Another Europe-wide heatwave isn’t the only sun-related story storming the news this week.
On Wednesday 12 August, there’ll be a solar eclipse visible from the UK, the Arctic, Greenland, Iceland and Spain. Though it’ll only be partially (well, 90% – so mostly) visible from the UK, it’ll be a total eclipse in the other countries. There’s only one total eclipse every 18 months, but at any individual location, it only happens once every 400 years, making this a pretty huge moment for Greenland, Iceland and Spain.
If there’s one thing we love about Swatch, it’s that the brand loves to celebrate a celestial and space-related moment (see the recent moon-landing anniversary MoonSwatch). It should come as absolutely no surprise, then, that Swatch is releasing a brand-new MoonSwatch, the second special one this year (also likely to be a limited-edition model), to mark the occasion.
Over the past few days, the official Instagram account for Swatch Spain has been teasing a MoonSwatch tour of the country, but a major update came this morning that flipped it all on its head. The brand announced the ‘Mission to the Sun Solar Eclipse’. We currently know nothing about it other than that it’s a “special MoonSwatch” made “to celebrate this ware celestial event”, and one fact about its exclusivity.
Unfortunately, the watch will be available exclusively in Spain, likely marking the fact that Spain will be the only European country from which the total eclipse will be visible. It may be released exclusively in stores like previous MoonSwatch models and the Royal Pop collaboration with Audemars Piguet, but there’s also a chance that the application process used for the ‘Mission to the Moon 1969‘ limited-edition model could return. We don’t know much yet, but hopefully all will be revealed on Wednesday.