Gold space helmets and AI futurescapes are the unlikely inspirations for Tej Chauhan’s Rado watch

Inspiration for watch designs can come from all sources – one of our most elegant and enduring icons is supposed to have originally been modelled on a top-down view of a First World War tank, after all. Even though today, Cartier’s Tank is about as far from a military vehicle as you can imagine, you can still see the connection.

So perhaps we shouldn’t be surprised at the number of watches that have helmets, in some form or other, as their muse. Casio makes a watch inspired by a Samurai’s kabuto, and in more recent times several brands have drawn on the liveries of Formula 1 or MotoGP helmets. Most famously, Gerald Genta is said to have styled the Royal Oak’s octagonal, bolted bezel on an antique diving helmet.

Now, there’s another addition to the list. British designer Tej Chauhan has based his latest collaborative creation for Rado, at least in part, on the brilliant gold space helmet worn by Brad Pitt in 2019’s Ad Astra.

The watch is a striking, futuristic take on Rado’s Diastar Original, a 1960s design that with its large, curved case is not dissimilar from the carapace of Pitt’s space suit. Made from Rado’s proprietary Ceramos – an alloy of ceramic and metal that the brand says combines the scratch-resistance of the former and the lustre of the latter – it was given a yellow gold PVD coating to achieve the required effect.

‘My form language is about the near future,’ explains Chauhan. ‘Not so futuristic that it’s polarising or intangible, but like a future that’s just within reach. For Diastar, I was looking at AI futurescapes and also happened to see a movie which featured a moonbase and some gold space helmets… this became the final inspiration.’

The rest of the design, which is Chauhan’s second collaborative project with Rado, follows a similarly futuristic watch aesthetic. The strap, made from pillow-shaped rubber, is intended to imitate space suits, and the dial design is straight out of science fiction. Chauhan created his own typeface for the date and weekday displays; each day’s abbreviation appears in a different bright colour, providing a vivid contrast to the matt black dial and stencilled luminous hands.

Unlike some horological sci-fi creations, which can be a little po-faced, Chauhan’s take on the Diastar seems to tap into a more playful mood. The indexes from nine to 12 on the dial are marked out in a bright blue shade; Rado describes it as ‘the party quarter’, saying it is the time when things truly get going of an evening. Combined with the rest of the dial design, it gives an overall impression of a futuristic late-night bar.

The watch runs on Rado’s R764 automatic calibre, an ETA movement with 80 hours of power reserve. It is water-resistant to 100m and is engraved on the case back to mark the special edition – the underside of the strap also reads ‘TC Souvenirs of The Near Future’.

The watch is available now priced at £2,100 from rado.com