Oris has a habit of saving its strangest ideas for one watch a year. The Hölstein Edition started in 2020 as an annual limited release tied to the brand’s June 1 birthday, and it has always leaned into playful reinterpretation. This year the company turned to the Artelier, the dress collection it relaunched a few months ago with mid-century-inspired dials. The result is the Hölstein Edition 2026, a 250-piece run with a few changes that go deeper than the finish.
The Hölstein Edition has mostly pulled from established lines. Five of the previous six came out of the Propilot, Big Crown, and Divers collections, with the sixth being a one-off 1990s revival. Drawing from a collection that’s only a few months old is a different move, and it says something about how confident Oris feels in the new Artelier. CEO Rolf Studer has framed the program as a place for quirky ideas that wouldn’t survive in a core piece but make sense as a short run.
The 2026 theme is “thoughtful reflection,” which Oris takes about as literally as you’d expect. The textured Artelier dial gives way to a matte light gray surface carrying nothing but a printed wordmark, while the caseback and a new subdial lean on mirrored finishing. The faceted markers and skinny baton hands carry over, though the date is gone. In its place, the Artelier gets its first small-seconds complication, set at 6:00 with a single red hand over a mirrored register. That red is the only color on the dial, and on a watch this restrained, it pulls a lot of weight.
There’s a sizing change worth flagging, too. The dial is based on the 38mm Artelier Date, but it sits in the larger 39.5mm case from the Artelier Complication. Oris has been open about wanting the new Artelier to reach a younger audience, and the brand reads the appetite for the 40mm zone as strong as ever. Whether that lands for you probably depends on which way your own taste has been drifting lately.
The bigger news for collectors sits inside. This is the first Artelier reference to run an Oris in-house movement, the Caliber 401, with a 120-hour power reserve and a -3/+5 daily rating. The mirrored caseback hides most of it, with the Oris Bear peeking over a laser-engraved insert developed with Swiss engineering firm Inspire. The detailing reveals a rainbow layer that ties back to the reflection theme.
At $4,600 and limited to 250 pieces, the Hölstein Edition 2026 sits well above the core Artelier in price. It also raises a question the watch doesn’t answer on its own. If the in-house Caliber 401 can land in a limited dress watch, how long before it shows up in the regular Artelier lineup? For now, Oris is keeping that one to itself.
Co-Founder & Senior Editor
Michael Peñate is an American writer, photographer, and podcaster based in Seattle, Washington. His work typically focuses on the passage of time and the tools we use to connect with that very journey. From aviation to music and travel, his interests span a multitude of disciplines that often intersect with the world of watches – and the obsessive culture behind collecting them.