What's the Point of Buying a Watch in 2024?
With the ubiquity of smartphones and countless other ways to tell the time, no one really needs a watch in 2024. There, we said it. So, what is the point of buying one? And why, against the odds, are they seemingly everywhere now?
First, a quick, condensed recap of the state of the Swiss watch industry since 2020: Unsurprisingly, the global pandemic briefly halted manufacturing (and shopping), with watch export values dropping to a record low since 2011, according to a report by the Fédération de l’Horlogerie Suisse (FHS). But, just a year later, something uncanny happened. The pendulum started swinging the other way. Export figures on the primary market trended upwards and broke records consecutively over the course of 2021, 2022, and 2023. Meanwhile, the secondary market, too, enjoyed unprecedented growth.
Phillips, the auction house, saw historical records broken not just at-large, but also specifically within the watches department. In 2021, Phillips achieved the highest annual watch sale total for any auction house in history at $209 million — a 57% increase from 2020 — only to break its own record the next year with $227 million. I was in the room for the 2021 auction in New York City, and the energy was electrifying. I did not raise a paddle, but I got a second-hand high from the people bidding more and more and more in the room, online, and on the phones. (Btw, if you haven’t had the pleasure of attending an auction IRL, I highly recommend it.)
So, while the pandemic left many people in dire financial straits, the ultra-wealthy were investing in things like watches, which were emerging as a highly competitive asset class. This generated a horological frenzy in the headlines and on social media, and lots of us started considering wearing a watch again for the first time since the Y2K BABY-G craze hit our local middle schools.
Paul Boutros, head of watches for the Americas at Phillips, credits these mind-boggling numbers and the ever-increasing popularity of watches in the cultural imagination ultimately to — please don’t say “pun intended” — their timelessness. True, nobody needs a watch, but “nobody needs a bespoke suit, fine art, an exotic sports car, or a crocodile bag,” says Boutros. “Like a fine mechanical watch, owning any one of these creations gives us the rare pleasure of enjoying timeless objects that can approach perfection in terms of materials and human craftsmanship.”
Of course, we’d expect someone like Boutros, who has grown Phillips’ watch department for a decade and has personally collected since childhood, to wax poetic about a fine timepiece’s proximity to perfection. But, those of us who are lucky enough to own and wear a luxury watch will attest that there is something about them that renders them more than just an accessory (which, stripped of their contemporary timekeeping necessity, is what they are).
“While I am not a super-sentimental person, I bought my watch in a very transitional part of my life,” says Alyssa Vingan, New York City–based writer, editor, and host of The New Garde, a podcast about the future of the fashion industry. “I sold my engagement ring after my divorce and put the money towards the purchase of my first luxury watch,” she recalls of her investment in 2021. “I was so used to wearing diamonds on my left hand every day, that I felt a strange sense of loss once I had to stop. But buying myself that watch, which I also wear on my left hand, was symbolic for me — of my independence, of a new chapter, and of how far I’ve come in my life.” This coming from a self-described unsentimental person! Not only does Vingan hope to keep her first watch forever, but she’s got her eyes on another to commemorate her next celebration or transitional life moment. She’s not alone here.
Professional vintage watch and antiques dealer Alan Bedwell has been in the business for 20 years, sourcing and selling watches to individual clients, auction houses, and mainstream fashion retailers. Although he sells a bevy of other fine goods (sterling silver trays, super-chic designer cigarette rollers and lighters, etc.), “there are not many other objects that can elicit the emotion that a watch does. You have a small working machine on your wrist that is at once practical and, often, deeply meaningful.”
It is here that I must interject and praise my watch for helping me reduce my daily screen time. Relying on our smartphones for the hour of the day is a slippery slope — your intention may be to merely check and see how many minutes you have until your next meeting, but just one glance can lead to notifications and the opening of apps and, before you know it, you’ve wasted 30 minutes on Instagram. From this standpoint, it’s nice to have a watch to tell the time (how old school!), and what’s more is that this “little machine has the capacity to remind you of a person, achievement, or milestone,” continues Bedwell. “That, itself, is worth a lot more than the cost of buying the watch.”
In my daily chats with various watch heads — new and old — the overarching theme is the same: We’re all spending thousands of dollars on these objects because they represent a sense of permanence in a rapidly changing, whiplash-inducing world.
“In our current fashion climate of TikTok-driven ‘-core’ trends,” Vingan muses, “it’s easy to get really sucked into overconsumption.” Few of us, hard as we try, can’t keep our fingers on the “aesthetic” trend du jour — ”cottage-core” can turn into “brat” in the blink of an eye — and although luxury watches have themselves experienced an uptick in the cultural conversation since 2020 (and can often get swept up into the micro-trends; see: the rise of yellow gold timepieces during the fleeting “mob wife aesthetic” period), the objects themselves are made out of quality materials (inside and out) built to outlast not only fads, but centuries.
“The fact is, a fine mechanical watch can last and be used virtually forever, serving as your timekeeper for the rest of your life, and then handed down to your descendants,” says Boutros. “In this era, where so many of the products we buy are either disposable or become obsolete within a year or two, an ‘investment’ in a fine timepiece will neither go out of style nor ever need to be replaced.” Here, Boutros is coming from a decidedly more watch-oriented position than Vingan (and likely clocks less hours on social media), and yet the message is the same: Best to buy better, not more.
This works not only from a philosophical standpoint, but a practical one, as well. When I bought my first watch to celebrate the success of my own watch platform, Dimepiece, in 2021 (coinciding with my 31st birthday), it was the most money I’d spent on anything… Ever. And so I went for something versatile that could get me from a day taking meetings around the city to a glamorous dinner. It can be daunting to sink thousands of dollars into a luxury item, and so you want to get your money’s worth.
“I prefer to buy a few really special pieces each year that I can wear every day and that I can style a million different ways,” says Vingan, who, like me, wants to get the best bang for her buck. “That’s part of why I love my watch so much — it can make my uniform of a black sweater, vintage jeans, and flat boots feel elevated, and can complement a dressier look, like a cocktail dress, just as well.” Indeed, a luxury watch really feels like a bright, juicy cherry on top of an already great look. It ups the ante, stylistically and mentally. After a long day of toiling away in front of my laptop, I’ll take a shower, get dressed, and treat myself by gracing my left wrist with my gorgeous watch. It makes me feel more put-together and serves as a tangible reminder of my success, even on days that I’m feeling down on myself.
“It’s a wonderful feeling knowing that the greatest, skilled artisans designed and crafted your timepiece,” says Boutros, adding real weight to a feeling a lot of us instinctually pick up on when we strap our watches on. Even an “everyday” watch “builds on centuries of knowledge and know-how,” and the crème de la crème brands “create unbelievably precise timekeepers using springs, gears, and levers made to last an eternity.”
