Now that we all carry our smartphones with us and can use them to check the time, many people no longer wear a watch. This is such a shame because a wristwatch is a wonderful accessory and a great way to express your personality. They can be fashionable or sentimental, stylish or purely functional. A watch can show your style, class, sense of humour or priorities no matter what the rest of of your outfit says. I have a classic stainless steel Gucci watch that I wear every day and which means more to me than an engagement ring. It’s a reassuring constant on someone who hates to wear the same outfit two days in a row.
Analogue watches are pretty much standard in the style stakes these days, with digital time pieces more about function and divided into the cheap 80s retro or twenty-first century smart watch camps. OK, I’ll concede that some of the versions of the Apple Watch are pretty gorgeous… but, if I had the cash for a Hermès Apple Watch, I’m still not sure I’d buy one. A more interesting, but admittedly less functional, digital option is the QLOCKTWO W (pictured) which uses a grid of 110 letters, lighting some of them up when you press the stainless steel button, in order to describe the time. This unusual watch is available in German, Dutch, English, Arabic, French, Spanish and Italian. If you can’t read, that watch would be no good to you, and if you have a visual impairment most watches would be useless, but the stylish and tactile Bradley Timepiece has got that covered. Perfect for those situations when you need to check the time but it’d be rude to do so obviously.
There are many more unusual watches out there… during a morning of searching I found Scandinavian style by Hygge, Roger Tallon’s designs for Lip, Lego style watches from JCDC, plus quirky designs by Nava, o.d.m and Nooka. Being a child of the 80s, my first thought for fun watches is always Swatch. They have limited edition patterns and artworks, amazingly thin watches that sit flat to your wrist, digital styles, and even classic metal designs. I also discovered the wonderful watches by Mr Jones (see video below) in the Eurostar magazine recently and really love his quirky limited edition tymepieces. If you like classic silly styles, you could always get yourself a Mickey Mouse watch (that links to a kids one, but you can replace the strap if you need something longer).
If you prefer vintage style watches, rather than the oversized or generally over the top modern analogue designs, check out Farer and Crowder. I discovered both of these brands via the incredibly dapper Grey Fox and they offer excellent gender neutral classic style at very reasonable prices. Other brands offering classic simplicity are Mondaine, Arne Jacobsen and Skagen. Of course, we all know that there are analogue watches which have the sort of eye watering price tags that make you think they got the decimal point in the wrong place. If the Hermes Apple Watch seems cheap to you, I suspect a limited edition Breitling might be right up your street… but then I bet you’re probably not reading this blog in the first place.
Leave a Reply