Community Stories

Do you love "Patina"? show us why.

Vintagewtchzilla
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Mr.Bliss Mr.Bliss
Will the patina continue spreading? What causes it? On my omega for example the omega symbol
is barley noticeable, will it disappear with time? Love to hear you opinion.
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the cause has many factors like:
what material was used as dial (brass,iron,etc) , how was the "paint" applied on the dial(painted, galvanised ... ), which radium/tritium mix was used, how was the watch stored, so there is a bunch of things to consider why and how the dial and hands ages. a good example for kinda trial and error is the ploprof, you can see blue dials with zero damage and later dials with heavy bubbling caused by a different color mixture, those dials vary in color from close to perfect blue with no bubbles to almost black and huge (even broken) bubbles.

every collector has it's own definition of patina, for most it's the perfect dial with only the lume discoloured, other like dials like the one you showed.

that's the most funny watch purchase i did. originally i bought this one because of the bracelet it came with (7912) and the crystal was so scratched you could just guess what's below. as it arrived i gave the crystal a little polish and badummmm .... now it's the daily watch of my GF
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Sukurux
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This watch has endured 55 years of oxidation and water damage and I absolutely love it, especially the marshmallow tritium.
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30T2
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Yeah, I would guess almost all watches that are used, have some sort of patina, and if is 50+ years old, looks odd if it doesn’t.
 
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Flatfoot
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slwoodster slwoodster
Where do you draw the line between patina and damage?
That line you ask about has been a bit of a moving target for me over my time collecting. It’s a personal choice and a preference that I believe can only be answered by what one’s instincts tell you at the time. Consistent aging of the dial and case overall can be so very tasty looking, as a number of examples here have shown.

Tool watches with scuffs and scrapes are a bit of living history on your wrist. My dad’s -69 Speedmaster tells this story. But even without the family connection I’d still find it attractive to own and wear, pock marked/moon cratered bezel and all.
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I do note that people have become very creative in providing colorful adjectives for what is truly dial damage. An example that comes to mind is a “spiderweb dial” which simply means that the dial coating is cracked. How such a dial holds up over a longer period of time is a big question in my mind. I know when you get this “spiderweb” finish on an old automobile, you are a few years away - at best- from total paint failure.

ive enjoyed seeing the wide variety of watches and definitions of patina shown here... keep them coming.

and I love this dial from the mid-1930’s. It’s not perfect by any means, but it just looks good to my eye.
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Spruce
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J joe band
“Life should not be a journey to the grave with the intention of arriving safely in a pretty and well preserved body, but rather to skid in broadside in a cloud of smoke, thoroughly used up, totally worn out, and loudly proclaiming "Wow! What a Ride!”

kinda like hunter s thompson... i will chose an honest worn and battle scarred watch, that has history written all over it, nearly every time over a safe queen that has no record of the time it has kept.

some beautiful examples of well used and well loved watches here. congrats to those caretakers.

You’ve put it beautifully. I don’t recognise the quotation but your own summary is also pretty poetic too
 
Spruce
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All three photos are of the same watch (taken on different days).

Sometimes I see the patina .......

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........ and sometimes I don’t 😉

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MtV
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A friend of mine just purchased this one and I thought it belonged in this thread. Surely not to everyone’s taste, but to me (and him - unfortunately, he saw it first) that’s a killer aging / patina / damage:

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Rumar89
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@michael22, thank you! Big shout out to @kov for facilitating the purchase of that one. In person, the dial almost looks like marble veining. It’s pretty cool.
 
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