Aquagraph
·Took a trip to Bicester village today and needless to stay I stopped off at the TAG Heuer store. I won't detail the bargains in there, as I'm aware this is frowned upon. I will say they had a lot of really nice items in there, including a couple which I tried on for size.
First was the Grande Carrera Calibre 36 with the caliper (with the red accents and red stitched strap). I have been thinking about the Carreras and Grande Carreras for a while but feared they would be too big for me. I needn't have worried. Taking off my Aquagraph and laying it on the counter, the Grande Carrera felt smaller, probably because it is thinner and much, much lighter than my beast of a diving watch.
Somehow I didn't like the look of it as much as I liked the photographs, I was rather disappointed to tell the truth. I also didn't like the strap much, it seemed rather narrow and the clasp would not shut easily.
I thought while I was there I would try on the black case Monaco Twenty Four with the Gulf Stripes. This was much nicer and confirmed to me that my previous indifference to the Monaco has passed. This was a very nice piece, with a full window on the back, but again fastening the clasp was not an easy task. I have to say that while I liked it, there's no way I would pay nearly £11 grand for it (not the price at Bicester obviously), and it's disappointing that the black case models are all rather expensive. But that's the way it goes I suppose.
Again it looked quite different from the photographs, and again felt quite light and not as substantial as I'd hoped. I think if I was to buy a Carrera I would go for the modern style, but perhaps plainer models. Sadly they did not have the F1 Automatic with the orange and black dial, as I would probably have bought it, assuming it looks like the pictures.
I was quite surprised that the person who served me didn't seem to know what my Aquagraph was, I have previously spoken to a guy in the Cheshire Oaks store who seemed pretty well up on the various models (and not just the current models) and you can hear in the stores that the customers want to talk about the watches and their watches and it strikes me that it would be a good idea for the staff to be properly trained to deal with this, let's not forget they are selling watches worth a lot of money and somebody spending multiple thousands of pounds probably would like to be served by someone who knew the range and history of the various models.
First was the Grande Carrera Calibre 36 with the caliper (with the red accents and red stitched strap). I have been thinking about the Carreras and Grande Carreras for a while but feared they would be too big for me. I needn't have worried. Taking off my Aquagraph and laying it on the counter, the Grande Carrera felt smaller, probably because it is thinner and much, much lighter than my beast of a diving watch.
Somehow I didn't like the look of it as much as I liked the photographs, I was rather disappointed to tell the truth. I also didn't like the strap much, it seemed rather narrow and the clasp would not shut easily.
I thought while I was there I would try on the black case Monaco Twenty Four with the Gulf Stripes. This was much nicer and confirmed to me that my previous indifference to the Monaco has passed. This was a very nice piece, with a full window on the back, but again fastening the clasp was not an easy task. I have to say that while I liked it, there's no way I would pay nearly £11 grand for it (not the price at Bicester obviously), and it's disappointing that the black case models are all rather expensive. But that's the way it goes I suppose.
Again it looked quite different from the photographs, and again felt quite light and not as substantial as I'd hoped. I think if I was to buy a Carrera I would go for the modern style, but perhaps plainer models. Sadly they did not have the F1 Automatic with the orange and black dial, as I would probably have bought it, assuming it looks like the pictures.
I was quite surprised that the person who served me didn't seem to know what my Aquagraph was, I have previously spoken to a guy in the Cheshire Oaks store who seemed pretty well up on the various models (and not just the current models) and you can hear in the stores that the customers want to talk about the watches and their watches and it strikes me that it would be a good idea for the staff to be properly trained to deal with this, let's not forget they are selling watches worth a lot of money and somebody spending multiple thousands of pounds probably would like to be served by someone who knew the range and history of the various models.