Tag: collector guide

Curating the Collection – The Return of the Doxa SUB 300 Searambler -1970s Ugly Is Back

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Doxa SUB 300 Searambler Dive Watch

For me, the Searambler is the weirdest Doxa of them all—less sporty than orange or black, and totally ready for bare chested-Dads of the 1970s. The Searambler is the watch for men who smoked cigarettes with their wetsuits tied around their waist as they discussed the next dive plan. The Searambler is the watch stuck in a drawer in a lakeside cabin in northern Michigan ready to be discovered by some yet-unborn great-grandchild who will hold it as a genuine antique, a lost family heirloom this great-grandchild may see on his great-grandfather’s wrist in a faded Kodachrome photograph in a shoe box. In this hypothetical photograph, grandad has a cigarette in one hand and the backside of his bikini-clad wife (that’s great grandma?!) in the other. Their carefree smiles and sun-burnt skin suggest a pre-apocalyptic moment when hope and happiness weren’t so rare—a mid-century moment when technology was still a good and simple, not some self-taught AI unleashed to consume its maker. The SUB 300 Searambler is a watch a man could wear while water-skiing without a life preserver, maybe even with a beer in one hand.

Hands-On – Bremont Broadsword Recon 40mm Limited Edition Military Watch

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Bremont Broadsword Recon Dirty Dozen Watch

One of the problems I often have with two-piece watch cases this thick is that the sides can be super boring or, as the kids say, “slab sided.” The 40mm Broadsword case is 11.9mm tall, which is the exact same height as Tudor’s Black Bay 58, a watch I don’t buy precisely because the thing is so “slab-sided.” (The new BB54 is better, I hear, but I digress.) The Broadsword case is simply not slab-sided. It’s actually quite elegant and interesting.

Collector Guide – Vacheron Constantin Reference 4073 Time-Only Sub-Seconds Calatrava-style Dress Watch (1940s -1960s) – Complete Information

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Vacheron Constantin Reference 4073

The reference 4073 is effectively a second generation descendant of early Calatrava-style wrist watches from Vacheron Constantin. The first generation began to appear in the 1930s as the company began to work with Jaeger LeCoultre base movements in order to serially produce more modern wrist watches for a changing market. Those earlier references that predate the 4073 include the 2871 and a few models that are not clearly specified by reference numbers. The 4073 began production sometime in the early to mid 1940s.

Collector Guide – Vacheron Constantin Reference 4217 Time-Only Center-Seconds Calatrava-style Dress Watch (1940s -1970s) – Complete Information on an Undervalued Classic

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Vacheron Constantin Reference 4217

The reference 4217 is effectively a second generation descendant of early Calatrava-style wrist watches from Vacheron Constantin. The first generation began to appear in the 1930s as the company began to work with Jaeger LeCoultre base movements in order to serially produce more modern wrist watches for a changing market. Those earlier references that predate the 4217 include the 2871 and a few models that are not clearly specified by reference numbers. The 4217 began production sometime in the early to mid 1940s.