Recently I was watching an interview with watch industry legend Jean-Claude Biver, and he said something which really resonated with me, and it was: “Look at your watch. Don’t look at what time it is.”
I’m sure we’ve all been there, you glance down at your wrist initially to check the time, but then find yourself looking at those tiny details, the light playing on the dial, the hands, the numerals… whatever it may be, by the time you look up again, you invariably realise that you still haven’t actually checked the time, and have to go back for seconds! Anyway, this got me thinking about other watch quotes, and so I set about trying to find some others. Before long it occurred to me that it would be interesting to bring some of the best ones I came across together into a list!
The result is below, some of my favourite watch quotes from various interviews and videos I’ve seen in recent months – I hope you enjoy them!
Watch Quotes
“One thing I love doing on tour is finding independent watch brands from the country I’m touring, and then wearing them for the duration of the tour in that country”
Ed Sheeran: Singer-songwriter (Hodinkee)
“Every time I wear that watch I feel connected to him. Watches have the power to do that I think”
Matt Hranek: Author of A Man and His Watch, talking about wearing his father’s Rolex DateJust (Bulang & Sons)
“Look at your watch. Don’t look at what time it is”
Jean-Claude Biver: Former CEO, LVMH Group (@jcbiver on Instagram, 16 Nov ’19)
“We know that making these watches now, if they’re looked after, in hundreds of years’ time there will be something around that we’ve made with our name on it. It’s like a legacy in a way, or like a mechanical ghost that I’ll leave behind on this Earth when I’m gone!”
Rebecca Struthers: Watchmaker and Restorer (In Conversation with Dr Rebecca Struthers)
“We do not sell time. If you want the time you have a phone or a smartwatch, we sell an experience, we sell a way of doing things, a name, a beauty, design, techniques. So it’s our whole package about authenticity, which goes way beyond functionalities”
Antonio Seward: Audemars Piguet (Exclusive Style)
“When you wear a Daytona on your wrist, you’re wearing a piece of art”
Spike Lee: Director, Producer, Writer, Actor (Hodinkee)
“Everyone was saying the world was going to go under and I had just felt that people were losing perspective. What’s important is the here and now, living in the moment. So, I thought, what if I can make a watch where all the numbers are upside down, and only the present hour is correct. The aim of which, to inspire people to focus more on living in the here and now; it has some humour to it”
Ludovic Ballouard: Independent watchmaker (A Collected Man)
“I don’t wear a Tank watch to tell the time. In fact, I never wind it. I wear a Tank because it’s the watch to wear”
Andy Warhol: Artist
“I think craziness is in the eye of the beholder, like beauty, meaning what is completely normal for me is completely insane for somebody else.”
Max Büsser: Founder & Creative Director, MB&F (In Conversation with Max Büsser)
“We buy watches to kind of get kicked in the crotch in a certain way, you know what I mean? You go ‘oof’ “
John Mayer: Singer-songwriter (Hodinkee)
“I was at the restaurant of a hotel and some people from Patek were sitting in one corner of the dining hall, while I was sitting alone in the other corner. I told the head-waiter: “Bring me a piece of paper and a pencil, I want to design something” and I designed the Nautilus while observing the people from Patek eating!”
Gerald Genta: Designer, on creating the Patek Philippe Nautilus (VeryImportantWatches)
Gerald Genta
“You need to take the time to enjoy trying a watch. Because, never, never, I mean, never trust just pictures on the internet … try it on your wrist, ask the right questions to the clerk, to the retailer. I think that’s very important”
Thierry Stern: President Patek Philippe (Hodinkee)
“I met Gerald at a dinner, and he introduced himself with the phrase, ‘My god, your watch is ugly’ “
Evelyne Genta, on when she first met Gerald Genta (A Collected Man)
“Knowing Steve’s reputation for having sticky fingers, I detailed one of my prop assistants to shadow him on the set and retrieve the watch whenever McQueen finished a scene. Even so, somehow one of the five remaining Monacos still managed to go missing – probably to Steve”
Don Nunley: Property Master for Le Mans, on the Steve McQueen Monaco props (Quill & Pad)
“…though I don’t like wearing watches, I do really like creating them!”
Gerald Genta: Designer (VeryImportantWatches)
“There’s something one should expect not only of a watch, but also of oneself: to never stand still”
Walter Lange: Great-grandson of A. Lange & Söhne founder, Ferdinand A. Lange (Displayed at Regent Street Watches of Switzerland, A. Lange & Söhne boutique)
“When you see it in pictures, you might say that’s just a watch with diamonds on it. When you see it in person, it all adds up and makes perfect sense”
John Mayer: Singer-songwriter, on his Patek Philippe 5971 (Hodinkee)
“We are the artisans of giving birth to a product with a soul”
Jean-Claude Biver: Former CEO, LVMH Group (@jcbiver on Instagram, 16 Nov ’19)
And to finish, whilst this is a little bit more than a single watch quote per se, I cannot recommend highly enough that you take the time to listen to Stephen McDonnell’s presentation at Dubai Watch Week 2023 entitled “The Trials and Tribulations of Watch Innovation”.
I’ve embedded it below, and I absolutely promise you, it is well worth an hour of your time.
For any questions, or even if you have seen some other watch quotes that could be added to this page, please get in touch via our Contact page, or via our Instagram.
You might also be interested in:
- Recommended Reading: ‘The Wizard of Swiss Watchmaking’ – Interviews with Jean-Claude Biver
- In Conversation with Ludovic Ballouard
- Watch Affinity Interviews
- Watch Stationery and Gift Ideas
- Watch Books, Watch Boxes and more at the Watch Affinity Shop on Amazon (commissions earned)
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