Back in 2018 when the Hermes Slim d’Hermes GMT dropped, I was smitten. I loved the Philippe Apeloig designed font, the asymmetric layout, the contrasting pop of the sub-dial, and the multi-faceted stick hands. I’ll admit the biggest sticking point for me was that Hermes wasn’t recognized as a serious watch brand. While it’s arguable if other’s perspective on this has changed or not, I have come to realize it doesn’t bother me; I need to just buy what I like.

I missed these initial pieces as they were limited, as was the subsequent limited edition from Hodinkee. However, in 2020, a non-limited rose gold variant with a blue dial was released and it’s this variant I ended up with.

One night while aimlessly surfing the internet, I stumbled across one in Japan at a stellar price – less than half of retail! A couple factors contributed to this: these trade low on the secondary market, the strength of the USD (mid-2022), and this particular example didn’t come with the strap (due to CITES). While I have heard amazing things about the quality of Hermes’ leather goods, that didn’t deter me as I tend to swap straps anyway.

Despite having stopped by a couple boutiques to look for the Hermes Slim d’Hermes GMT, this unboxing was the first time I had seen the piece. I wasn’t disappointed. The first surprise was in certain lighting, the rose gold, which is more yellow than Rolex’s Everose, actually looks like a white metal. I like this as it makes the watch a little more subtle. From a side profile, the mid-case has a little curvature to it, tapering inward near the bottom, preventing it from looking slab-sided. This case curvature does provide easier access to pull out the crown given the crown is a little on the small side. This case shape, with its wider bezel, gives the watch more presence than I’d expect from something that is only 9.5mm thick.

The dial is two concentric circles. The inner circle, upon closer examination, has a concentric circle pattern in it. The outer circle on the dial I believe is actually a flat color, but there’s a darkening effect due to the underside of the crystal having a tint near the edges. Together, it give the dial a lot of character as the light plays with these different textures.

On the right side of the dial, those two small indicators are named L (local) and H (home). These change at 6am and 6pm to white and to blue to represent day and night respectively. The L is tied to the subdial at 10 o’clock, and the H to the main hours and minutes. The pusher at 10 o’clock jumps that subdial hour hand backwards (counter clockwise) an hour at a time for each push. Activation requires a pretty firm and long travel push, but the feedback is pretty apparent, if a little quiet. I had expected more of that mechanical click sound like the pusher on a chronograph, but I’m not traveling so much these days that it matters.

On that topic, the travel functionality seems a little backwards to me. When you get to your destination, you push the pusher at 10 to adjust your local time and you’ll read the time from that sub-dial during your trip. The main hands will stay at home the entire time. I honestly expected it to be the opposite where the sub-dial is home time, and the pusher jumps the main hands to my local time. That said, I really just use the L sub-dial time to track where my company is based.

Aesthetics aside, it’s great that the Hermes Slim d’Hermes GMT has the horological chops to back it up as well – a micro rotor from Vaucher coupled with the GMT add-on module developed by Agenhor. On the finishing side, while the repeating H pattern isn’t to everyone’s taste, I actually don’t mind it too much as it’s unique. However, I do wish that Hermes had exposed more of the gears; after all, that’s part of the reason I like micro-rotors.