3/28 COSTA MESA ROUNDUP

What an extraordinary evening full of great food, amazing watches and diverse afficiandos!

One of the highlights of the evening was meeting Paxton Wong one of the most relevant figures in the Australian watch community.

Founder of Watchfest with a personal collection exceeding 5000 pieces, Paxton was instrumental in developing the Australian watch community into the powerhouse it is today. His community building efforts resulted in several makers introducing boutiques into Australia including the first Grand Seiko boutique outside of Japan!

I had the opportunity to have a long conversation with Paxton which illustrates what a great resource our apex collectors can be at these gatherings. His knowledge of Speedmasters is encyclopedic and I just happened to be wearing mine.

We discussed everything from @pete.mcconvill.watches to the development of emerging markets to the watch cultures of various countries.

In the pic above Paxton is wearing two watches that are currently the talk of the town. A Speedmaster White Dial annnnnd the MoonSwatch Moonphase aka "Snoopy". How's that for a thumb in the eye to those who dislike the MoonSwatch series and thinks "no real collector" should like it either? I'm filling my California pool with their angry tears!

Paxton got off his plane in Houston early in the morning and decided it couldn't hurt to take a ride over to the Swatch location. When he saw that he would be about the 20th person in line he went for it! No special access, No inflated grey market price, just showed up, stood in line and got it!

Our Orange County Chrono Group hosts, Mike and Cortland, provided tacos to order, premium cold beer and a well lit photography studio environment. Over 200 watches were on display with a depth and breadth that had a little something for everyone.

Our lovely ladies made a strong showing and apparently vintage Swiss is trending. YouTube figure and Bob's Watches representative Emily Fergason was sporting both an opulent Omega and a more demure Girard-Perregaux while my better half wore a rare 18k gold Rolex Hunter.

Emily's latest "addition" is due in about five months so congratulations to her for creating another future enthusiast.

@Drowning_in_Digitals again brought one of the most fun and unique collections I've seen in quite some time.

Steve's collection may have sparked a new area of digital collecting for me and I'm A-OK with that. Many of my watches are the direct result of meeting other enthusiasts in person.

A shout out to @KairosChrono, @ckim4watches and @CorbettW who also attended the Laguna Beach gathering last week and came back for more! George, Carl and Corbett represent the best of the WatchCrunch face to face experience. Heartfelt conversations not warped by the desire for clicks and views. It was also great to see @TheWatchStylist take a break from creating Hollywood magic to hang with other Crunchers

Buy hey watches!

Much appreciation to those who made it out last night. Like I've said many times before, it's the offline opportunities that keep me online. Hoping to meet more of you in the future. @The_Timist is cooking up some summer fun in Seattle with more news to follow and you may just find a certain someone in Geneva next month.😉