German watch manufacture Glashütte Original’s Senator Cosmopolite is designed specifically to meet the needs of today’s world travelers. With an impressive movement that can display all 37 time zones in one watch, the GMT watch is a user-friendly and elegant travel accessory.

A GMT watch – which stands for Greenwich Mean Time – is quite useful for the modern day travelers that jet from one time zone to another on a regular basis. Although they were first designed for aviation, GMT functions have become a popular feature of sport watches today, with the ability to tell the time in at least one additional time zone on a 24 hour scale. But Glashütte Original’s Senator Cosmopolite is not your typical sport watch that can tell the time in different time zones.

©Glashütter Uhrenbetrieb GmbH

Let’s start with its functionality. Its innovative time zone mechanism allows the traveler to display two different time zones at once, choosing among any of the 37 time zones. This is already a step above some of the most impressive GMT models on the market, because it provides the option of selecting time zones at smaller increments.

The complication owes its superb functionality to the new automatic Calibre 89-02, developed in-house by the Saxon manufacture. Its time zone wheel displays a choice of the 37 world time zones: 24 time zones aligned at full-hour offsets from Greenwich Mean Time that present a black IATA at 8 o’clock; a further 10 time zones aligned with GMT at half-hour offsets that appear in blue; and 3 remaining zones at quarter or three-quarter hour offsets from GMT, which are represented by the relevant IATA location code in red.

The differently coloured indications are intuitive and allow the wearer to identify the offset from GMT at a quick glance. And because the primary point of reference for the traveler on the road is the local time at destination, the designers at Glashütte Original have made the dial easy to read by giving the prime positioning of the dial to the away or destination time.

The 400+ component movement – which also boasts an impressive 72 hour power reserve – can be admired through its sapphire crystal on the case back. Perhaps even more impressive than the dial, it is a great example of the superb finishing and features characteristic of fine German watchmaking, including the Glashütte stripe finish, the brand’s “double-G” logo on the off-centre rotor, blued screws and the hand-engraved and galvanised balance cock.

The elegant finishing is evident all across the lacquered silver-grained dial, which features a black railroad chapter ring framing black Roman numerals. Along the central horizontal axis we have the destination time day/night dial at 9 o’clock, which also shows a starry night sky on the lower half and a yellow sun on the upper, complemented at 3 o’clock by the brand’s logo.

The Glashütte Original Senator Cosmopolite is available in a choice of either a red gold or white gold 44mm case, with brushed and polished surfaces and a black or blue Louisiana alligator leather strap with matching red or white gold fold-over clasp. The watch is a true luxury accessory for the modern traveler, with the ability to offer complex functionality in a very user-friendly package, without at all sacrificing its masterful finishing. Although all that means the watch costs upwards of 40,000 euros, I have little doubt that the brand will struggle for customers in the modern jet-set era.