Giuseppe Sala — watch collection

About Giuseppe Sala’s watch collection

Giuseppe Sala is an Italian politician and urban manager who has served as Mayor of Milan since 2016. Before entering electoral politics, he built a long career in business and public administration, most notably as CEO of Expo 2015 S.p.A., the company responsible for organizing the Milan World Exposition. That event drew over 21 million visitors and positioned Sala as one of the most high-profile public figures in Italian civic life. Re-elected in 2021, he remains a central figure in shaping one of Europe's most design-conscious cities.

The Giuseppe Sala watch collection, as documented so far, points to a man with a serious eye for vintage Rolex. At Expo 2015 — the very event he spent years building — Sala was photographed alongside the spectacle of the world's longest pizza, and what caught our attention was not the food. On his wrist sat a vintage Rolex Submariner reference 5508 in stainless steel, a piece that serious collectors immediately recognize as a significant find.

The Submariner 5508 was produced from roughly 1958 to 1962, placing it at a precise turning point in Rolex's dive watch history. It is among the last Submariner references made without crown guards — the protective shoulders flanking the winding crown that would become standard on later models. Production numbers were relatively limited, and surviving examples in good condition are not easy to locate. For a sitting mayor to wear one casually at a public event, rather than behind glass or in a safe, says something direct about his relationship with watches: this is not display collecting. It is the kind of piece worn by someone who simply knows what he has and appreciates it on the wrist, which is exactly where a tool watch belongs.