A dear friend and I'll never forgive him. :)
I love these threads, really interesting to hear people’s histories.
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A dear friend and I'll never forgive him. :)
I was interested in watches as a child but at the time it was more about what they could do other than just tell time/date. Features like calculator, storing contacts etc. appealed to me. When I bought my first mobile phone, I stopped wearing a watch because the phone had all those practical functions (and more).
About 4-5 years ago my wife tasked me with finding a watch (not an expensive one) as a wedding present for someone. I explored what was the best I could get within the budget. It exposed me to different types of movements and how they were powered. Long after the gift buying was out of the way, I kept looking at watches so my wife offered to buy me a good automatic watch (I am sure she regrets that decision now). I ended up with an all black GMT Master II. After wearing it daily for about 1.5 years, I replaced it with a BLNR (because that was the one I really wanted all along). Again thanks to my wife who pushed me to go for it when I was being indecisive. I was very happy with just one watch for well over a year after that.
Then I started visiting this forum more frequently and it all went downhill from there ...
I was working on a client site near the Barbican and to get out of the dungeon like environment I went out to get myself some lunch.
I passed a tiny shop on the corner of a couple of roads (I've never been able to find it again!) near there and in the window was a stunning watch.
Looking more closely I realised it had a 24 hour movement and it said 'Breitling' on the dial.
That was the top edge of the slippery slope.
That night I trawled the web and realised what I'd seen was a Breitling 809 Cosmonaute, over the next few years I obsessed over this watch. The usual first flush of excitement that usually fades to nothing didn't on this occasion, but, to be honest, I couldn't see me spending 2 grand on a 50 year old watch.
Then the mortgage endowment finally ended and we actually had a small surplus and I persuaded my wife (who'd noticed my obsession, but likewise wasn't going to spend the money a Cosmonaute would cost on it as gift for me, although I know she'd looked!) that this would be, at worst, a neutral investment and that in 5 years, I'd probably get my money back on it.
I found a lovely 1967 example (I wanted white subdials - Although looking back maybe I should have bought an all black one too! ) via the Breitlingsource forum and 6 years later, it's still my 'grail' and I haven't seen anything I'd rather have.
Of course, before that I wore a small quartz Seiko chrono that my parents gave me as a Christmas gift (and the gold watch they gave me as a 21st present on occasions) and the only watch I'd ever bought myself before was an F91-W to windsurf in!
Since then, though, oh dear... 50 or so watches later (and more than 30 still here), the craving has declined a bit, but I still need to rein myself in when browsing Sales Corner!
M
My parents got me a Citizen EcoDrive Red Arrows for my 30th and I loved it. I started getting interested in Russian/Soviet watches and built a small collection. Currently I have a few Christopher Wards, Hamilton, Fortis, Mondaine, Seiko and a few others.
I got one of these in the 80's, and was the first watch I actually wanted.
After that I was always interested in watches. Especially my dad's who wore/ and still wears a Seiko 5, it has been updated to a newer model by me as his was totally trashed.
But the watch that got be into higher end watches was the Panerai luminor Marina. I saw an advert for a watch in the late 90's the simplicity and the of the dial, and of course the crown guard, sold it to me. I saved up until I could purchase one,it was my first expensive watch and my grail all in one.
As many have mentioned already, I should have stopped there.
I used to walk past a jewellers shop on the way home from school in the early 60's. For the years I walked past they had an Eternamatic Kontiki in the window for £45. I wondered how a watch could cost so much. My Dad then bought me a Seiko Sportsmatic for my birthday. They had only recently started being sold in this country. That Seiko cost £12.10s. It had a sunken crown and steel rice grain style bracelet like Omegas of the period and is still a beauty. I wore it until my early thirties when I then got an Omega and subsequently a Rolex or two and then onward to JLC and IWC.
then there was a top gear article in 2010...best bit of watch marketing ive seen...
Exactly the same. Got mine in 1999 I think for something like £950. Still got it and at present I'll never sell it as its my first proper watch. I only wish I'd stretched the extra 200 quid or so for the auto but couldn't bring myself to spend 4 figures on watch.
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A Rolex ad in a 60's edition of Nation Geographic was the start of my watch journey. It was about a watch lost in the ice fir years being found and still working IIRC. I've loved mechanical watches since.
Always liked watches when I was younger but more so the Adidas & Casio brands. Stop looking at them as I got into my late teens and it was only when I was getting married that I started to look at Patek Phillipe watches & fell in love, then saw how much they were!
Got a Tag from my wife and I said I wanted a Rolex for when I was 30, started to look at some in windows and never liked what I saw so gave up on the idea. Then a colleague got a BLNR, I saw it and knew I wanted a Rolex again, looked online & discovered the LV aswell and that was it. I just had to get myself a BLNR or a Sub.
Went to an AD in Birmingham, put my name down for a BLNR & SubC thinking it will be a 6 month wait just in time for my 30th so I can save, but got the call for a BLNR 5 days later and it was on my wrist 6 days after leaving my name!
Went downhill quickly then, I ended up getting 2 ND SubC’s for myself, sold one as I got the call for a Hulk & then sold the other as I just never wore it and got an offer I could not refuse. My wife also has a lady date which was for her 30th, diamond really are a woman’s best friend!
I would like to have a Grand Complication Patek for my 40th, no idea on which model but I have a lot to save for!
I don't really know what started it all off to be honest. I remember an uncle having a Navitimer and knowing it was a big deal. Some years later, my first ever "big" purchase as a teenager was a rather handsome (as I recall) Accurist chrono (don't shoot me) and then I joined the RAF and entered the wilderness. During that time I had several CWC G10s and original Seiko aircrew watches but never really appreciated them other than to "impress the ladies"...
A couple of decades later and I found myself on here and buying a Seiko 007 (my first automatic watch) and it kind of snowballed, costing me more money than I care to think about. I'm now sitting on just 3 watches plus my old issued Pulsar Mk1 aircrew watch (which I managed to keep on leaving the RAF). It's a funny old game...
As a boy in the 1970s I thought that digital watches were the business. I was given one when I was about nine, and a little while later I received a slap for taking it apart “to see how it works”. At secondary school, bragging rights were gained by the functions and water resistance of your Casio.
I started to appreciate mechanical watches in my late teens after reading an article in a Sunday paper. My first was a Citizen Eagle 7, which really ought to be serviced and put back to use.
I’ve never had the money to make a ‘big’ purchase, and don’t own a watch that has anything other than sentimental value. However, I do seem to spend a lot of time on tz-uk admiring other people’s timepieces.
Currently awaiting Eddie’s forthcoming Air Ministry watch, and would like to think that I would then have all bases covered. However, I have a similar relationship with camera lenses - there always seems to be ‘just one more’ that is required...