“Time is what we want most, but what we use worst.” — William Penn
Pondering about luxury watches checks both of those actions.
Types
- Quartz: battery powered
- Mechanical
- Manual-wind
- Automatic: winds itself through wrist movement
Components
- Case: the body of the watch, can be made of different materials
- steel, ceramic, titanium, precious metals
- Dial:
- indexes: the markers on the dial that indicate the time
- hands: the rotating pointers
- Complications: any added features beyond telling the time.
- Crystal: the glass protecting the dial (sapphire, mineral)
- Bezel: The ring around the dial (can rotate for dive watches)
- Movement: the internal mechanism
- Lugs
- Crown
- strap/bracelet
Mechanical
When looking at mechanical watches, take into account the jewels. They’re sapphire or ruby pieces that are used to reduce the friction between the moving parts.
- Mechanical watches usually come in a standard of 17 jewels (fully jewelled)
- Some complications can lead to additional jewels used
Complications
- Day/date complication
- Chronograph: stopwatch functionality
- GMT / dual zone
- Moon phase
- Power reserve indicator
- Tourbillon: You can identify it by the slow rotation of the mechanical heart
Styles
- Dress Watches – Minimalist, elegant, often thin
- Generally no complications, but if thin/elegant enough, complications aren’t out of the question
- Jaeger-LeCoultre Ultra Thin (Moon)
- Dive Watches – Water-resistant, robust, usually with rotating bezels
- Breitling superocean, Omega seamaster
- Pilot Watches – Large, legible, often with GMT
- Breitling navitimer
- Field Watches – Rugged, military-inspired
- Some G-shock models fit the bill
- Chronographs – With stopwatch functions
- Luxury / Haute Horlogerie – Grand complications, hand-finished
- Bauhaus/Minimalist — Nomos, Junghans
Dressing styles
Notable brands
- Entry: Seiko, Casio, Citizen, Bulova
- Mid-tier: Tissot, Hamilton, Oris
- Luxury:
- Entry: Longines, Nomos, Jungahns
- Mid: Tudor (mid), Grand Seiko (upper-mid), Omega (upper-mid)
- Upper: Rolex
- High end: Patek Philippe, Audemars Piguet, Vacheron Constantin,
- These are prohibitively expensive TODO: research their histories, create pages for those that interest me