In conversation with Alex Gedye of The Swiss Watch Company
By The Prodigal Fool, published on 24 May 2010
A couple of weeks ago, we popped in to see our friends at The Swiss Watch Company. Wait! Our friends? What are we saying!? These guys have taken thousands from us over the years without so much as a smile or a thank you. Yet, like some deluded lovestruck schoolgirl, we’re still going back for more. Sometimes it feels like they’re the street corner dope dealer and we’re the crack whore… Sometimes. Most of the time, we think SWC is one of the more impressive dealers of quality used watches in the UK. Their prices are fair, their stock enormous and they have an excellent service centre.
The primary purpose of the visit was for The Prodigal Fool to pick up a 14060M Submariner that he wants to put on a NATO strap. Did he find what he was looking for? Well, that will have to wait for another post. What we want to do today is bring you some highlights of the chat we had with The Swiss Watch Company’s Alex Gedye while we were there.
It’s fair to say that – like all too many of our endeavours – the interview was a shambolic affair, lacking in both structure and direction. Luckily with a guy as knowledgeable and passionate as Alex, that doesn’t matter much. Like the best watches, all you have to do is wind him up and he’s off.
In less than five minutes, Alex covers the various Rolex GMT-Master variants, Magnum P.I.’s watch choice, the Huey pilots in the Vietnam war ripping off their GMT bezels, why PanAm ground crew used to replace their white dials with black dials (we bet they regret that now!), the enormous appeal of the Submariner, and why he prefers Rolex’s older models to the latest generation bling fest. Oh, and then – just when we thought he was surely spent – he whipped out a very clever twist on the Submariner LV.
Enjoy.
In conversation with Alex Gedye of The Swiss Watch Company
A couple of weeks ago, we popped in to see our friends at The Swiss Watch Company. Wait! Our friends? What are we saying!? These guys have taken thousands from us over the years without so much as a smile or a thank you. Yet, like some deluded lovestruck schoolgirl, we’re still going back for [...]
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6 Responses to “In conversation with Alex Gedye of The Swiss Watch Company”
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We do our best to please our audience but that may be a stretch for us, Pieter.
The filming was the very best camera work that Straight-Six could muster. And the idiots in the background? Well, let’s just say that we were 50% of them…
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Nuts for NATO « The Prodigal Guide
31 May 2010
[...] again, you have to get up-to-date on our recent watch acquisitions. You might have read that we recently went looking for a modern Rolex Submariner. What we wanted was an everyday knock-around watch that would be as happy being worn under the [...]
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28 June 2010
[...] remember a while back we purchased a bunch of NATO straps for our new 14060M Submariner. Well, they arrived. And for the best part of a week we stared at them lovingly, then stared at our [...]
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A Prodigal July « The Prodigal Guide
1 August 2010
[...] At number 10 – Just because: The Rolex LV Submariner – In which a post over on Jake’s Rolex Watch Blog prompts us to celebrate one of our favourite versions of the venerable Submariner, the one we affectionately refer to as ‘Froggie’. Want the ultimate new but old Sub? Take one LV Submariner, swap the bezel for a black one and put the whole thing on a NATO strap. That’s how Alex Gedye rolls. [...]
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A Prodigal August « The Prodigal Guide
6 September 2010
[...] At number 4 – Just because: The Rolex LV Submariner – In which a post over on Jake’s Rolex Watch Blog prompts us to celebrate one of our favourite versions of the venerable Submariner, the one we affectionately refer to as ‘Froggie’. Want the ultimate new but old Sub? Take one LV Submariner, swap the bezel for a black one and put the whole thing on a NATO strap. That’s how Alex Gedye rolls. [...]
Pieter Lammerse
24 May 2010
Please do this again, but with decent filming and without the idiots in the background…..