[VIDEO] Owner’s Review: the Vertex M60 Aqualion ND

“If you’ve heard the phrase ‘one-watch guy,’ you’re likely far beyond being one.”

I’ve used that line a lot the last few years. In the last decade, the collective watch community has evangelized the ‘one-watch guy,’ transforming the concept from a simple idea into a lionized ideal rooted in the days when the Don Drapers of the world would get home from work, roll up their sleeves, and mow the lawn in cordovan loafers, Oxford cloth shirts, and a 4-digit Rolex.

For better or for worse (honestly, mostly for better), we don’t live in that world anymore. Start looking around, and you’ll quickly realize that the modern one-watch guy is far more likely to own an Apple Watch or Garmin than a 1016. And yet, the theory of the ‘one-watch guy’ continues to permeate, no doubt helped along by people like me who keep writing story intros like this one. There’s a romantic simplicity to the idea; a sense that, if a collector can somehow encapsulate their taste into a single watch, they have achieved the ultimate in collecting prowess, or at least some advanced level of enthusiast zen.

Generally, ‘zen’ is not a word I would use to describe myself, and I’m certainly not a one-watch guy, but I can understand why the concept holds appeal. In collecting, as in so many things, constraint can be a gift, forcing our own perspective into stark relief and keeping us accountable to our taste. From that perspective, a one-watch collection is the ultimate constraint, and I’ll admit the idea of distilling all of one’s collecting instincts into one perfect watch sounds pretty nice. 

Still, I’m not the ‘one-watch guy,’ and so you could rightly ask why I’m talking about all of this when I’m meant to be writing an owner’s review. Well, because for about the last year and a half, I’ve gotten about as close as I’ll ever be to that mythic status, and it’s all because of the Vertex M60 Aqualion ND.

The Watch I Didn’t Think I Wanted

The Vertex M60 Aqualion ND is not a watch I wanted to want, and it’s certainly not one I expected to need. When it first came out, I thought it was compelling, but not really for me. The blunt reality is — for as much as I like a good dive watch — I’ve never found myself hugely drawn to the basic black dial/black bezel diver. It’s why I never had a Seiko SKX007 stick around for more than a few months, and why the tried-and-true no-date Submariner has never found a spot on either my long or short list.