Worn & Wound
Unplugging: Combatting Enthusiasm Fatigue
I’m a pandemic-era watch enthusiast. Stuck inside along with the rest of the world, I found myself with an unusual amount of time on my hands in the spring of 2020. My interest in watches had been passing at best, reflected in my recent purchase of a quartz Citizen dress watch that, looking back, was likely the most generic version of a bland 3 handed watch available on the entire internet. It was this office-inspired watch (which I was not even allowed to wear to the now-shuttered office) that probably led YouTube’s algorithm to throw a watch review into the mix as it attempted to entertain me for hours on end. Imagine my surprise when my former coworker and Worn and Wound’s own Zach Kazan was on my screen, talking about the water resistance and case diameter of a Seiko. And just like that, I stumbled into an engaged group of local collectors that were more than happy to get a newbie like me up to speed. Sure, it felt like the world was on fire, but at least I had a new hobby and community to distract me as it burned. Stories similar to mine were playing out all over the world as a new wave of enthusiasts used an influx of time (and sometimes money) to give themselves self-curated crash courses in horology. For those of this cohort that still spend their free time reading watch blogs, it’s been a wild ride. We witnessed (and perhaps fueled) the rise of hype culture, the skyrocketing of prices, the divisive power of a plastic Speedmaster and the advent of not one...
