Rolex’s website proclaims that the Cosmograph Daytona was “born to race.” So . . . what driver in his right mind would wear the Rainbow Cosmograph Daytona variant in a race car? One of the 36 baguette-cut sapphires surrounding the bezel, the 11 sapphire hour markers, or the 56 brilliant-cut diamonds covering the lugs might jar loose! But you’ve got to give the $100k Rolex credit for . . .
not being as horrifically bling as Richard Mille’s diamond-encrusted abominations. You might even say that the celebrities charging their people with securing a Rolex Rainbow Cosmograph Daytona (e.g., Adam Levine, Antoine Griezmann, Mark Wahlberg) are showing admirable aesthetic restraint.
Then again, subtle as it almost is, the Rolex Rainbow Cosmograph is still a betrayal of Daytona’s brand DNA, best seen in the eternally unavailable $12,600 Oystersteel version.
The Rainbow model’s bedazzling turns a tool watch into a piece of horological frippery. Anyone who wears one doesn’t “get it.” And anyone without stacks of cash and pull with Rolex won’t get one, period.
