In Defense of Date Complication

Hi all (fair warning: this will be my 1st attempt at a longer post with WatchCrunch 😀; you have been warned).

As you know, all fields of life have something fashionable to hate. For example, if you are in media, it's kind obligatory to hate Mark Zuckerberg. I honestly don't understand why... Yes, I know, his company prioritizes money making over, umm, whatever the haters care about, just like every other company in America. Zuck, though, is devil reincarnation (different from Steve Job, may he rest in peace, who is genius reincarnation, or pre-Twitter Elon Musk; personally, I like Mark Zuckerberg better as a person than both, but what do I know?).

In watch, it seems very fashionable to hate date complication.

Like, whenever there is a new watch released with date window, it seems like someone has to utter the words "looks good, now lose the date window." Seriously. Just... look around WatchCrunch.

And I am here to defend the date complication. I am here to assert this: date complication is awesome! It's a great thing to have, for a few reasons:

1. Honest to goodness, date complication is the single most useful feature to me.

2. Date complication can be ok right relatively easily, which helps you weed out bad watches relatively easily.

3. Date complication can be done well, and it makes the watch that much nicer.

First, usefulness. To me, date is more important than time on a watch. Surprise!

Look, have you been to a modern office environment? You have something called "calendar app." Traditionally, it's run by Microsoft, but Google Calendar rocks these days (full disclosure: I do work for Google). In any event, if you are at a certain level, the calendar app, be it Outlook or Google Calendar or Apple Calendar or your teammates (yep, they are there to help), rule your time. Ding ding, 15 minutes to meeting with your team; ding ding, better wrap up this meeting because dear goodness your partner is about to blow your day; ding ding, it's time to run to pick up the bugger from school. Pardon me, I have 2 kids, so my homelife also runs on a calendar.

Anyhow, you pretty much always know what time it is. If you dare have a block of an hour free, 3 different groups of people want that block to talk about **** that will make your manager glare down at you at performance time.

And you need a mechanical watch to tell you time? No no, time is rained down on you, except if you put a "focus block," which also rains down on you.

Date, though, is different.

You don't get the current date pushed into your face on an hourly basis (ok, there have been days when my meetings are in 15 minute blocks for the entire morning, so hourly pushing is... not that bad). Instead, it sneaks up on you. Like "oh, that report will take 2 days? that means what date again?, because I know we need to publish the other piece on the 15th."

Also, date tends to not be displayed as prominently in devices. In older generation of Windows (honest: I haven't touched Windows for a while), only the time shows up by default; you have to click to the calendar to see date. Same for phone, really. Usually, there is a BIG clock on the lock screen, while date is small, if at all displayed.

So, when the date question jumps, you have 2 choices. You can click out of your precious window to check (good luck while you are presenting; I have... interesting experience when stuffs pop around), or you can lift up your wrist and glance quickly (or not too quickly; hey, my green dial looks a bit cheerier than normal in this conference room, I mean it's 12th, so the report will be ready on 14th, so we will make it thanks to all the goodness in the world and corporate structure).

(above: Obama realizing that maybe Congress may not be able to do their jobs after all...)

And thus, date complication is amazing. It saves us from the risk of displaying our WatchCrunch tab to a conference room while checking out your estimation (side note: you should never share entire screen; ever; window or tab only; you never know what that idiotic teammate would type into the chat, ok?).

Kidding aside, though, it's just nice to be able to tell time quickly without breaking out of any window or view or whatever. Time complication is very very useful.

Now that we establish the importance and usefulness of date complication, let's take a detour and talk about why date complication is so hated these days.

Let's return to Obama's picture above. Why him? Well, why not? The guy stays faithful to his wife, shoots basketball like a dream, held down a stressful job and 2 kids, and kept his shit together while the financial system melted down. What else can we ask from POTUS, right? Well, for one, better watches. In the above picture, he was looking at Jorg Gray JG6500 (nicknamed "Obama watch"), which is a mild example of how date complication goes off:

As you can see, the date window is too close to the center (probably because the movement is too small for the case), so disrupt the row of indices. It has a white background, which harshly jumps out from the black dial. It has a totally different font from the rest of the watch (number 2 is different from the minute track, while number 0 is different from both the minute track and the 3 subdials).

To be fair, it's... not the worst. Dunno if you can call it a compliment or not. In some cases, the date window is round, harsh white, wrong font, too close to the center, and there is nothing else to distract. The whole thing resembles a pimple.

That's why people hate the date complication.

But then, flip it around, and you can see the 2nd point above.

Today, with abundance of date and time info around (much more accurate, too), watches (especially mechanical watches) become a personal statement and enjoyment rather than necessity. In other words, we no longer time our infantry assaults with our watches (Outlook fills that role; TO THE ALL-HANDS YOU GO), but these watches still look ready for those assaults.

So words like "attention to details" and "passion" and "artisanal" and so on were abound. Every watch would boast about how much love and care and passion go into its making.

Well, here is where care and attention and design should go: the date window.

It's relatively easy to do an ok job at this. There are 2 ways to do the date complication: the complication can stand out (that's point 3) or it can fade from attention (this current point). To avoid calling attention to itself, there are a few options:

• It can have other things to balance it out. Look at the Horage pictured at top. The watch has 3 major things on the dial: the date, the small seconds, and the power reserve; with multiple things going on, each with its own quirks, the date window fits in.

• It can have the background quasi-match the dial. Dark dials should have dark date wheel (white numbers on black background). Light dials should have light date wheel (black numbers on white background).

• It should avoid calling out the date window closeness to the center. Ideally, the movement matches the case, and the date goes to the edge. If this is not the case, add stuffs to the side of the date window (or balance it on the other side) to avoid calling out the negative space; also, don't let the date window slightly out of step with the indices and call attention to its location (really Obama; you should tell the watch producer).

Note that these things don't need to be exactly right, just ballpark would be decent. Observe below:

The date wheel has black background, but the dial is blue; the dial has vertical stripe, while the date window does not. The font still doesn't match. However, since their color scheme (dark on dark) is close enough, the date window doesn't jump out and scream "OH YE WHO LOOK AT ME, I NEED HELP!" After all, I am not expecting a completely customized date wheel at that price level (that's stock photo of my Citizen). But they care enough to make it look decent.

Thus, if a watch just uses stock date wheel (seriously guys, you can get matching color date wheel from the internet), you can tell for sure that "attention to details" and "care" are non-present. Because if they are, the date window should not be a pimple on the dial.

And finally, my friends, date complication can be something to be appreciated, not despite. Look at this big date:

How can you not love that? German watches and their gorgeous big dates. Or this:

(yes, that my wristshot with newly-wedded ring 😉). You can see the date subdial at the bottom of the watch, ever so slightly indented down as a kinda-subdial. The black overglaze glints softly at correct light ever so blue-ish. The date dial shows off the skills with which Seiko produced this thing. I am still at loss at how they were able to indent the enamel, since glass (especially opaque enamel grit) tends to flow and obscure this kind of every-so-slightly-different texture. How can you not love this?

Or this:

The bold, very red, very hot pointer at the date on the outer perimeter of a beautiful dial. How can you not love this?

Date complication done right is between gorgeous and breath-taking. After all, for most watches, date is actually the most complicated part (as in, the only complication 😉). Done ok ok, date complication is useful but unintrusive.

And so, my friends, love the date. It's good. If date window sticks out like a sore pimple on an otherwise ok watch, well, you now know why: the producers just don't pay attention. I am not saying "avoid that." I am saying "think about what you are paying for." Look for a good date complication.

And remember, Outlook and co don't scream the date at you, so this part of the watch is actually useful.

With love, Lam.