Many Seiko watches from the 1960’s through the mid-1980’s have rightly gone down as design classics, building a considerable following amongst watch collectors. 
 
Conversely, some truly gorgeous watches from the same era produced by the same company have quietly slipped under the radar for the simple reason they were designed for the typically slighter wrist, ie: women - like this two-tone petite early 1980s Seiko SilverWave "Royal Oak" 3423-0190 women’s watch, on its original two-tone bracelet.
 
And it’s a shame, because many of these smaller watches feature exquisite details – Seiko found an original, great looking formula for its divers, and stuck with it.  The quartz movements Seiko designed for watches like these are tough and reliable – during its heyday, the movements were popular with armed forces for this same reason.
 
The Seiko introduction of their SilverWave line in 1961 marked a number of firsts for Seiko: it represented their first diver’s watch, their first watch with an inner rotating bezel, their first use of the tsunami wave symbol on the caseback, and their first automatic watch with a screw-down case back. 
 
There are many vintage Seiko watches popular with Seiko enthusiasts - the long-running SilverWave line is evidence of this - and for good reason; Seiko discovered the secret to manufacturing mass-produced stylish and affordable watches.  And it made a lot of them...
 
As for the Seiko SilverWave line?  Per Fratello’s resident Seiko guru Michael Stockton, “...the mid 1960’s [the era of Seiko's original SilverWave watch, the J12082] were a time of tremendous transition.  It seemed to be a period of transition away from the feel good, somewhat old-fashioned 1950’s into a more modern, but realistic period."
 
"Literature, music, art, and technology were all undergoing these same patterns of metamorphoses…California and its surfing culture went mainstream and people became highly interested in all things water or ocean related.”
 
Seiko’s “sport divers” would become a long-running theme in their watch design that continues to this day. Clearly its SilverWave line were not designed for deep sea / Jacque Cousteau-like dives.  At the time, the only really hardcore dive watches were Rolex, Omega, Blancpain, and some limited others.  But as noted, water sports during this era became mainstream, and the SilverWave line was designed for snorkeling, swimming, surfing, and other light water sports.
 
This two-tone Seiko Royal Oak comes on its original two-tone stainless-steel bracelet, and with springbar tool and rugged travel case.