Classifying Patina with Guillaume K

Patina is a love-it-or-hate-it topic in the watch collector community, and we’re firmly in the “love-it” camp at DVW. The Patina Boy himself brings us some incredible scholarship and insight into patina and why it’s worth a second look.

We spoke to Guillaume K (@the_patina_boy on Instagram) about his thoughts on patina and his world-class collection — but we got way more than we bargained for, as he’s created a patina classification system that will definitely be its own future article. Stay tuned for that, but in the meantime, enjoy some stunning photos and jump into the mind of a patina connoisseur. 

Joshua Cameron: Introduce yourself a little — who are you, where are you based?
Guillaume K: I’m a 34-year-old vintage watches enthusiast living in France. I go by the nickname “The Patina Boy” in my humble horological adventures on Instagram.

JC: How long have you been into this hobby? What brought you to it?
GK: Technically, I have been into watches since I was a kid, but through different phases and magnitudes. I was very interested in “high-tech” digital watches. I really enjoyed wearing a very solid Casio G-shock and especially a Casio that had a touch screen with a calculator (this was in the 90s!). A friend of mine even had a Digital watch with infra-red signals that could mimic a TV remote control, this was so freaking cool. 

Fast forward to 2008 in a flea market in Tokyo, I stopped at a watchmaker’s stand who had several vintage watches displayed on the floor. It was my first encounter with vintage watches, and what an encounter — I was mesmerized. He showed me different pieces and as he saw those sparkles in my eyes, he told me to swing by his shop the next day. So obviously the next day I paid him a visit and he showed me so many different watches. I ended up buying my first vintage watch which was a Swiss Thoresen Landeron 48 chronograph from the 40’s.

I really liked the patina of this watch (at the time I had no idea what “patina” was), and the cool combination of the blue tachymeter scale with a leather strap of the same colour. He also gave me a few cheap movements to play with. From this moment on, I’d fallen into the vintage watches rabbit hole. I literally spent all my free time looking up the different movements on the internet, learning about ETA, Valjoux, Venus, Landeron and how they differed from each other. I was always fascinated by magic performances, and I am interested in economics, so I think the common denominator with watches is the need to understand the underlying mechanisms. So my first appeal for vintage watches was strangely as much mechanics as it was aesthetics. Then I looked up all the different vintage watches I could find on the internet to try to understand what I liked. At first, I was into white dial chronos and hated divers. I guess your tastes always evolve when collecting.

JC: What's the draw to patina for you?
GK: As you know, patina was the factor that caught my eye before I entered the horological dimension. To me it summarizes the essence of watch collecting, but to build up a more structured answer, I searched on the internet for better descriptions of patina. I was surprised to only find brief or vague articles on the topic, but nothing covering the subject deep enough to list or classify patinas, so I thought why not do the exercise myself? I will try to share my view of the different kinds of patina, though there are probably plenty others and the list is incomplete so far.

I tried to categorize patinas into “even” and “uneven”. Even patinas would basically be colour shifts from the original colour of the dial. I have mentioned here the most common and sought after ones: light dial patina shifts (tropical, tobacco, salmon) and dark dial patina shifts (caramel and chocolate). These are usually results from sun-exposure & oxidation — the more exposure, the darker the tone (from light yellow to dark brown). They give a very warm impression as if you were carrying some tropical micro-climate on your wrist. These usually alter the colour of the dial but leave the inscriptions untouched, contrary to ghost patinas. Ghosted dials have a faded colour (therefore a lighter tone, in opposition to “coloured patinas” exhibiting darker tones) and often faded inscriptions too. The combination of both gives an impression of a virgin dial with a diluted output where dial paint and inscriptions blend in. I understand the true nature of patina as a materialisation of time decay (as watches locked in safes for decades can develop patina while never in contact with sunlight, humidity or any external factor). Basically, patina = time.

We then have the uneven patinas, which are probably more interesting as they are idiosyncratic. Indeed, each type of uneven patina is the result of a different causal factor, but many of them are water-related. Let’s start with the most controversial uneven patina: the water-damaged dials. These usually present as very noticeable brown patches of dried water, and both the heterogeneity and the brutality of its colour makes this patina the less-loved of them all. They are usually even seen as a discount factor when pricing vintage watches, contrary to smoother patinas sometimes adding a premium to the price. A more refined version of this patina would be rust patches. These have smaller, more delicate and homogenous rusty areas across the dial showcasing an old school look (this kind of patina is still pretty hardcore and is not loved by everyone, but I love it!).

As we are still in water-related patinas, there’s no better moment to mention dive watches. Those should have spent hours in salty water which might have crystallized on the dial in a polka dot patchwork, or in a starry night pattern (“stardust” dials). Sometimes humidity can even alter the texture of the dial itself by blistering the paint or creating a thin layer of moisture on the dial.

Some uneven patinas are not necessarily water related, but probably more linked to oxidation. Dials might have dried out and part of the paint could have fallen off (“scattered paint” patinas) or oxidation might have cracked the material on the dial’s base layer (“spider” dials) creating an intricate spider’s web look. Some patinas are purely related to the radioactivity contained in the lume of the hands or indices, creating radium burns or fading on the dials. And sometimes, all of the above combine into absolutely unique patinas (stardust, chocolate, etc.).

This has mostly been a classification of patina on dials, but patina also happens on bezels. The patina factor that exists for bezels and not dials is friction, in addition to oxidation and light-exposure to offer faded bezels. Those are very appreciated therefore often faked as the end result can be easily reached by bleaching bezels. Another factor of bezel patina can be the presence of radium, even though this was pretty rare, it could be found in references like the Rolex GMT Master 6542 blending bezel fading and radium burns.

I’ve done my best to categorize the most common types of patina, but obviously there are as many patina types as there are watches. This opens the door to patina as a vector of uniqueness. There are way too many factors that come into play for patina to be effectively controlled — all patina factors act randomly to create this output on the dial/bezel, it’s impossible to tell a singular story. This is a feature that I love about patina, it reveals the true identity of the watch just as fingerprints disclose a unique DNA — this patina retraces the history of the watch.

Patina tells you what the watch went through, each layer or variation of patina adding to the mystery of the watch. Patina literally creates a new dimension to what might otherwise be a regular production-run watch, in stark contrast against more pristine contemporary watches who currently can only offer their one dimensional immaculate dials. Looking at a dial textured by the scars of time gives so much more substance to the watch. The life of the watch continues too, as the current texture will develop and add other dimensions incrementally every day it’s on your wrist.

JC: Do you have a favorite piece in your collection?

GK: I would have to pick my Aquastar Deepstar Mk. 1. It has been a grail of mine, unattainable, left for older days. But a great opportunity popped out of the blue and I didn’t think twice. This timekeeper has such a fantastic feeling on the wrist, such a powerful dial with a strong tobacco patina, exquisitely balanced against the eggshell subdial and the silver coloured chapter ring. The patina of this watch is the most versatile and mysterious of any of my watches, it literally never looks the same whenever I look at it, giving a different patina output every time I look at the dial from another angle or in a different light.

 5. Is there a grail you're hunting for?

My medium-term grails are an Aquastar Deepstar “maxi dial” and an Aquastar Airstar. The ultimate grail would be a dark caramel Omega Lollipop Speedmaster 2998. I hope someday I’ll be able to find one, but honestly, even a non-chocolate non-lollipop 2998 would still be fantastic, and probably more reasonable. But I should aim for the moon for my biggest horological dream I guess, it’s called the moonwatch after all! (Well, not this one, but you get it).

You can find Guillaume and his incredible collection on Instagram at @the_patina_boy. If you have an interesting story or topic you’d like to see covered on the site, let us know through our Contact form or send a message to @iamjoshcameron on Instagram.