Oris Star Edition: A Road Trip to Mont Ventoux

There are watches we appreciate for their movement, their architecture, their history, or simply for the aesthetic emotion they evoke. And then there are those which, without it ever really being planned, end up becoming linked to a moment in life. They remain the same horological objects, with their qualities and their flaws, but something has changed. A landscape, a road, an encounter or a memory now gives them a value that no spec sheet can measure.

For about ten days, at the height of this summer of 2026, an Oris Star Edition thus left its natural environment to take to the road. From Paris to Auvergne, from Hérault to Provence, from Mont Ventoux to the Nesque gorges, then from the Cevennes to Haute-Loire before returning to the capital. A motorcycle road trip, above all. A journey between a father and his son, talked about for several years and simply waiting for the right moment to become reality. And on the wrist, a watch whose story is precisely about freedom.

Oris Star: a watch born from freedom regained

To understand the Oris Star Edition unveiled at Watches and Wonders Geneva 2026, we need to go back six decades.

Swiss watchmaking from the 1930s to the 1960s developed under the influence of the Statut horloger, a regulatory framework initially designed to protect an industry hit hard by the economic crisis. Over the years, however, this framework ended up constraining the industrial freedom of certain manufactures. Oris was particularly affected.

The Hölstein-based manufacture remained confined for many years to movements fitted with pin lever escapements, while the lever escapement gradually established itself as the reference among connoisseurs of fine mechanics. In 1956, Oris entrusted young lawyer Rolf Portmann with the mission of changing this situation. A legal and political battle lasting nearly a decade then began. It came to a conclusion in the mid 1960s and allowed Oris to regain a technical freedom that would profoundly change its destiny. The Star appeared in 1966 and became one of the symbols of this new era.

Sixty years later, Oris pays tribute to it with a watch that above all does not try to reinterpret the past excessively. The Star Edition fully embraces its retro character. And that is probably what gives it its charm.

35 mm and no desire to impose itself

In a contemporary landscape where the sports watch remains omnipresent, the Star Edition takes a different path. Its steel case adopts a tonneau silhouette characteristic of the 1960s. Its 35 mm diameter, combined with a lug to lug length of 41.5 mm, can almost seem anachronistic at first glance. It is not. It simply restores the proportions of another era and contributes directly to the watch’s identity.

The silvered dial also follows the codes of the historic model: applied indexes, hands with squared tips, an off-center date at 3 o’clock and the inscriptions “Star”, “Automatic” and “26 Jewels”. The whole is protected not by a sapphire crystal, but by a domed plexiglass that brings that particular warmth familiar to vintage watch enthusiasts. Even the case back takes part in the historical exercise, engraved with the Oris crest of the 1960s. Inside sits the Oris automatic caliber 733, offering hours, minutes, central seconds and an instant change date. Its power reserve reaches 41 hours. Water resistance is rated at 5 bar and the watch is delivered on a black leather strap with a pin buckle. Nothing in this spec sheet, then, seeks to turn the Star Edition into an adventure watch. And yet…

A dress watch takes to the road

The departure is given in Paris on August 3rd. First stop in Auvergne, at La Chaise-Dieu. Then comes the Garabit viaduct, a stop by the shore of Lake Pareloup and finally Montpellier.

This is where the road trip truly takes on another dimension. Two generations, two motorcycles and two very different approaches to time: a Honda NT1100 for the father, a Honda CB125R for the son. On the latter’s wrist, a Garmin Fenix 8 Pro AMOLED, whose technological capabilities correspond perfectly to this generation of instruments capable of measuring, recording and accompanying practically every activity.

On the other wrist, the Oris does simply what mechanical watches have always done: tell the time. This contrast could almost sum up several decades of watchmaking history. Yet this is not about opposing the two worlds. Quite the opposite. Each naturally finds its place in the journey. The Hondas then take to the roads of Hérault, pass through Pic Saint-Loup, cross the Gard via Uzès and reach Bagnols-sur-Cèze before continuing toward Provence. Destination: L’Isle-sur-la-Sorgue.

In the shade of its quays and along the different branches of the Sorgue, the pace changes. After the kilometers come calm, walks and a night of rest. For the next day is to lead to the first real objective of the journey. Mont Ventoux.

A missed appointment with the Giant of Provence

Thursday August 6th starts early. Wake up at 6 a.m. and departure at 7 a.m. to make the most of temperatures that are still bearable. A few dozen kilometers later, Bédoin appears at the foot of the Ventoux. But the road stops there. The Gendarmerie is blocking access. That day sees L’Étape du Tour de France Femmes avec Zwift take place, the event reserved for amateurs that precedes the arrival of the professional peloton at the Ventoux the following day. Several thousand cyclists are due to climb the Giant of Provence and the roads are naturally closed off.

It is necessary to give up. At least for the time being. The program then shifts toward Fontaine-de-Vaucluse, its impressive spring and the surprisingly cool waters of the Sorgue. A morning of walking, a lunch and then a return to L’Isle-sur-la-Sorgue help pass the time until the end of the day. Around 6 p.m., a decision is made: go back and check. Bédoin again. This time, the barriers are gone. The gendarmes are still present but the road has been reopened to traffic. The two Hondas then set off on the climb.

36 degrees at the bottom, 18 at the summit

Some roads seem to have been designed for motorcycles. The Ventoux road is undeniably one of them. That evening, it also offers an extremely rare situation. After being closed for much of the day, it is almost entirely deserted. A few cyclists, two motorcycles spotted during the climb, practically no cars. The Giant of Provence almost belongs to those who waited. As the altitude increases, the scenery transforms. The Mediterranean vegetation gradually gives way to forest, before that too disappears in turn. There then emerges that mineral landscape so characteristic of the Ventoux, giving the summit its almost lunar appearance.

The temperature drops just as dramatically. The dashboard of the Honda NT1100 had shown around 36°C on the plain. At the summit it will read only 18°C. And when the motorcycles finally arrive up there, the sun begins to set. The whole trip, every change of route and the missed appointment that morning suddenly make sense. Facing the setting sun, the Oris Star finds itself in an environment it was never imagined for. No plush salon. No shirt sleeve. No horological staging. Simply a 35 mm case, a few hands and a mechanical movement facing a landscape millions of years old. The watch suddenly seems perfectly in its place.

The luxury of having time

The next day, the Tour de France Femmes still forces a few adjustments to the program. It is impossible to complete exactly the loop around the Ventoux originally imagined. So the destination becomes Monieux and the Nesque gorges, also almost deserted at this early hour. The road clinging to the rock offers some of the most beautiful views of the trip before a stop at Venasque, then Gordes and Saumane-de-Vaucluse. Another Provençal day comes to an end. The next day, the motorcycles head back toward Montpellier via Arles and the Camargue.

Then already comes the way home. After a necessary intervention on the tires, the Honda NT1100 takes to the road again, this time with two passengers. The Cevennes are crossed via Chamborigaud then Luc, before Langogne, Haute-Loire and a stop at the Château de la Rochelambert, in Saint-Paulien. The loop finally leads back to La Chaise-Dieu.

The next day, the road to Paris still passes through Châteldon and Ris. A few hundred kilometers later, the journey that had been talked about for several years already belongs to the past.

A watch does not need to be a « tool watch » to travel

The experience also reveals something interesting about this Oris. The Star Edition is absolutely not a tool watch. With its leather strap, its plexiglass, its 5 bar water resistance and its proportions inherited from the 1960s, no one would spontaneously think to name it the ideal companion for a motorcycle road trip. But does one necessarily need an adventurer’s watch to live an adventure? Probably not.

Its 35 mm on the contrary give it a measured presence. Its dial remains simple, without unnecessary complication, while its retro aesthetic contrasts pleasantly with the omnipresent electronics of a modern motorcycle. GPS, TFT screens, smartphone, Cardo Freecom intercoms allowing the two riders to talk while riding: the motorcycle trip of 2026 no longer has much in common with one from twenty years ago. In the middle of this technological environment, a mechanical watch that simply measures the passing of time has something almost restful about it.

From a collective story to a personal one

This is perhaps ultimately where this Oris Star Edition finds its full coherence. The watch commemorates an episode in which Oris fought to regain its freedom to create. Sixty years later, it accompanies a journey whose whole purpose is precisely freedom: deciding on a route, changing it when it is closed, stopping when the scenery deserves it, setting off again at sunset or completely changing an itinerary because circumstances demand it. The Star Edition officially tells the story of Oris. From now on, this particular watch also tells another one.

The story of an almost solitary climb up Mont Ventoux after a day of waiting. The story of 36 degrees becoming 18 over the kilometers. The story of the Nesque gorges early in the morning, of the roads of Provence, of the Cevennes and of two motorcycles moving forward together. And above all the story of a father-son road trip imagined for years and finally made real. This is often how a watch simply stops being a reference, a caliber and a few technical characteristics. It becomes his watch. Not because it is rare, the Oris Star Edition is incidentally not a limited edition, nor because it would be objectively superior to another. But because one day, somewhere on a road, the time it showed became a memory.

Oris Star Edition, Technical specifications

Reference: 01 733 7813 4151-Set
Case: stainless steel, tonneau shape
Diameter: 35 mm
Lug to lug: 41,5 mm
Dial: silvered, applied indexes
Crystal: domed plexiglass
Movement: Oris Calibre 733, automatic
Functions: hours, minutes, central seconds, date
Power reserve: 41 heures
Water resistance: 5 bar
Strap: black leather, pin buckle
Recommended retail price: 1 800 €
Edition: not limited

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