ReviewHome Is Where The (Watchmaking) Heart Is: Raymond Weil’s Freelancer Diver Lake Geneva

Family-run Swiss watchmaking brand Raymond Weil are known for their high-value timepieces that offer more for less, including the ‘Swiss-made’ tag that spells high quality. In keeping with their eponymous founder’s vision and as a tribute to the city that the brand was born in, Raymond Weil launch the Freelancer Diver Lake Geneva Limited Edition. A fresh interpretation of the Freelancer, this one exemplifies dive-watch staples, and carries forward the brand’s efforts towards delivering quality in performance and durability.

At first glance, the Freelancer Diver Lake Geneva looks clean and easy to read, like any other good dive watch. On closer inspection, subtle nuances invoke visuals of the inspiration behind this telling timepiece—the largest lake in the heart of the watchmaking world, and the scenic mountains that look down on it.

Barrel-shaped hour and minute hands look light grey in the day, alluding to the mountains that watch over the lake

Another reference to water is the shape of the date window at six o’clock on the dial—a droplet-shaped aperture, featuring date numerals presented in a font with fluid lines

Geneva—Home To Their Independent Watchmaking

Founded in Geneva in 1976, today Raymond Weil is among a small circle of family-operated Swiss luxury watchmakers. Despite the watch industry’s infamous ‘quartz crisis’ in the 1970s, founder Raymond Weil, set out on his own, pushing the ‘Swiss-made’ tag in a world where cheaper quartz movements had taken over the market. After his grandfather’s death in 2014, Elie Bernheim took over the reins, adding his own contemporary ideas to those of his grandfather (and father, Olivier Bernheim) before him. In a reflection of the late Raymond Weil’s desire to keep the brand independent, in 2007 they launched what is now, arguably, their most recognised line: the Freelancer.

Needless to say, in the last decade and a half, the Raymond Weil Freelancer series has become über-successful for the brand. With simple and elegant watches, as well as functional and practical ones in their repertoire, this collection fits right into a world where change is an everyday phenomenon.

Inspired By The Geography Of Geneva

For over four decades, the city of Geneva has been home to the brand, naturally inspiring Raymond Weil’s timepieces. As inspiration goes, nature is probably the best muse. The naming of their first in-house movement used in the partially open-worked dial of a Freelancer Automatic—the calibre RW1212—was a tribute to the postal code of the brand’s headquarters in Grand-Lancy, Geneva.

Easy legibility in dim light is one of the prerequisites of a dive watch, and in the dark, the Super-LumiNova on the hands and the applied indexes glows a bright blue

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The highlight of this watch is its gradient dial: the blue dial transitions to a darker hue in a circular fashion only near six o’clock—a shade that references the much darker deep end of the lake

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Unlike other watches that offer water resistance up to 300m, this one boasts 310m of water resistance, a figure that references the deepest part of Lake Geneva

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Now, the maison pay homage to the city’s most prominent landmark, Lake Geneva, or Lac Léman as it is popularly known, with the Raymond Weil Freelancer Diver Geneva Limited Edition. “The inspiration comes from our deep-rooted connection with Geneva, as a brand but also as a family,” says Elie Bernheim. The highlight of this watch is its gradient dial. The blue dial transitions to a darker hue in a circular fashion only near six o’clock—a shade that references the much darker deep end of the lake. The lighter blue on the rest of the dial also resembles the crescent shape of the lake. Another reference to water is the shape of the date window at six o’clock on the dial—a droplet-shaped aperture, featuring date numerals presented in a font with fluid lines.

The unidirectional rotating bezel is clearly legible with its Super-LumiNova marker at 12 o’clock

The case comes fitted with a five-link, steel, diving bracelet with a folding clasp with double-push security system

Diving Into Lake Geneva

It is not just aesthetically pleasing though. This watch is a legitimate diving tool as well. Barrel-shaped hour and minute hands look light grey in the day, alluding to the mountains that watch over the lake. Easy legibility in dim light is one of the prerequisites of a dive watch, and in the dark, the Super-LumiNova on the hands and the applied indexes glows a bright blue. The unidirectional rotating bezel—also a requirement for a dive watch so as to mark and measure the time spent underwater—is clearly legible with its Super-LumiNova marker at 12 o’clock.

The 42.5mm stainless steel case has a secure, diving-proof, screwed-down steel caseback, engraved with a visual of another Genevan landmark, Jet d’Eau, the iconic fountain on Lake Geneva that goes up to 140m high

The 42.5mm stainless steel case has a secure, diving-proof, screwed-down steel caseback, engraved with a visual of another Genevan landmark, Jet d’Eau, the iconic fountain on Lake Geneva that goes up to 140m high. Unlike other watches that offer water resistance up to 300m, this one boasts 310m of water resistance. This figure is a reference to the deepest part of Lake Geneva. Interestingly, this timepiece is also limited to the same number—310 pieces. The case comes fitted with a five-link, steel, diving bracelet with a folding clasp with double-push security system. The time and date functions of the Freelancer Diver Lake Geneva run on the RW4200, a mechanical self-winding movement with a power reserve of 38 hours.

In 2019, the brand released the Raymond Weil Freelancer Diver 300M, an automatic diver’s watch, water-resistant to 300m

This isn’t the first dive watch in the Raymond Weil Freelancer collection. In 2019, the brand released the Raymond Weil Freelancer Diver 300M, an automatic diver’s watch, water-resistant to 300m. Available in three dial options, blue, black and silver, that timepiece was issued with a rubber strap or a five-link steel bracelet. Like that one, the Lake Geneva Limited Edition is practical, highly legible and robust. This one’s just a little closer to the heart—of the brand, and of Swiss watchmaking