An original Swatch Jellyfish from 1985 from the Rescapement Collection.
When I saw the latest Swatch release, I felt seen, as the TikTok generation says.
Like a lot of people, I’ve gone down the vintage Swatch deep end once or thrice. Last time I came to and swam to the surface gasping for air, I ended with an original Swatch Jellyfish in tow (ref. GK100). Released in 1983 — right around the time Swatch as a brand first launched — it’s one of those classic Swatch models. Apparently, the first Jellyfish run was actually the first Swatch limited edition.1 Swatch re-released the Jellyfish in the 90s with a plain black handset, but it’s just not the same as the original.
This time though, Swatch got it right, in so many ways.
Swatch has introduced the Clear Collection, an homage to the original Jellyfish. It’s a collection of four watches with clear cases and bands, designed to look pretty much exactly like the 80s Jellyfish.
The 4 watches of the Clear Collection: Big Bold (47mm), Skin (34mm), New Gent (41mm), and Gent (34mm)
Even better, Swatch has one model in the original Gent size, a cool 34mm. Sure, there’s also the Modern Gent (41mm) and the Big Bold (47mm), but to me a classic watch deserves a classic size. There’s also a Clearly Skin, the Jellyfish form packaged up in Swatch’s super-thin classic Skin form.
According to A Collected Man, Swatch produced only 200 examples of that original limited-edition Jellyfish run. In that ACM article John Goldberger himself also refers to Swatch as the “last great innovation in horology,” a sentiment from the great mechanical watch collector that I love.
I do think the vintage Jellyfish is somewhat “collectible”, as are many of Swatch’s artist collabs — as much as any battery-powered piece of plastic can be, I suppose. Not for any horological feat, but just because it’s a cool object of the 80s.
On most original examples, the clear case and band have aged to an absolutely disgusting yellow. It took me a good 6 months of searching and eBay notifications to find an NOS example with the original retailer tag still on it (a Marshall Field’s tag at that, catnip to a Chicagoan!).
Now though, you can snag a new Swatch Jellyfish with the click of a button. Check out the Swatch Clear Collection on swatch.com. The Gent version starts at $70.