I just can’t quit you! The watches that we’ve bought, sold and bought again…

Luke Benedictus

There’s a line usually attributed to Albert Einstein that claims that “Insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results.” Unfortunately, this brutal logic can apply to watches, too. You buy a particular timepiece but, after the initial honeymoon period wears off, you realise that it’s perhaps no longer as indispensable to your collection as you initially thought. Plus, if you sold it on, then you’d free up some welcome cash to reinvest in another watch instead.

So you sell the watch and cash in. Only to find yourself strangely haunted by its absence. Now that it’s no longer in your possession, you realise that you perhaps you didn’t properly appreciate it before. Absence makes the heart grow fonder and its disappearance gnaws at your heart. Finally you can bear it no longer. You cave in and  buy the same model all over again.

Truth be told, the Time+Tide team is full of degenerate watch flippers who are permanently jonesing for their next wrist-bound fix. The aforementioned scenario is therefore depressingly familiar to many of them, as they explain below in stories that, weirdly enough, all seem to revolve around rather similar watches.

Thor Svaboe (Independents Editor)

Ah, the Tudor Black Bay. At first I was slightly bemused by the hype surrounding the 2012 original with the matte burgundy bezel. But when the silver-detailed 41mm Black Bay Blue came out with its smiley-faced ETA movement I was totally smitten. In a fit of madness, I traded in a vintage Rolex 6694 for it (what!?).

Suffice to say I loved it, but I felt it a bit too icy cool, so as soon as a nearly new Black Bay 41 with the enticing gilt details came up with a good price, plastic still on the clasp (hello!), I sold the blue and bet all my chips on black. But alas it was, with its new in-house movement a bit on the fat side, so it went, and I ordered a Black Bay Fifty-Eight. Finally this was the one – a sweet-looking package of Rolex family goodness in a 39mm case.

I don’t know what happened, but somehow I found it too perfect, is that allowed? After 10 months of a roller-coaster relationship it went to a new home, but damn, if I don’t fancy the pants off the new Black Bay Ceramic and the sex appeal of its lush darkness. And why did they bring out the richness of a bronze 58 too!? My personal carousel of Black Bays is beckoning yet again it seems…

Matthew Pickering (Strategy & Operations Manager)

Although I’ve lived and loved a lot of watches, part of me always liked the idea of being a one-watch guy. The no-nonsense simplicity of the concept really appealed. But I just never found that single watch that completely held my attention.

As part of my collection, I had a Rolex Submariner 11460 but, although I really liked it, somehow I never fully appreciated it at the time. And then this opportunity came up for me to get hold of a Pepsi, but in order to make it happen I needed it to trade in a few pieces. When I started doing the sums, the only way I could make it work was for the Submariner to go. The grass is always greener, I guess.

Then, due to various life circumstances, I had to streamline my collection. I decided that I needed one piece to be the hero of my watch-box rather than continually rotating between a bunch of supporting characters. And the more I thought about it, the more I realised that my old Submariner was actually my best bet. Here was a watch that I could happily wear day in, day out, in virtually every scenario at work or play. So I wound up buying another Sub and we’re very happy together, too. Ultimately, I figure that if this model was good enough for Sean Connery and Steve McQueen then it’s good enough me.

Zach Blass (US Editor)

When you’re hunting for the next watch, sometimes you have to say goodbye to one in order to say hello to another. The original Tudor Black Bay Fifty-Eight in gilt/black was a phenomenal wear that you would more often than not find on my wrist. But when I had the chance to buy a birth-year Rolex Explorer, the Black Bay unfortunately made the chopping block.

Eventually the Fifty-Eight returned to my collection, but in the navy blue configuration which I felt was a better fit. Why? Because the blue diver differentiated itself more from my Rolex Submariner and felt less like I owned two of the same watch. But like the original Tudor Black Bay Fifty-Eight sold to fund the Rolex Explorer, and the same Explorer sold to fund my A. Lange & Söhne, the navy BB58 has recently left my collection for… well stay tuned for what’s incoming.

While the story seemingly ends with me BB58-less, I suspect the first chance I get I will return the compact and classic-styled model to my collection – especially if more models get outfitted with the new clasp that debuted on the Black Bay Fifty-Eight Bronze.