![]() ![]() This idea of correctness and originality is more important now than ever. Likewise, paintings that have had significant restoration are also more difficult to sell today than in the past.” Likewise, cars that are too heavily restored are also becoming harder to sell as people now are beginning to prefer unrestored cars with their original paint and seats. So what changed? As Eric Wind, watch expert and owner of vintage watch dealer Wind Vintage, continues, “There was a broad evolution in collecting, across many different categories, to prefer original, untouched, and unrestored pieces compared to those made to look ‘new.’ That is the case for coin collecting, where coins that had cleaning in the past are hardly sellable. With this basic mindset in place, it is definitely understandable that there was less emphasis on ‘originality’ - a confusing term with vintage wristwatches in particular - and more emphasis on aesthetics and history.” In other words, before vintage watches started carrying more substantial values, the whole point was to buy what you liked and put no thought into the rest of it. It’s a beautiful thought, and one I always hold close, but as the market has evolved and real values are now accompanying quality vintage timepieces, it is important to collect with a broader understanding of the whys/hows/and whats, and not just buy something because you like it. James Lamdin, founder and CEO of NYC-based Analog/Shift, notes that “In the early days I was guided to ‘buy what I loved’ and not to overthink any of the financial/investment/originality angles.” There is no other word for it.Ģ0+ years ago, the vintage watch market, such as it was, didn’t value watches with patina, or, in other words, watches that showed their age, to nearly the same degree as it does today. Of course, many of these watches are also decades old and have some sort of damage, even if that damage is superficial. There’s a strange type of poetry to the whole thing that’s difficult to explain - “a little city” on the wrist is how many a watch movement has been described upon viewing. A spring stores energy and then disseminates that energy to the rest of the watch movement, which includes a series of levers, gears, jewels and other tiny parts. Most of them predate the quartz watch era and make use of a mechanical movement (either hand-winding or self-winding) that requires some sort of interaction with the wearer. There’s no denying that vintage watches are an endless source of fascination to watch collectors. ![]()
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