Simon de Burton

The hidden fortune in old watches

  • From Spectator Life
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It’s not so long ago that old watches used to turn-up at car boot fairs, charity shops and jumble sales (remember those?), usually in the form of unremarkable models set aside to be ‘got rid of’ after the grim reaper had called time on their original owners.

Back then ‘watch collecting’ had yet to benefit from the turbo-boost of the internet and remained an esoteric hobby enjoyed by scholarly types who had put the work in to discover the varied histories of all the best brands in the old-fashioned way: by reading books.

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