Fit For Purpose

Watches and Wonders Geneva 2023 has wrapped up, and presented the world with watchmaking's carefully curated talking points for the year. The editors of WOW Singapore and Thailand weigh in with their own thoughts

- ASHOK SOMAN

Switzerland is a weird place to see watches. To be clear, this is not a value judgment about buying watches in the historical home of watchmaking, nor the appeal of fine watches to Swiss people, for whom watchmaking is an inextricable part of everyday life. Instead, the disquietude is about why Swiss watchmaking is famous in the first place, which is really an accident of history. Just think back on the kerfuffle about "Swiss Made" just a few years ago; it all feels much more important to outsiders than to the Swiss. Much like the banking and pharmaceutical sectors here though, you cannot expect the Swiss to be emotionally vested in these areas because they are a part of the landscape, which visitors rave about. One does not, for example, drone on about one's home - when it comes to watchmaking, the Swiss leave it to watch bores to do that. The editors of WOW Singapore and Thailand certainly qualify for this, although it should be noted that WOW Malaysia is the edition that goes out of its way to run publicity on travel and tourist attractions in Switzerland.

Watches and Wonders Geneva finds the editor of WOW Singapore ruminating (visually, on IG Reels) on how lucky the Swiss are to have a veritable legion of tourism officers in the form of watch enthusiasts. Now in its second year of being a physical watch fair, Watches and Wonders Geneva did not disappoint in drawing the crowds and the brands, underscoring the limitations of digital events and uncoordinated physical novelty presentations. While Rolex and Patek Philippe are blessed with a surfeit of popularity, such that their stands at the big Geneva show are literally mobbed in the opening hours of the first day, other brands depend on these stars to draw the crowds.