Le Monde Edmond

March 9, 2016

Insight Collector series Part 2: How many watches make up an ideal collection?

Fine WatchesCollector's InsightCollecting & Investing

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What is the ideal number of watches for a collector to own? 

This must be one (for the watch collector) of the most often asked or thought about questions on the planet.


If you think about it – its a pretty ‘silly’ question to ask.

Yet at the same time it is a question that I would love to have answered by some of the great collectors out there. It is perhaps a silly question in the sense that there is not really a correct answer to it.

Indeed it’s a very personal question and most probably every collector will tell you a different number. There is not right or wrong answer to this question.

It largely depends on what type of collector you are. Maybe there is not even an ideal number and it does not matter how many watches one owns.

Having said that I still would love to know what some experienced and great collectors think about this. So I asked some of the well-known collectors to share their thoughts on this subject.

Here is what I found.


Collecting is a long journey.

It is journey filled with experiences good and bad. I think the best collectors are those that have owned many watches. Some of the watches owned will be mistakes. Others will be home runs. Good collectors have experienced as many watches as possible. They have lived with a watch only to perhaps find out it was not the right one. This process can take years.

As one superb collector/blogger and friend of mine (who has a world class collection) told me, ‘I want to own and live with as many watches as I can. This process of owning and considering is an important part of collecting. You never know how you will ‘live’ with a watch until you own it.’

You never know how you live with a watch until you own it. This is indeed very true and paramount in the collecting process. For him the ideal collection came down to 8 watches, all varying of age, manufacture and style.

Another extremely well known and experienced collector told me. ‘How about one for every day of the week. Or maybe one for every day of the month. Or maybe just one or two watches period?’ What he was trying to say – that this is indeed an almost impossible question to answer.

So what is my opinion? What is ideal number of watches to own?


Before I go into answering this question. Let me state a few important things.

I am in the early stages of the collecting journey. Having only started five years ago – I am still in the process of surrounding myself with many watches and going through the process of finding out what is right for me. Having said that I am learning quite fast and I am in the age and have the budget to buy exactly what I want. My collecting style lends itself towards not owning many watches.

Let me explain what I mean.  


In my last post I said that I am perhaps the careful and strategic collector.

I try and buy few watches. If I can I try and buy only the best examples – watches that are icons, and important in watch history. I try and think very long term. When I buy a watch I ask myself three basic questions: 1) is this a watch I am absolutely in love with? 2) will this watch be timeless in twenty-thirty years? Meaning if I buy the watch now will it give me pleasure in 20-30 years time?

Can I grow old with a watch? This is important to ask because as I said before I am a big believer in wearing all my watches regardless of rarity, value or brand 3) Is the watch important in watch history* – and last 4) is the quality and condition to my standards? 

If I can answer all four (or at least three) questions with a yes then I go for it. But how many watches fulfill all four criteria? Very few. Most watches I look at will fail in answering one of my questions. Which brings to me to a very important point. 

I think the best collectors are better than all other collectors in saying ‘no’ to watches. Thats right. To use an analogy from financial markets, the winner will not be the one who finds stocks that double; but rather the winner will be the one who avoids more mistakes than others. There will be many temptations to buy watches. But the reality is most watches are nice to have. But not must have.

As I mentioned in my personal profile the best collectors have seen up and down cycles and touched and carefully analysed hundreds if not thousands of examples be it cars, watches or art. They are experts in often saying no to items- even if they are good. 

They wait for exceptional and reject the ‘merely’ good. This is extremely difficult to do and only the most experienced of collectors master this. By having this strict criteria – it forces me to only buy very few watches. But hopefully with time it will be a strong collection.

I will end up with MUST have watches as opposed to nice to have watches. 


So now I can finally answer the question: what is the ideal number of watches to own? Unfortunately my answer is not a number but rather two words. Under 20! Maybe its 16,17 or 18. But for sure its under 20.

For me the answer was relative easy to figure out.

I asked myself a few questions. 1) do I want to wear all my watches often? Yes. 2) Do I want variety in terms of sports watches, evening watches and a few complicated watches? Yes. 3) Do I want the freedom to own a few brands but mainly concentrate on one or two? Yes. 4) Do I want to be able to change watches three times a day when I am on holiday (and still have a few important watches back home in the safe). Yes.

So I knew the figure would be higher than 8 or 10. But since I want to wear all my watches often (ideally I want to go through wearing all my watches within a month)** I knew the figure had to be 2o or under. So under 20 is the ideal amount of watches for me.

I do think that with, for example, 18 watches you can accomplish many things. 1) own sports-watches and evening watches 2) own a few complicated watches. 3) own one, two or even three brands 4) have a world class collection that covers the most important times of watchmaking (1930s -1970s) 5) own a few different metals (gold, white gold, platinum, steel). 5) Even have a theme within this collection (like small crown Rolex) or a few world time of Patek. Or collecting steel chronographs. The point is the following: You don’t need to own 40+ watches to do what I mentioned above.

Since I want to wear my watches often – I will never want to own 40-50 watches in my permanent collection. But in order to get to my dream 18 watches it could well be that I will go through owning perhaps 3-4 dozen watches in my lifetime – even if reject 80% of the watches I am tempted to buy (for the collector in general is tempted almost every week to buy another watch- most collectors are natural accumulators). But in the end it will come down to owning less than 20 watches. All will be important. Be unique to me. Be icons that stand the test time in general.

And most importantly they will be the watches – I lust after every day. And I will wear them like crazy and often. Because I will have under 20 watches.

(Main picture credit: Park Ji Hong)


*It might seem odd that I place an importance in terms of ‘watch history’ in my criteria. But I believe that collecting watches that represent some sort of milestone as a nice strategy to have. Watches like the first Rolex submariner 6204. Or first perpetual calendar chronograph Patek 1518. Or the first automatic movement in Patek like the 2526. These are the kind of watches I enjoy collecting.

**I think the biggest problem some collectors have is in fact also the most absurd and the most simple problem to solve. It is the problem or headache of owning too many items. Collectors are by nature accumulators they need to repeat the exercise of hunting, buying and storing. This leads to collectors often having too many cars, paintings or watches to the point that they cannot enjoy each item anymore. After all how many times have you heard a collector say: I have ten classic cars but only drive three of them. I have 50 watches but I only wear 10 of them. This is a problem I don’t want to have and thus my under 20 rule. For collectors interested in the psychology of collecting see our post here.

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