Memory Keepers: A Peek at My Fave Watches

It’s no secret that I love watches. It should be no surprise that I love them as aesthetic accessories more so than functional objects. (Fun fact: I think I have one working watch in my entire collection.) To me, they are fancy bracelets with extra bits. Like jewelry, watches are wearable art. With a couple dozen in my collection, there’s one for every mood and outfit. I definitely have favourites, though. Wanna see them? Of course you do.

The Timex moon phase watch was one of my thrifting White Whales for a long time. I ended up finding one on Poshmark after a years-long search, but before that happened, I found the vintage Guess version on the left at a local Goodwill. To this day, these two watches are my absolute favourites – the 2 that I’d save first in an emergency. I am a total sucker for anything moon/sun/star themed, which goes a long way to explaining my fondness for these watches. I love their vintage feel – they’re very 90s-coded to me. The Guess watch also happens to have my favourite font (?) of Roman numerals, reminiscent of the Cartier Ballon Bleu which is the watch of my dreams.

I am not generally a huge fan of skeleton watch faces, but I love the intricate steampunk-ish vibes of the vintage Fossil watch on the right. I also love how black-and-gold colour scheme pops. If you like the vibes of this trio and want to add something similar to your collection, I recommend looking at vintage Guess and Fossil because they had some great designs in the 80s and 90s. There are tons of listings on eBay, and the prices are generally far more affordable than, say, Timex and other similar brands.

The Bruno Magli watch (middle) is another piece I spent months hunting online because it reminded me of the classic Cartier tank watch, at a fraction of the price. (And I ended up finding it for a killer deal on eBay.) The vintage Emile Renaud watch on the right reminded me of the iconic Gucci stripe design. I got it for a song on Poshmark and replaced the old, cracked strap with a new leather one off Amazon. Good as new! Same strap, in a different size, went on the vintage Bulova watch I thrifted at Value Village, replacing the original metal strap that showed a ton of wear. Changing straps is a super easy way to “fix” up thrifted watches – you just need a basic watch repair kit, and there are lots of inexpensive ones on Amazon. (They will also allow you to replace batteries at home, if a working watch is a must have for you 😉)

On a related note: if, like me, you have champagne tastes and a beer budget, it’s worth looking at non-dupe dupes. Inspiration being a widely accepted form of flattery in the fashion/design industry, many iconic designs end up being “copied” by a variety of different brands at various price points. The Emile Renaud watch is a good example of that. It’s not pretending to be Gucci (i.e. not stamped as such), but it looks an awful lot like, well, you know what.

I tend to gravitate towards watches on the daintier side, but the Michael Kors watch on the left is an exception. It’s hefty … and I love it! I think it’s the purple-blue watch face, along with the chunky Roman numerals (sense a theme?), that make it a standout for me. The Anne Klein watch on the right was my attempt to “dupe” the Cartier Ballon Bleu at an affordable price point (aka under $50). It checks off all my boxes, but it has one downside – the strap is non-adjustable and slightly large for my wrist. I have to wear it pushed up my arm a bit, which I don’t love. I got the watch on eBay and assumed that, like most bracelet-type straps, I could adjust the size by removing links. Wrong. It also turns out that it’s basically impossible to remove and replace the entire bracelet. Sigh.

Last but not least, shoutout to the “starry night” Skagen Anita watch, one of my OGs. I have a couple of versions of this design, and it’s such a cool, minimalist everyday option. It’s definitely something of an outlier in this line-up, but I still adore it. It’s a rare sighting on the secondhand market, but worth chasing down — I always get tons of compliments whenever I wear it.

And there you have it: the highlights on my (current) watch collection. I’m still dreaming of a day when I might get my paws on the one watch to rule them all [ahem, Cartier] but I’m happy making memories with this lot in the meantime.

Come tell me all about your fave watches in the comments!