Why do you collect watches?

I was working with a guy who had found a vintage Bulova on eBay and was very pleased and proud of it.

I’d never bought on eBay but was curious and, over the next few months bought a couple of Roamers and Seikos. I then fell for an Oris Big Crown pointer date - and ended up with two!

Pretty much at the same time I discovered OF and the fact that on eBay, I was able to afford all those Omega I’d spent hours admiring in the window of Austin Kaye in The Strand, and which had always been outside any conceivable budget I had

Because collecting cars is too expensive.

And space intensive….

I collect watches because I like collecting generally with interests in several different collecting fields. I collect watches for most of the usual pack rat, hoarder, vintage aficionado, styling, and admiration of mechanical design kinds of reasons.

Underlying all of that however, is the fact that mechanical watches (especially round faced watches) are my friends. They need me to wind them and set them and bring them to life and I need them to keep me grounded and oriented throughout my day. Watches are always along for life's ride and the experiences gleaned, both good and bad.

I remember being eight years old and being bored with third grade class lessons so would take sneaky glances at my Caravelle watch on my wrist, timing how long beyond a minute I could hold my breath, counting down to lunch or afternoon recess, or else just idly watching the sub-second hand describe its labored circuit.

This carried on into adulthood and the farther I advanced in my career the more I found myself afflicted with boring and interminable staff and board meetings. I am religious and appreciate a good expository sermon, but there can be such a thing as a long and dull or sloppily composed sermon. A surreptitious glance at the watch-of-the-day offers a bit of cheer. Very few watches other than round faced ones are kept on hand here. It's the round faced watches that somehow give me an impression of cheerfulness. This feeling translates to pocket watches and mechanical clocks.

It's round watch faces that is the root of the watch appeal for me.

The Caravelle from the third grade no longer works and any watchmakers I petition to rehabilitate it's low jewel count movement seem to possess faces with mouths that curl up into a sneer of contempt when I inquire. I still have it though.




I probably could use psycho-analysis about my watch habit, but am of an age to not be too bothered about it.

I don’t collect. Using a sophisticated algorithm I systematically time the market and through timing and luck, lose my shirt on a constant basis.

They take up less space than cars?

I do not collect watches, but somehow I've accumulated quite a few. Not really sure how/ when that happened...

I’ve always had watches, since I was 6 years old. My first watch was a Westclox Pocket Dax which my grade 1 teacher liberated when I took it to pieces, in class! My late father was a watchmaker/jeweller, so I guess I was born into a world of watches. But I see the inception of my becoming a collector happened when my father gave me his Rolex Prince Observatory duo-dial “doctor’s” watch from about 1933 (pictured). My count is now approximately 120 watches.

In 2011 I was turning 40 and I knew my family would want to give me a “significant” gift. I had recently heard that vintage watches were becoming popular so I googled “collecting vintage watches” and found Desmond’s blog. I read all the things and started to trawl eBay. After months of daily searching, I found The One and bought it. After a few months. I started to have my suspicions that it wasn’t quite kosher, so I began looking for another one, and I found my second. Fast-forward to today…

Yes, there is that.

Or else, as is common in Texas, a high powered bass boat with associated equipment: electric steer cable GPS remote controlled trolling motors, electronics such as depth/fish finders, GPS with distance-from-shore tracking and route memory, electronic mapping and chart displays with 360 degree viewing, electronic-hydraulic anchoring systems with drift paddles, live wells, bait wells (all plumbed and aerated), rod holders all around, rod racks full of rods and reels, enormous tackle boxes full of $10,000 worth of lures and baits, a telescopic dip net and don't forget the ubiquitous needle nosed pliers.

Oh, and a $115,000 pickup truck to back it all down the boat ramp for launching. A Navy fighter pilot would be envious of all that kit as the boat roars out onto the lake to do battle!


All to yank a fish out of the lake for a photo op.

Because I can finally afford to. Fell in love with Omega in 1987 when I was 21 and bought a day/date constellation, steel/gold with slate dial and full gold link bars. Then a Tudor mini-sub, wish I still had that. Then a Speedmaster triple calendar in 1997. Had to sacrifice them in 2004 or so, but have replaced the connie with an exact duplicate, and the speedy with a blue dial 3523.80. Past couple years I've been on a spree of sorts. 6 new omegas and a Tudor.