Selling Watches to Buy Watches: One Collector’s Story

Transition one: altering tastes

Early on, my watch shopping for preferences centered on Jaeger-LeCoultre (see Jaeger-LeCoultre: A Collector’s Gateway Drug And Ongoing Pleasure).

Within the early 2000s, I additionally struck up relationships with two native licensed sellers who launched me to the worlds of Parmigiani and Ulysse Nardin, resulting in numerous purchases.

Round 2005, one thing great occurred: largely by means of the type places of work of pal and indie advocate Tim Jackson, I turned conscious of the implausible world of impartial watchmaking. On the identical time, by means of on-line boards like The PuristS my eyes have been opened to items just like the Audemars Piguet Equation of Time and Vacheron Constantin’s skeletonized watches.

Over the following few years, the face of my small assortment modified fairly a bit. Out went my Jaeger-LeCoultre Reverso Duoface and Artwork Deco, together with one-time must-haves like a blue-dialed Ulysse Nardin Marine Chronometer and a Panerai Ferrari Chronograph (in my protection, all that I can say about that watch is that I did personal the matching automotive, extra about that later).

Stored the automotive, offered the watch: Panerai Ferrari Chronograph

By means of 2010, incoming items included two from Peter Speake-Marin (the Shimoda and his Preventing Time collaboration with Kees Engelbarts), an ultra-thin skeletonized Vacheron Constantin, the aforementioned Audemars Piguet Equation of Time, two Habring2 watches, and the capper, a pink gold Observatoire from Kari Voutilainen.

I additionally took the chance to commerce up inside my Jaeger-LeCoultre assortment, shopping for a pre-owned Reverso Repetition Minutes.

Shifting on up: Vacheron Constantin Malte Squelette

When you’re preserving observe, it’s possible you’ll have already got famous a transparent cheat: beginning with every wave of promoting and shopping for, the overall worth of my assortment went up!

For me (and I think for a lot of others) promoting is simply a partial offset to purchasing; however at the least it retains us within the sport.