This Week’s Object of Lust: Breitling Top Time

My love of watches is apparent from even a cursory read of this blog.  I’m always looking to add to my roster of timepieces, especially where I feel I have a gap.  My current obession is a series of vintage watches from legendary Swiss watchmaker Breitling.  For me, the mid-to-late ’60’s examples from the relatively short-lived ‘Top Time’ line of watches check all my personal watch aesthetic boxes: simple and elegant dial design (unlike the majority of modern Breitlings, whose dials I often find too busy); chronograph registers (earlier Top Times sport two chronograph registers, while later watches have three); a modern size (the ‘Jumbo’ size checks in at 39mm, which stands up well to modern watches and is only a single milimetre smaller than a Rolex Submariner); and finally, price.  Many vintage Breitlings will set you back closer to $5,000 than $1,000.  The Top Time hasn’t quite garnered the same amount of attention as the Navitimer or Chronomat lines (likely because these lines continue to exist to this day, whereas the Top Time died an untimely death) and I’ve seen examples sell for anywhere between $500 and $3500.  The cheaper Top Times tend to have the ‘cushion’ style case (as pictured below, in middle), are older models (from the late ’50’s and early ’60’s, in the smaller 35mm size and made of stainless steel rather than white or yellow gold.  The most expensive typically hail from the ’70’s, such as those on the far left and far right below, often sporting three chronograph registers.

For me, a 39mm, two-register, mid-60’s model with a “panda” dial (black with white chronograph registers) exactly like the one pictured above, keeps me up at night (usually trolling the classifieds section of watch sites trying to find one).  With the wide variety of colours, case shapes, sizes and materials, the above may not be your first choice.  Which is ok, because  there’s something for everyone in the Top Time line (and in the vintage watch market in general).  Click on the pictures below to make them larger.

To me, this is what loving watches is all about: the thrill of the chase.  I’m sure other watch-loving readers can relate, and have their own “grail” watch in mind right now.  Most importantly, if anyone knows the whereabouts of a watch like the one pictured above, please send me an email at: oneguysstyle@gmail.com.  To sweeten the pot, if anyone can find such a watch (and I end up purchasing it), than I’ll hook you up with a $25 gift certificate to eBay, a Ralph Lauren Purple Label tie from my personal collection, and my eternal gratitude.

Thanks for reading and please feel free to add comments below, email me at oneguysstyle@gmail.com, or follow me on Twitter, @oneguysstyle.   For my earlier comprehensive post on watches, click here.   For my recent post about NATO watch straps, click here.

What One Guy’s Buying on eBay: Martin Dingman belts

A big part of what this blog is about is maximizing the bang we can get for our bucks.  There are a number of sources for excellent deals on clothing items and accessories on the internet, and two of my favourites are eBay and Styleforum.com’s Buying & Selling pages.  One of the ‘tricks’ to eBay is uncovering items that fall into two camps: 1) Makers of high-quality items that aren’t widely known, and therefore attract few bidders; and 2) Makers of high quality items that aren’t known, and therefore attract few counterfeiters.  Sorry to say, but you’re unlikely to score a great deal on a Prada suit on the ‘Bay – and, that listing based in Malaysia with ‘Prada’ spelled incorrectly should probably give you pause as well.  Your best bet is identifying a few under-serviced, under-hyped brands to bid on when they come up.  To help the readers of this blog out, I’m going to be running a new series of posts identifying just such brands.  The first brand I’m highlighting is Martin Dingman.

Martin Dingman makes accessories.  Made-in-America, high-quality leather goods, with a particular focus on belts and shoes.  My experience with his shoes is limited – however, his belts now make up a major portion of my closet.  For whatever reason, the idea of purchasing an expensive belt never quite sat well with me.  It seemed like an item that was seldom focused on and even covered up, if one is wearing an untucked shirt.  Worse still are belts with logos the size of car trunk badges (the ‘H’ belts from Hermes are offenders in this regard) that we really could use as a society to uncover the ‘D-bags’ amongst us.  Then I discovered Martin Dingman – whose belts range from stunning alligator and crocodile, to high-quality calf leather.  They feature exquisite buckles, no visible branding and really might be the perfect belt for the office.  In particular, the crocodile print belts from his calf leather and suede collections look fantastic.  Best yet, few people have heard of Martin Dingman, which means that you can uncover some amazing bargains.  To whit, my first Martin Dingman purchase: a brand new, polished black leather, crocodile print formal belt with gunmetal buckle, which set me back a whole $20 on eBay.  As soon as I picked it up, I was a convert to the quality belt (although, only where I can purchase it for less than a mediocre belt).  This has been followed by a number of further Martin Dingman acquisitions, capped off by a stunning suede belt for $35.

So, set your eBay search to ‘Martin Dingman’ in ‘Clothing, Shoes and Accessories’, and make sure to find a belt that’s approximately 1-2 sizes above your actual waist size (so, if you wear pants in size ’34’, look for belts in ‘35’ or ‘36’).   Happy hunting.  You can also check out Martin Dingman on their website, and read more about a proud Ozark Mountains-based company who make consistently high-quality products: www.MartinDingman.com.

One Guy Recommends: Muji Luggage

It’s been awhile.  Far too long, actually.  For everyone that has subscribed to my blog, thank you for your support.  I will do my best to get back to posting as regularly as I can.  My first few posts back are going to centre around things that I’ve stumbled across in the last few months and havejumped out as things I’d like to share.

Relatively recently, I changed jobs.  A major part of my new position is travel.  Over the last few months, I’ve been living out of a suitcase roughly 60-70% of the time.  Luckily I enjoy travelling, and, by sheer luck, I’ve happened to be near friends and family for the vast majority of this time.  Nonetheless, it can be a tiring process.  The more someone travels, the more it is understood that your luggage and the rest of your travel kit need to help and not hinder. 

Given my impending travel needs, I realized early on that it was time for a new suitcase.   You’ll recall that I actually featured one in my inaugural Christmas List post.  I thought hard about purchasing a beautiful piece of luggage (given how much I would be using it) from the likes of Globetrotter or something from a well known manufacturer like Tumi – but the more I thought about it, the more I realized how ridiculous that would be.  Images of my bag being stuffed by an overworked flight attendant into a tiny overhead bin on my flight from Saskatoon to Des Moines made me shudder.  Therefore, despite my love for Tumi, I believe I’ve found a more realistic and equally efficient alternative: Muji.