Watch collectors find they can make valuable fashion statements.

03 december 2004

Article published by: IndyStar.com (By Samantha Critchell) Watch collectors find they can make valuable fashion statements. A watch's primary function might be to keep track of hours, minutes and seconds, but its style, system and statement are hardly secondary factors. That was a lesson collectors learned with quartz watches. Advancements in timekeeping techniques -- some of which date back centuries -- barely budged until the 1970s, when quartz watches came on the scene, replacing the tension-controlled springs found in mechanical watches with a crystal in an electric field to oscillate at a constant frequency. Almost immediately, the demand for mechanical watches waned and a slowdown in production of those watches followed. But what happens when people stop making something? "Everyone wants one," says Edward Faber, co-owner of New York's Aaron Faber Gallery, which sells vintage, collectible and estate jewelry. "They want one for the nostalgia of a mechanical watch." That made such watches "collectible," and in a world of expensive toys and eccentric hobbies, collectible often is a code word for valuable. "Now if you have a Daytona Rolex or Patek Philippe moon-phase (watch) -- if you have the means to acquire these -- when you walk into a board meeting in Los Angeles, London, Paris or Italy, it gives you cachet," says Faber, who wrote "American Wristwatches: Five Decades of Style and Design" (Schiffer). The private market for high-end mechanical watches started to skyrocket, with particular interest from European and Asian collectors, and auction houses recognized the trend. The value continues to increase so dramatically, according to Faber, that watches made in the 1950s and '60s that cost hundreds of dollars then, are now worth thousands. "The Rolex Explorer -- a simple black military watch -- sold for $300 in the '70s. Now you can spend $6-, $7- or $8,000. You could have bought a Patek Philippe moon-phase full-price for $2,000 in the early '80s; now you cannot find them for less than $100,000," says Faber. A Cartier Tortue Minute Repeater, a rare minute-repeating wristwatch in 18- karat yellow gold from the 1920s, was auctioned earlier this year for $640,500. A luxury watch is an acceptable -- yet noticeable -- sign of wealth for a man looking for a counterpart to a woman's diamond ring or tennis bracelet. "A big gold bracelet or pinky ring a man can't really wear. But it's OK to wear a 1930s Cartier or Vacheron Constantin," observes Faber. It's a perpetual challenge to mix modernity with a brand's heritage and integrity, all equally important elements when you're hoping to design a future collectible, says Stanislas de Quercize, president and CEO of Cartier North America. For the 100th anniversary of Cartier's first wristwatch, the Santos, the company unveiled an updated version with its classic square face and screws that stand out, representing the rivets on an aircraft that Louis Cartier's friend Alberto Santos- Dumont would have flown. Cartier created the watch so Santos-Dumont would be able to tell time while he was in his plane and unable to reach his pocket watch. Brian Pier was on vacation in the Netherlands in the early 1980s when he shelled out about $30 for his first Swatch, a quirky watch with a black face, gold hands and a black plastic band that he expected would last two weeks. That Swatch still runs, and Pier has changed the batteries only twice. It sits among his collection of almost 1,000 Swatches -- his favorites are the artist series watches, particularly the Sam Francis splatter-painting Swatch. Article published by: IndyStar.com (By Samantha Critchell)