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adage that “you don’t buy the watch, you buy<br />
the dealer” makes emphatic sense here. Buy<br />
from someone who has built their reputation<br />
on legitimacy and transparency, like Eric<br />
Ku has, one watch at a time. And what about<br />
the GMT that’s mired in a sort of botched<br />
liminality, possibly worse off than it was before<br />
the entire “restoration”? Well, I am inclined<br />
to hand it to one of the legitimate restorers<br />
and see if they can put right what years of<br />
mendacity have conspired to convolute.<br />
And what about J? Funnily, I don’t really<br />
hold any animosity toward him. I might even<br />
have a drink with him the next time I see<br />
him. He is the ultimate personification of the<br />
scorpion that stung the frog after riding across<br />
the river on its back. You see, he can’t help<br />
himself. He is a relic of a time when people had<br />
no information and he was able to amass what<br />
I imagine was a great fortune as a result. That<br />
time is irrefutably over and even as I write this<br />
story, men like J are fading into irrelevance in a<br />
knowledge empowered world.<br />
MICHAEL HUI OF ROLLIWORKS ON WATCH RESTORATION<br />
When we founded Rolliworks, it was our vision to provide our very passionate<br />
community with a complete repair/restoration. From bracelet repair,<br />
movement servicing, to Swiss lapping and chamfer restoration, we say with<br />
much pride that we’re the only shop in the world that tackles all three primary<br />
components with our own hands, in-house, without the use of outsourced<br />
vendors. This was very important for us from the start. It allows owner of the<br />
piece to contribute and offer input throughout the process.<br />
I think a project can take on a whole new life when one can transport<br />
themselves back to the time when the piece was originally produced. Just<br />
imagining how the piece would have looked like at the time, it’s easy to<br />
understand why our clients have expressed a certain comfort in seeing their<br />
timepiece with the beautiful lines and edges that Rolex intended. There’s<br />
definitely a lot of uncertainly in regard to restore or not restore. I think<br />
sometimes clients can get caught up with worrying too much about what the<br />
imaginary person down the line might want instead of focusing on what their<br />
personal preference is.<br />
A restored piece should never-ever be called NOS, a term that’s too<br />
liberally thrown around these days. I feel very strongly NOS should be virtually<br />
unworn and in top condition without any work done to it at any point.<br />
VINTAGE 147
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