The Fourth Wheel, Issue 61

Ask Me Anything: What makes a good heritage reissue, and how to buy a good Rolex on a budget

Hello and welcome back to The Fourth Wheel, the weekly watch newsletter that is belatedly answering your questions. A big thank-you to everyone who sent one in. I chose to focus on two really meaty questions this week, so apologies if I haven’t answered yours - I will save some for issue 70! Meanwhile, the industry feels like it’s really slowing down for the summer, but I have found a really great selection of stories to recommend - one of the best batches for a while - and no shortage of things to be snarky about, too.¹ Enjoy!

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On with the main event: your questions answered.

What divides good reissues from bad? Does it matter how much they add to what’s already out there? - Alvin

You could argue that reissue designs never really add very much because by definition, they are repeating something that already existed. That hasn’t stopped them being rampantly popular and successful, though, and I think it says a lot about the modern watch market that a lot of people aren’t remotely concerned with whether a new model ‘adds’ anything; they just want a good-looking watch.²

I have said before, although it escapes me precisely where, that to run a mainstream watch brand today is to be primarily in the heritage business³. Good or bad, what the immense dependence on heritage reissues says to me is that there is a generation-long dearth of fresh, interesting watch design in the industry, and we should all be asking why that is. I don’t think I need all my fingers and toes to count the truly original, successful watch designs that have come forth in the last 25 years.

Is it because our cycles of nostalgia are accelerating thanks to social media? We live in a post-post-modern age where nothing creative truly dies, it is merely recycled again and again? What I think is an even more interesting question is whether watches, as fundamentally anachronistic items, are fated to be forever tethered to the ‘glory days’ when they still had true meaning and relevance, or whether in time, a 21^st century aesthetic will emerge and dominate.