Editor's Picks (WIP)
Aged to Perfection: The Patina Trend
Editor's Picks (WIP)
Aged to Perfection: The Patina Trend
As with many trends, it is hard to track the exact origin of this desire, but certainly one of the places it originated was in Japan where the “wabi-sabi” aesthetic approach values imperfection developed over time. In Japan, this has affected their watch collecting for many years, particularly in regard to vintage Rolex sports watches. Japanese collectors have long liked seeing original cases with the beauty of scratches and fading on original parts such as bezel inserts on Submariners and GMT-Masters after years of wear, compared with vintage watches that were made to look like new. And of particular interest and desirability was a black dial that turned brown or “tropical” due to fading over time.
This trend of seeking honest patina has extended worldwide, particularly over the past five years, associated with a massive growth in the number of vintage watch collectors. Many people are drawn to vintage watches for the beauty of having something that looks old. As one younger vintage watch collector told me, “If I wanted something that looked new, I would just go into the boutique and buy it, but I wanted something different; a watch that has been made unique from the ageing process. The way vintage radium and tritium lume on dials and in hands can look, from a warm orange to bright yellow, is so much cooler than the stark and sterile bright white look of LumiNova and Super-LumiNova found on new watches today.”
It is not at all intuitive for non-collectors that they should not have their fathers’ and grandfathers’ watches restored to look like new after they inherit them. In fact, when I present to groups about vintage watches, the concept that collectors prize originality over restoration is one of the things that laypeople find most surprising about collecting vintage watches.
Remarkably, this Rolex retained what appeared to be its original grey leather strap and also the original Rolex buckle. Furthermore, the large steel case that earned the model the nickname “Padellone” or “large frying pan” in Italian had remained unpolished with its striking case and edges retained.
The dial had developed an unusual and striking patina, perhaps from heat and moisture that had gotten in the non-water-resistant case over the decades. Like finding an amazing vintage motor car that had somehow survived the decades with its original upholstery and all original parts, finding this reference in this original condition was spectacular and it was a watch people could not keep their eyes off during our preview. On auction day, there was a fierce battle for the watch and it sold for $161,000.