Every year, a few trends and brands steal the spotlight. In the 2020s, colorful dials took the crown. First, you had Rolex releasing their Oyster Perpetual line in colors like Coral Red, Tiffany Blue and Bright Green. In 2021, you saw more brands following the trend, like Cartier's colorful Tank Must Collection.
More recently, it seems like Cartier has held the spotlight 2022-2023, with an even larger resurgence of vintage models and rarities (like our favorite Cartier Cheich that sold for a measly 1.1M in 2022). For this year and the near future, we have several predictions as to what we may see gain more popularity and well-deserved traction.
1. Watches with a story behind them
(Credit: Fratello Watches)
One of our favorites, that we hope get's more recognition, are watches with provenance or a mark/engraving that tells a deeper story. Co-branded dials, like Gubelin, Tiffany & Co and Serpico Y Laino have became extremely popular along with company-branded watches (IE: Domino's Rolex) , however, there are a still many options out there that are more affordable and attainable. Working at a watch consignment company for many years, I've seen many vintage watches with personal engravings from ex-lovers, friends and family that tell an entire story on a small area. We've also scored some watches that were given to employees/managers as service awards or for job-related milestones. Being able to share a story behind a past owner of a watch adds a whole new level to a timepiece and makes it that much more interesting.
2. Old Gold (and other precious metals)
(Platinum Cartier Tank Chinoise CPCP From Our Personal Collection)
While stainless steel, titanium, and other cheaper metals have been on a steady rise for the past decade, we hope to see an emergence of gold and other precious metal watches. There are also many beautiful watches that are made from metals like Platinum, Palladium that are often overlooked or disregarded. Even though the value of a watch is usually sentimental or based on rarity/condition, it doesn't hurt to have some intrinsic value in a watch (ie: the melt value of your precious watch).
3. Piaget.
(Credit: Mendel Watches)
You've probably seen this already from your favorite watch influencers, but Piaget is still highly under-appreciated in the watch industry. Going back to #2, Piaget ticks all the boxes. You'll see that a majority of vintage Piaget watches are made from precious metals, most commonly 18K gold and many feature beautiful stone dials, like this Piaget Tank with Jade Dial. There are so many iterations of vintage Piaget that catch our eye, especially their Hobnail pieces, 2 stone dials, and more.
4. Less Modern, More Vintage.
Reading all these daily Reddit posts about Rolex AD horror stories (like this guy who got his signature forged), makes me never want to step into an Authorized Dealer again (unless they have a GMT or Daytona for me to pick up). There are so many hoops to jump through when buying a modern watch that's worth it- and an instant depreciation of most watches that probably aren't worth it. I understand when people may not want to wear vintage clothes, or drink from clean vintage glassware, but watches are a completely different story. If you clean a watch and swap the strap, it's practically a brand new watch and the value in vintage is unreal compared to modern counterparts.
5. Smaller Case Sizes & Unusual Case Shapes
(Our Jaeger-LeCoultre Vintage Watch Available for Sale)
This one is pretty self-explanatory and has been slowly shifting for the past few years. Unless you have the wrists of Arnold Schwarzenegger there is no reason for you to be wearing 44MM Yacht-Master IIs and 41MM Day-Dates. We really hope to see a decline in large watches, and more appreciation for vintage, smaller sizes cases in the 32-36MM range. There's a reason most vintage watches fall under this sizing- it's elegant, easy on the eyes and just enough watch. Most of our collection will be in these sizes, so hopefully the trend shifts in our favor. We also see an uptick in people interested in case shapes other than the classic round, square and oval. Watches with fancy lugs, asymmetrical and unusual case shapes are very in demand.
That wraps up this post on 5 trends we see the watch market heading towards, of course these are just the trends we see and like. We always encourage every person who is looking to buy a watch to ultimately buy what they like, but if you don't know where to start. hopefully this helped!