Dare To Dream

Watch companies that want you to live vicariously through their timepieces must first be bold enough to test their own limits.

- Alvin Wong

"IT TAKES A licking but keeps on ticking." The catchphrase popularized by Timex in its television commercials in the 1960s has justifiably endured. A reminder that, in life, success isn't determined by failure but how one pushes on in spite of setbacks, the advertising slogan-turned-life lesson has also been adopted by luxury watch brands obsessed with pushing the envelope with high-performance timepieces that can, as Timex appropriately described, "take a licking".

The incongruity of putting a watch that costs tens or hundreds of thousands through extreme conditions isn't lost on collectors. It isn't that affluent aficionados are too fussed about scratches and dings. In fact, away from punishing field and laboratory tests, these watches are unlikely to endure a more diabolical challenge than a wardrobe conundrum. If this were so, one might wonder: why go through all this trouble? The short answer: a thirst for adventure. The most inspired watches have the capability to take you on a journey to uncharted territories. Often, the mere suggestion of their abilities to emerge unscathed from ocean depths, extreme G-forces and aeronautical exploits are enough to pique collectors' imaginations. Sometimes, these onc left-field performance-enhancing features-think about the world's first waterproof watch or multitime zone pilot's watch-end up becoming staples.

But most of all, the desire to make watches that are tougher, fly higher, dive deeper or evoke more richly-enabling watchmaking houses to venture where their competition has not in this horological equivalent of extreme sports-is sufficient fuel for ambition.

The most inspired watches have the capability to take you on a journey to uncharted territories.

Plotting Adventures