Posted by When it comes to vintage watches it has become fashionable to talk about “Tropical dial” when ever there is patina on the dial…
Guess I am old school, to me it’s patina. But there is patina and there is patina… One which makes your watch more desirable due to it and the other makes it less…
What is what, that’s in the eyes of the beholder!
Last week I showed you the blue Jaeger-LeCoultre E 875 Memovox. One out of four E 875 in my collection, the three original configurations plus one with patina.
Original configurations are blue/blue, white outer/blue inner and white/white. I have seen some blue outer/white inner but not convinced they ever existed as original configuration.
The E 875 with patina – to me, the type of patina that makes your watch more desirable! This is an example where I think – time is an artist!
The left one, original blue and the right one, was originally blue.
Guess in modern terms this dial would be called “tropical” or maybe “AP Salmon”…
Now, which one to prefer? Well, for me it depends on my mood…
Some days I prefer the pristine blue…
Some days, the patina copper brown!
Over time the dial turned form dark blue to this brown copper look.
What changed it? Sun, moist, air and bad lacquer in combination..? And time! Time is a true artist!
If we look closer on the dial, you can see that there is still a blue hue around the printed white text and lines while the rest of the dial have changed. The sunburst pattern still there but not as clear as originally.
The longer I have been in this game, the more I think that patina should either be exceptional or not at all… But that’s me.
The Blomman Watch Report 