Not at all, Rob! I misunderstood you. I meant what I said too. Best of luck in your search!I appreciate the help, David, and I sure hope you did not think I actually took any offense at your kind and helpful post! I meant what I wrote in response in humor and I hope it did not seem offensive or grumpy either!
When I originally wrote "I have been starting to look [at] watches for my wife"--I realize some proofreading on my part would be helpful!--I really meant that I was, on my wife's behalf, or, maybe better, "at her instruction," looking at watches. Otherwise you all are going to think me a better and more generous husband than I actually am, albeit something I should aspire to.
If I were picking out a gift, I would probably go Seiko or Orient. Maybe even Movado, as I know she likes the look, and on something like Jomashop, they are inexpensive enough to be within striking distance.
I do not know that we are "wed" to getting a fine watch. An assortment of less expensive, but still substantial, watches might give greater flexibility and be a better use of funds. My wife is a practical person! I would say the thinking was/is, if she was really going to be wear just one watch nearly exclusively, we might want to explore something more upscale than is usual for us.
<I pointed her to xC line by Citizen, Sheen by Casio, and Seiko Lukia>
Thanks.
Thanks for all the suggestions!
Women's Watches
- Thread starter The Knize
- Start date
Not at all, Rob! I misunderstood you. I meant what I said too. Best of luck in your search!
Did she get a watch? Inquiring minds want to know.
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- #23
I have not figured it out yet. Your timing is good. I spent some time on it today. Not seeing an abundance of pre-owned women's watches!
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- #24
To be a bit more expansive, I am still liking Hamilton. If we could find a pre-owned Cartier tank watch for a reasonable price, although higher than I meant to pay, that might do it. Classic look. I am kind of impressed with Grand Seiko, although that would be a big step up in expense and I do not see that they retain resale value. They seem like real quality, whatever that really means.
It is ironic that it seems the more one spends on a watch, the better it retains its value. If resale value retention were the key, Rolex might be the way to go. But I just can't get there.
There are still a massive number of brands I do not have much of a handle on.
It is ironic that it seems the more one spends on a watch, the better it retains its value. If resale value retention were the key, Rolex might be the way to go. But I just can't get there.
There are still a massive number of brands I do not have much of a handle on.
If I were going to invest ten grand, I wouldn't want the investment to be in an easily damaged piece of delicate equipment that spends all day dangling on my (or SWMBO's) wrist, just begging for an accidental bump or scrape.
If I buy a tool to use, I accept that it will accumulate wear and tear. If I buy an investment piece, I stick it away far removed from any risk of the sort of damage that would reduce it's resale value.
But I have no experience dealing with the high-end watch resale market, so my fears may or may not be baseless or exaggerated. That's just me.
Ask her if she's interested in a smart watch. If so then get her the Samsung gear s2 smart watch in rose gold or platinum. If she has a Apple phone then get her the Apple smart watch. Trust me she'll love it. After years of getting swmbo watches, -she loves her Gear s2 the most.
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- #27
Yeah, I hear you Doc4. There is not way I should be wearing an expensive watch. I do think of my wife as taking better care of her stuff than I do, and as being generally way less "clumsy" than I am--there is a reason she drives a Lexus and I drive a Toyota!--but still there is the possibility of a traumatic event. The concept of buying an expensive watch because one can essentially wear it for free because one could sell it at any time for about as much as one paid for it does not work out if one cannot wear the watch for fear of damaging it! (I think actually gaining in inflation-adjusted value is kind of a crap shoot. I find it hard to think of a watch as a true investment.)
Thanks for the suggestion, dealaffianado. We are pretty much a Samsung family and I had not thought of the gear s2 in gold. She did not really take to wearing a Fitbit, whereas I wear a regular watch and a somewhat higher end Fitbit. I do think an iWatch would check a lot of the boxes. I do not think anyone would ever wonder why you are wearing a higher end smart watch, and there really is no reason to wear a regular watch and a smartwatch.
Thanks for the suggestion, dealaffianado. We are pretty much a Samsung family and I had not thought of the gear s2 in gold. She did not really take to wearing a Fitbit, whereas I wear a regular watch and a somewhat higher end Fitbit. I do think an iWatch would check a lot of the boxes. I do not think anyone would ever wonder why you are wearing a higher end smart watch, and there really is no reason to wear a regular watch and a smartwatch.
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- #29
Not a gift. She wants me to research and help her choose.
I purchased a mens Raymond Weil for my wife several years ago. It is a gold filled with strap quartz model and similar in size to the Timex above. It is large enough to be easy to read at a glance while still small enough and very thin to look appropriate for a woman. A vintage mens model may also work depending on your wifes style.The Seiko Dolce SACM171 may also be worth a look. I believe there are other models in this line, but I have not looked into them lately. Technically it is a man's watch but at a vintage size of 33.5mm it is more like a modern woman's watch (YMMV). Besides the dial I like that it is very thin and highly accurate to +/- 10 seconds a year. Picture from Seiya Japan.
Research and Help her choose is Code for she will still look at it as a gift, LOL
I think you're spot on with Longines.
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- #33
Thanks. That helps!
If resale value is a factor, unless you're looking at watches price in multiples of $10k, I think Rolex is your only option.
My wife loves the Nomos Tetra 27 which is the watch in their range specifically for a woman's wrist, but keep in mind that most European women happily wear "men's-sized" watches up to about 39mm (I've seen women in Germany wearing Rolex Subs and no one gives it a second thought). I also really like the rest of the Nomos range but haven't gone as far as actually buying one. Nomos are designed and made in the legendary watchmaking town of Glashutte in Germany. They may cost more than what you may have budgeted for but keep in mind that Nomos design and make their own movements in-house and they are of superb quality. Just about every other mid-range priced European mechanical watch manufacturer (Omega, Tag, Oris, Longine etc) buy in stock ETA movements and finish them to a specific price point. You would normally expect a European watch to cost a minimum of four times the price of a Nomos before they would use an in-house designed and made movement (Rolex, IWC, Patek, Jaeger LeCoultre etc). The problem you (or your wife) might have is that they are hand-wound; though to my mind this is actually a positive thing.
Tetra | Beautiful watches purchased online. Directly from NOMOS Glashütte.
Tetra | Beautiful watches purchased online. Directly from NOMOS Glashütte.
Have a look at Tag Heuer. They have a fairly comprehensive line of womens watches, and that at the time at least had matched sets of mens and womens. You may even come in under budget if you shop around.
I bought my Tag WD1211 for under $900 at the time, and they had a matching womens watch.
WATCHES FOR WOMEN - TAG Heuer Watches
I bought my Tag WD1211 for under $900 at the time, and they had a matching womens watch.
WATCHES FOR WOMEN - TAG Heuer Watches
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- #37
Thanks. Nomos seems interesting and I sure would not have thought of the brand. Seems to exactly to fall in the range of no one would wonder why you chose this watch.
<The problem you (or your wife) might have is that they are hand-wound; though to my mind this is actually a positive thing.>
A positive this to me, too, if it were a watch for me, although probably not a positive for my wife.
This is a great tip though. Thanks.
Right now I have her wearing an old/vintage Boulevard that has sort of the look of a tank watch. Manual wind. Leather strap. I am not sure just how inexpensive this watch was around the time of WWII or whenever it was first sold, but it looks just amazing to me, and may be perfect for current purposes. Maybe even put a gator band on it. One would have to really know watches, methinks, to recognize this one, and anyone who did I would hope would think it was cool that she was wearing it. That is, no issue of anyone thinking "wow, you really overpaid on that one, I guess you don't know watches at all" or thinking "wow, you really cheaped out on that watch, you just don't take much care with appearances at all, do you. Or I guess you are not very successful and cannot afford better." Something like that.
I know some of what I am saying sounds snobby. It is kind of like I think it was John Mallory of Dress for Success said about dressing to "please women." Something like: "If you dress poorly, there is no woman alive who thinks you know how to dress well, you just choose not to. Instead they think you do not know how to dress." Worse, I suppose, would be for a woman to think "you could not afford to dress better"! I hope people think when they see me wearing whatever I am wearing, including, say, an old Orient automatic with a Vostok leather band, that I have some sense of what I am doing and consciously chose to wear what I am wearing, and am not going for the absolutely least expensive watch I could find!
<The problem you (or your wife) might have is that they are hand-wound; though to my mind this is actually a positive thing.>
A positive this to me, too, if it were a watch for me, although probably not a positive for my wife.
This is a great tip though. Thanks.
Right now I have her wearing an old/vintage Boulevard that has sort of the look of a tank watch. Manual wind. Leather strap. I am not sure just how inexpensive this watch was around the time of WWII or whenever it was first sold, but it looks just amazing to me, and may be perfect for current purposes. Maybe even put a gator band on it. One would have to really know watches, methinks, to recognize this one, and anyone who did I would hope would think it was cool that she was wearing it. That is, no issue of anyone thinking "wow, you really overpaid on that one, I guess you don't know watches at all" or thinking "wow, you really cheaped out on that watch, you just don't take much care with appearances at all, do you. Or I guess you are not very successful and cannot afford better." Something like that.
I know some of what I am saying sounds snobby. It is kind of like I think it was John Mallory of Dress for Success said about dressing to "please women." Something like: "If you dress poorly, there is no woman alive who thinks you know how to dress well, you just choose not to. Instead they think you do not know how to dress." Worse, I suppose, would be for a woman to think "you could not afford to dress better"! I hope people think when they see me wearing whatever I am wearing, including, say, an old Orient automatic with a Vostok leather band, that I have some sense of what I am doing and consciously chose to wear what I am wearing, and am not going for the absolutely least expensive watch I could find!
- Thread starter
- #38
Thanks. I like the way TAGs look, myself. My concern is that in some corners the feeling seems to be that TAG is recent years anyway is starting to take a "fashion watch" tact, so that they are essentially over-priced for what they are and not really good quality, whatever that really means, and no did to your watch at all. I thought of TAG as a good brand and was surprised to hear of this kind of comment.
Whenever the B&B brethren talk about expensive wines, sooner or later Ouch pops by to show us his photos of famous old vintages ... and talk about how the best part of being "into wine" is not finally getting a bottle of Latour '45, but finding a $20 bottle of wine that is as good as most of what sells for $200. It takes effort, knowledge, and skill to ferret those bottles out from among the lake of thoroughly "adequate, forgettable, occasionally regrettable"* $20 wines out there ... but it can be done.
Find someone who serves those $20 gems at the dinner he invites you to, and somehow you just "know" that he's not fobbing you off with cheap wine, but serving you hidden gems ... major props to your host for being the master-jedi-sommelier.
The point I'm getting at in a round-about way is ... if you are the kind of guy who is "into" seeking out great vintage or obscure brands of watches (or shoes, or clothes) and you find hidden gems and such ... not the well-known brands known for being expensive luxury ... it tends to come across in ways I cannot really explain too well ... it sort of seeps out of your pores ... that you "get it", that you made an effort, and that you made more of an effort than the guy who just bought whichever luxury brand the guy at the store or the advert/article in GQ told him to buy. It's easy to look good if you spend a lot of money; it's harder ... but not impossible, and probably a lot more fun even if a lot more work ... to look good on a budget.
*27 B&B bonus points for the first guy to get that reference.
I read that comment as well and in some circles I'm sure that feeling is prevalent.
When I bought mine, I needed to replace an 8 year old Seiko. I went to the only high end watch shop in town here, prepared to spend up to $5000 for the "last watch I'll ever need to buy" as I said to him at the counter. I expected him to point me to a Rolex, he didnt. He said "Buy a Tag." That was 1993.
Between that day and this all I've done is have the battery replaced every three years and two years ago it was sent in for service that cost $200CAD. I didnt know at the time but when I bought it, it went into the Tag Registry, name, address, watch model and serial number were all recorded at time of sale and when I took it into a different store two years ago, they asked for the watch, looked it up on the computer, and there was all my information. This helps with insurance purposes if needed and if a stolen or lost watch is is ever taken in for a battery, as they now can only be replaced by a "Certified Tag Dealer" here in Canada, you'll get that watch back.
I dont see anything "trendy" with Tag watches, even today. I see them as class, with understated elegance. They dont stand out as eye catchers to most people, but with similar things, when you see "quality" you know it. I think Tag quality is still right there with the best, and some very reasonable prices too.
