Oris is absolutely crushing the affordable dress category this year.
Between the expanding Artelier lineup and the brand’s growing heritage catalog, 2026 is shaping up to be a banner year for the Swiss independent.
But among a slew of strong new offerings unveiled at Watches and Wonders this year, one piece in particular stands out from the pack: the Oris Star Edition, a faithful revival of the brand’s groundbreaking 1966 original, priced at a level that feels almost too good to be true.
Watches and Wonders Geneva: Rolex, Grand Seiko and dozens of other heavy hitters gather in Switzerland every year to release their biggest watches. Catch up on all the new novelties.
A milestone for Swiss watchmaking and Oris
To understand why the Star Edition matters, you have to go back to mid-century Switzerland.
In 1934, the Swiss government enacted the Swiss Watch Statute, a protectionist law designed to counter anti-competitive practices in the industry.
In practice, it froze brands in place, preventing them from adopting new technologies, even those already widely available.
For Oris, this meant decades of being stuck with inferior pin-lever (or Roskopf) escapements while other established makers used higher-quality lever escapements, the backbone of virtually all mechanical watches today.
Enter Dr. Rolf Portmann. He was a lawyer whose father worked at Oris, who was specifically hired to lobby the Swiss government to overturn the statute. The task took him ten years, but he eventually won, breaking a legal dam that had kept modern watchmaking innovations out of reach.
The clearest and most immediate fruit of his labor, though, was the Oris Star launched in 1966, the brand’s first watch with a lever escapement.
With its distinctive 35mm barrel-shaped case, integrated lugs and space-age silhouette, it was a bold departure from the round gold watches of the era and a symbol of Oris’s hard-won freedom.
