When grime GOAT Stormzy rapped, ‘Rolex collection’s looking dope / I got the Pepsi and the Hulk', on his 2019 track “Wiley Flow”, we immediately knew he was a man of the purest sensibility when it comes to watches. While there's also a place in his heart for an iced-out Cartier or preposterously opulent Jacob and Co, there are several Rolex in his ever-growing collection.
Originally designed for the Pan-Am pilots who flew the first transatlantic Boeing 707 jets, the Rolex GMT, is for want of a better word, the ‘tooliest’ tool watch of them all. It’s more like an extremely high-spec compass or slide-rule, rather than just something you flex with. In short, it has substance as well as style.
In addition to Rolex, two other brands dominate his collection: Audemars Piguet and Patek Philippe. There’s the rose gold Patek Philippe 5980/1R Nautilus he wore on the front row of Riccardo Tisci’s Burberry swansong, which comes loaded with a flyback chronograph. Stormzy also has a rose gold remix of another famous Patek Philippe steel watch, the Aquanaut, a sibling of the Nautilus, and what many consider the gateway drug into the world of Patek.
But the real love of Stormzy’s life has to be the various versions he owns of the Audemars Piguet Royal Oak, which includes a ‘Jumbo’ extra thin version in steel with pinky-gold face. Then there's also the frosted steel double balance wheel openworked, which he wore to the Met Gala with a papal gown designed by Burberry. Most recently, and perhaps most significantly too, the Black Panther flying tourbillon with sandblasted case, purple strap and black ceramic bezel, was the perfect accompaniment to the hot pink suit he wore on the red carpet of Black Panther: Wakanda Forever.
When you love something so much, it’s only natural that you’d want to share that love with your best friend. And that’s exactly what Stormzy did when he gave fellow grime god, Dave, an 18-carat rose-gold Audemars Piguet Royal Oak Balance Wheel Openworked, shortly after his album, We're All Alone In This Together, went to No.1. The horological love-in continued lyrically on the track ‘Clash’ in which Dave rhymes, ‘ “Rolexes, got more than one / My AP cost thirty-one / Millimetres, forty-one,” to which Stormzy replies: “Rollies, got twenty-one / I been lit since twenty-one.” Long may that continue.