Great watches stuck in the “friend zone”

For me it’s the Zelos Swordfish 40mm Ti. 

I’m a titanium fanboy, love dive watches and I think this looks really cool. But I always end up going for something else. 

For me it's the Doxa Sub600 in orange and yellow with the steel bezel. A great watch but there are always watches that I would rather buy than one of those. Maybe I'm a little bit intimidated by the bright colours. 

Most of the modern Omega catalogue. Most of the modern Tudor catalogue.

I think it’s cos my watches are usually: oddball, vintage, or more high end. So these guys get stuck in the “yeah that’s nice” middle ground..

I was gonna say kind of like a VW car. But I do have a VW sat on my drive and an omega sat on my wrist - so maybe I have a place in my life for reliability. I just don’t lust after it. (truthfully my unreliable very cheap fiat 500 which came before this VW I was more in love with.)

I get what you’re saying (as an owner of a Doxa 300t - I got it with a decent discount which brought the price down to around £1500 which sealed the deal. ) for similar sort of money, I’ve grown to like the Oris big crown pointer date, but not enough to spend the cash. I’d rather put it towards something else if I was spending around £2k 

Basically any Squale model. I look at the price... I look at the specs... I look at the watches visuals... and I think, yeah, I could happily buy and wear one of these. But it never happens. Other watches always come up, whether divers or other styles, and I never actually buy the Squale.

Check out this post...you may still feel the same way about Squale after reading it...then again...

https://www.watchcrunch.com/ChronoGuy/posts/squale-did-you-realize-what-an-important-historic-brand-this-is-18324

No Doxa ????

One of my favorite brands of all time...

If you want to test out whether you would really like the watch and the style before spending the big bucks, you can pick up the inexpensive Aliexpress homage by Seestern...

I would argue you need some 'friend-zone' watches in any collection. If all your pieces were bangers, it would just be too hard to make a decision on what to put on A piece that you'd be happy to have, but would never lust over would be an ideal 'tie-breaker', until the next time you opened your watch box.

Doxa SUB 600T is an awesome watch...I was able to get the Time & Tide x Doxa collab in Pacific Blue with titanium case...such a beauty...

For me it's every Seiko above 200 £€$.. 🤷‍♂️

Lol it’s been on list for while and ended up the yellow one instead… but now I have the orange/yellow swordfish I might get this one …. Might … 😅

The yellow sub 300T is so beautiful and cool 😍 it's one of my favorite watches ever that I don't own, never have and probably never will. But the Black Bay 36 was one of these watches for years and I actually pulled the trigger recently 😊

Any variant of the Seamaster 300.

Basically a perfect watch, suitable to be your only watch, cool history, cool marketing (Bond), great specs (Coaxial). But whenever I had the option of buying one I always went for something else, a BB58, 16610, SKX, Doxa…

Most of the watches I see online are of very little interest to me. I can even mark the levels of disinterest on a metric scale.

Outright antipathy: Most luxury watches from high end brands. They are the one guilty of turning something that used to be useful and a cool tool into blingy and tarted up men's accessories.

Resonate slightly less negatively: fashion and oversized watches. At least they don't pretend to be anything else beside a social status uplift tool for idiots.

Indifference: Most brands from Swatch that were tiered to death until nothing was left from their originality. For me it has all morphed into a bland and amorphous corporate mush. I can't even remember what a modern Rado, Mido or Tissot watch looks like 5 minutes after looking at their pictures. Oh, and please add Squale. The only thing I manage to remember is the strange sliced salami logo at the bottom of the dial.

Interesting but not my style: Doxa and Zodiak. Both brands kept their originality but I can't feel the attraction.

These are two that I want to love but just can’t get past their size. I actually own the Devil diver, but am trying to sell it. 
 

For me it’s easily Rolex. I’m not serious about that at all. I love Rolex. 
I am in the friend zone with Orient. I think they’re wonderful, but have never pulled the trigger on any of them.

Would you say that the Doxa and zodiac are “never buys” or “if money were no object they’d eventually be mine”?

They may be if and when my taste change. Right now I can appreciate them but I don't feel the attraction needed to push me to buy

Fack  - yes, way too many friends!!

Doxa 300, Oris bronze, any of several micros (farer, zelos, halios….) , Ming, Tag, Omega, Tudor, Bell &Ross, … I think I could go on for hours… All are in the cute💁‍♀️, but not hot 😍💃👠zone.   

Nomos design style speaks to me in the abstract. I love it and think it’s awesome. I just don’t know when the hell I would ever wear one. It doesn’t match with my mid-west, blue color lifestyle. 

Ming! Oh man, that’s a good pull. The design looks very cool and  yet at that price point I just can’t make it happen. You know one I think I might consider, because I think they’re beautiful, is Kurono. 

💯 I can appreciate and admire the design, but watches are a very personal expression, and is it me?

I find bb36 an interesting one, too. They’re almost too simple for me, but a dress field version of that design language is definitely what some people need. 

Yeah, Orient. Orient is like your first girlfriend / boyfriend. They’ll always have a place in your heart, but its not a place you need to go back to. Friend zone. (But with benefits, because while I wouldn’t buy one again, I definitely still own one! 😉)

BB41 Red Bezel, ZRC French Navy Reissue, King Seiko, Reservoir Watches, Credor GCBE993, Minase Divido 2.0, Citizen Chronomaster Washi

Off the top of my head these are some of my favorite watches, but would probably only buy if I suddenly make 5 times my current salary 

This is a great list. The red rose bb41 is like the Bruce Lee pogue for me. They’re collector watches I want, but just can’t seem to make a priority. king Seiko, too. And Credor, well, I mean, yeah. Haha

Hahaha. Excuse me, are you me? I like like like the idea of owning a Seiko but even when my girlfriend offered to buy me one, I said no. Don’t know what it is about Seiko that makes me not want to get one. Is it the brand? I don’t think so. Design? There are nice looking Seikos out there. I regularly visit thr Seiko website and spend hours ohhing and ahhing the watches. But something keeps me from buying.

At least until recently. 

I’m currently waiting for a preloved 1997 Seiko Superior Titanium. I saw the thing online, contacted the seller, cyberstalked him for half an hour. Then, satisfied with the intel I got from my stalking, sent him the money. Waiting excitedly for it. That said, the watch is less the 200 USD including shipping so maybe that’s what it was.

The Seiko turtle. Specifically the SRP777. I freaking love it and always seem to pass it up. Lol

Funny, the Turtle was one of my first “watch collector” watches. It’s my affordable go-to that’s just easy to wear and not worry too much about, especially in the summer. Different strokes! I appreciate the variety of where collectors gravitate. 

List is too long… top spot is the Omega Speedmaster. I’ve tried 5 times to pull the trigger, and I still don’t have a Speedy...