I lteqlly like a lot of the customised watches, especially some of the examples in this thread from Lewis WC.
But, just a couple of counter arguments to play devils advocate.
1. If buyers searched out an already customised watch to buy, that would still be someone else’s vision and design.
2. it feels a bit like modded cars to me. There are some people who can modify and the result looks great, better than factory. I’ve got a mate who buys a car, mods it over a few years then sells it and starts again. The results are really impressive.
However, the vast majority of modded cars look like they were designed by a 12 year old, Have no balance of cohesion and look utter shite. I’m left thinking, “wow, you’ve ruined a really nice Audi S4 there”.
A lot of the modded watches in general, even from places like Bamford, fall into this category for me.
3. like any collectible, most people want the archetype, especially when standard practise has been to replace and refinish over the years, meaning good condition, factory original examples are hard to find.
4. re Speedmasters, has anyone seen a mod they prefer over the original? I’d add limited editions to that as well. I like the ST1 and a couple of others, but if I had to keep one it would be the original.
there’s also a huge number of LE Speedies meaning many combinations one might have thought up have already been created. Parts supply also severely limits modding as there are no decent aftermarket dials etc that I’m aware of.
