian automobile manufacturer ZAZ:
(Again with the faded dial).
You'll notice that these are all printed or screen printed on the dial. In some cases copies of original hand drawn art. They're interesting, somewhat more unique than the #scubadude, and portray some fabulous #russian kitsch! One commision in particular has been reissued in more modern times:
My Desert Shield.
You can find the story behind the original Operation Desert Shield watch here.
An individual can even commission (I guess crowd-fund?) A Vostok, such as this run of 60 pieces celebrating the 60th anniversary of Laika the Russian space-dog:
All of this makes the Dynamo Kiev FC Amphibia something of an outlier. It has a starburst, faceted #champagne dial, applied gold markers, a big red 12 marker, and the club name and anniversary logo are discreet and we'll applied.
But things get a bit stranger still. The bottom of the dial is signed "MADE IN RUSSIA" as opposed to "Сделано в России" as we'd expect to find in a watch made in 2007... Let alone on what is ostensibly a Ukranian watch!
I now have to clean this piece up a bit and will probably swap out the bezel, which is a bit worn, for a modern first party version. I'd also like to find out how many pieces were made... I'm thinking a number with 80 in it. 80? 800? 8000?😁
Raconteur, budding collector and man about town. I buy watches because they're shiny.
Fun watches!
Amazing watch i love the dial
I love Vostok and their Amfibia. Until recently I used to find the overly patriotic dials of the Komandirskie hilarious, now not so much unfortunately.
Love it! Very cool collection.
I love Vostok and their Amfibia. Until recently I used to find the overly patriotic dials of the Komandirskie hilarious, now not so much unfortunately.
Well yes, and here in a nutshell is a strange anachronism - Russian watch made to celebrate a Ukrainian football club!
Cool finds. Geez, what could be more ruskie than a Vostok Lada watch. That would be a fun piece to wear while watching Russian dashcam videos.
Vostok certainly has a way with dials that some other makers could look into, although I'm a little surprised Vostok still offer KGB editions. Really, who would buy those? Imagine Timex releasing a watch with a CIA crest on it.
Thanks to eBay I now have a Vostok Century Time on the way from Kyiv, it might arrive by Christmas.
I am fond of Vostok’s too
Like your collection very well put together and historic.