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Watch collecting is filled with stories of love at first sight, which I guess makes sense considering the hobby revolves around looking at watches. Stare at enough stranger’s wrists, browse enough boutiques and partake in enough endless scrolling sessions, and it’s only a matter of time before cupid’s horological arrow strikes. If your watch consumption habits are as excessive as mine, you’ll likely be struck on a regular basis.
Knowing when to embrace these moments through distant appreciation and when to splurge by breaking out the credit card is a balancing act that comes down to personal finances and individualized collecting goals. Have stacks of cash and enjoy rotating through dozens of watches? Sounds like a green light to hit that buy button whenever your heart desires. Writing monthly checks for your kid’s extra curricular activities that are high enough to make even your inflated grocery expenses blush? We have plenty of room for you in the strapped for cash parents club, where we maintain concise collections that prioritize frill free practicality over opulence.
As a proud member and self-designated ambassador of the latter group, I’ve set a limit of $300 for individual purchases. Yes, it sounds low, and compared with most of the collectors that are likely to appear in your Instagram feed, it is. But armed with patience and a penchant for bargain hunting, it’s really not all that limiting and has allowed me to embrace love at first sight with two Bulova Oceanographers, about a dozen Islanders, and more pre-loved Seiko references than I’m capable of remembering. I’d be lying if I said I was never tempted to cross my self imposed financial confinements, but with seemingly endless attainably priced options, I made it all the way from 2019 to the end of 2024 without indulging any out-of-budget urges.
But then in December of last year, I experienced a unique case of love at first sight that made me question if love was blind. As is the case with most watches that end up in my watchbox, it started with a routine scrolling session. On this particular day, I had honed in on Louis Erard- a brand now known largely for their collaborations and regulator style watches. Just as I was pondering what a toad leather strap would feel like if I could actually afford a Time Eater, I stumbled on a line of dress watches I wasn’t familiar with called the Heritage collection, from an era of the brand before their recent resurgence with Manuel Emch at the helm. Watch enthusiasts enjoy few things more than falling down new rabbit holes, and I happily explored the somewhat sporty but mostly elegant collection of simple dress watches. Surprisingly, considering I’d never once lusted over a dress watch in several years of enthusiasm, I began to feel tingles of that well known infatuation sensation coming on. And then in a complete shock, I spotted one particular out of budget (but technically within responsible reach) Heritage that seemed to be the antithesis of my “type”, and yet, had me instantly doing mental gymnastics trying to justify breaking my longstanding financial limits to obtain it.
Unlike all those sporty Seikos, Bulovas and microbrands I’ve owned that shared commonalities of unique designs, rugged specs and enough lume to tell the time in the middle of the night (I’m that weirdo that sleeps with a watch on), this attractive yet bland watch that lacked lume or any of the flair we now associate with Louis Erard, could best be described as basic. If not for the name on the dial, it could have easily been a Mido or Tissot. But despite the generic design and the fact that I have zero practical need for a dress watch, here I was daydreaming of pairing it with t-shirts and shorts as I did yard work and other home-based activities in style. Confused by the pull this watch had on me, I tried to have an honest conversation with myself to discern if I liked the Heritage for the name on the dial, or if my subconscious knew that I was simply in that phase of life where I could most accurately express myself with a watch that had some serious “dad watch” vibes. Failing to reach a conclusion, I entered my credit card information and had my bracelet sizing kit on standby when the watch arrived a few days later.
In several years of unboxing an excessive amount of watches, my initial reactions have spanned a range of every emotion from instant bliss to immediate regret, but never wavered between the two… until now. The Heritage was arguably flawless and even more impressive in the metal than I had anticipated thanks to superb finishing and indices that caught the light in a way I typically only associate with higher end luxury pieces. Heck, even the dial space behind the 12:00 name had a mirror-polish quality to it. Without a doubt, in terms of quality, it was the nicest watch I’d ever purchased. On the other hand, it just didn’t look like me. The cynical side of my inner collector remained unswayed by the shiny bits of metal and instead began spotting perceived flaws such as the thin bezel, which resulted in a dinner-plate aesthetic that required almost cartoonishly long hands to reach those shimmering indices on the perimeter of the dial. Compared to all those tool watches I’d owned that offered complex finishing despite their modest prices, this part of me questioned if the 41mm uniformly polished case of the Heritage was somehow too simple.
Over the next few days, I treated the watch in the same way a recently adopted cat might approach a new family. I mostly ignored it, acted indifferent to it, and occasionally got close enough to take a better look. Through a series of peeks while simultaneously checking the return policy, those hands stopped looking so long and I began to appreciate how easy they made reading the precise time. As I was turning the crown to inspect them, I saw (and even felt) the ETA day and date discs snap into place exactly at midnight, a stark contrast to my much loved Seiko SSK025 with a date disc that leisurely rolls over 17 minutes before 12:00. One by one, I accepted that those “flaws” I had spotted were nothing more than calling cards of a genre that was out of my wheelhouse. This realization allowed me to appreciate the silver honeycomb dial, which I now found captivating, especially how the center facing indices felt perfectly at home tucked amid the refined geometric pattern. Likewise, I could now see that the lack of complexity in the case was a feature and not a bug, deliberately accentuating the polished elements on the dial rather than distracting from the depth its texture provides. I felt how the bracelet articulated with a silk-like quality in my hands… and suddenly became curious how it would wear on the wrist.
