Longines Flagship Heritage 38,5 mm L4.795.4.78.2

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The storyWhy this reference matters

The Flagship arrived in 1957, the year the manufacture turned ninety, and was the second Longines family to get a name of its own after the Conquest. The word is not decorative: a fleet's flagship is the ship flying the colours of the officer in command. From that came the naval-officer spirit and the emblem the line has carried ever since, a caravel under full sail that you never see from above, because it lives on the back.

That emblem is the most hand-made part of the watch, and it happens entirely out of sight. Enamel, mixed with water, is painted by hand onto an 18-carat gold medallion and then fired at 800 degrees as many times as it takes to vitrify and bond to the metal. Then it is filed and polished. Every Flagship since 1957 has had its caravel sailing on a deep blue sea, and this reissue is no exception.

Do not confuse it with the anniversary piece. In 2017, for the line's sixtieth year, Longines released an edition limited to 1,957 examples, reference L4.817.4.76.2, with the calibre L609. This L4.795 is the catalogue version: no numbering, no waiting list and a different movement, the L615.3, running at 28,800 vibrations per hour with around fifty hours of reserve and the quiet business of small seconds at six.

SpecificationsThe numbers, in one table

IdentificationHow to tell it apart

The signature of this reference is at the bottom: the small seconds and the date window share six o'clock, an uncommon arrangement that orders the dial symmetrically and rules out almost every other Flagship at a glance. Above it, an opaline ivory dial, gilt bar markers, matching alpha hands and a discreet touch of lume.

The 78 in the reference is the ivory dial and the final 2 the alligator strap. This is a watch of 38.5 mm across with barely 46 mm lug to lug and a shade over 10 mm of case: genuinely small, not catalogue small. The lugs take 19 mm straps, a size that makes you hunt a little harder than the usual 20 or 22.

Do not mix it up with the moonphase Flagship Heritage models, which have domed dials in havana beige, anthracite or green, eleven applied markers and the calibre L899.5 with seventy-two hours. Nor with the original Flagships of the sixties, which also wear the caravel but in much smaller cases and with in-house calibres. The caravel is the family surname, not one reference's identity card.

CollectingWhat collectors check

The first thing to look at is the thing almost nobody looks at: the medallion. On old Flagships the enamel wears away against the wrist and the caravel ends up blurred; on modern ones the usual problem is a different one, a back opened carelessly by somebody who rests the tool where it should not go. A scratched medallion, or one with the enamel chipped, is not restored, it is replaced, and it does not come cheap.

The 3 bar governs how you use it. This is a watch to wear under a cuff; it copes with rain and with washing your hands, and it should not go near a pool or a hot shower, where steam gets in where water would not. If the example in front of you has condensation under the crystal or moisture marks at the edge of the dial, walk away: on an opaline dial those stains are permanent.

The other point is the movement. Early runs were advertised with 42 hours of reserve and Longines now declares fifty for the L615.3, so the seller's spec sheet tells you more about the age of the watch than the year he bought it. It is an automatic on very familiar ETA architecture with no parts oddities, and that is good news: what you spend on a Flagship goes on cosmetics, not on mechanics.

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