Rapper Sfera Ebbasta spotted wearing a Jacob & Co

Sfera Ebbasta, Italy's most internationally recognised trap rapper and a committed Jacob & Co enthusiast, was recently photographed wearing the brand's Five Time Zone reference in stainless steel — a model that defined the jewellery-watch crossover aesthetic of the early 2000s. Coordinating the light-blue rubber strap precisely with his cap, shirt, and sneakers, the Cinisello Balsamo native demonstrated the kind of deliberate styling that has made him a recurring fixture on luxury-watch spotting platforms.

The Five Time Zone — often referenced internally as the JC-FTZ — is architecturally unlike anything else in the watch world. The large-format stainless steel case, typically 47mm across, houses a white mother-of-pearl main dial divided into five colour-distinct sectors: white, pink, cream, blue, and grey. Each sector contains a subsidiary quartz-driven time display for a different world city — New York, Paris, Tokyo, Los Angeles, and a fifth selectable zone — with Arabic numerals marking the peripheral hour track. This example features diamond-set angular bridges forming a geometric lattice across the dial, adding approximately 1.5 carats of brilliant-cut stones to the decoration. The quartz movement is battery-powered, prioritising legibility and reliability over mechanical complexity.

Launched in the late 1990s and refined through the early 2000s, the Five Time Zone became Jacob Arabo's calling card — adopted by hip-hop royalty from Jay-Z to Diddy before crossing into European rap culture. Its combination of genuine horological function (five simultaneous time zones at a glance) with aggressive jewellery aesthetics made it a status object that mainstream Swiss houses simply would not produce.

Sfera Ebbasta has been documented wearing multiple Jacob & Co references, reflecting both the brand's Italian retail penetration and its deep cultural alignment with trap music globally. His choice of the Five Time Zone rather than the newer Astronomia or Epic X positions him as a collector with genuine nostalgia for the golden era of bling-era horology.

On the secondary market, clean examples of the stainless-steel Five Time Zone with diamond-set mother-of-pearl dials trade between $8,000 and $13,000 depending on condition, box-and-papers status, and specific dial configuration. The $20,600 original retail price reflected Jacob & Co's premium positioning rather than manufacturing complexity — a dynamic that makes these watches relatively accessible entry points into the brand's universe today.