KEY POINTS:
Satori menswear founder and managing director Bob Nelson is not afraid to admit that he cuts timing a bit tight and often ends up on the late side for meetings.
But despite this you will never catch him without a watch on his wrist.
Nelson, who has been
in the fashion industry for more than 20 years, began collecting watches 15 years ago as a way to fill in time while visiting foreign cities on his hunt for designer fashion clothes, and now has more than 20 in his collection of dress watches.
His first find was in a Melbourne second-hand watch store where he picked up a Longines Swiss watch made in the 1940s.
"I just saw it and thought it was so beautiful - I liked both the dimensions and the casing."
While some people collect things for their investment value, Nelson says his attraction to watches stems a lot from their ability to be used as accessories.
"In the fashion industry they are one of the acceptable forms of masculine self-ornamentation. In the past men who wore earrings or chains were not readily accepted but with a watch you can do what you like."
His oldest collectible is from the early 1940s and is a World War II watch that was worn by soldiers. He found it in Italy during one of his many trips there.
Many in his collection also come from the 50s and 60s - an era which Nelson says he has a lot of time for.
"Pre-mid 1950s the watches were really too small. I'm 6ft 3 inches [190cm] so I prefer to wear larger watches.
"I don't like many modern watches, they are too glitzy - too shiny. They are over-finished and over-designed.
"The 60s found the right balance between useable features and style."
He collection spans upwards towards the 70s but does not include anything with batteries in it.
"After then you get calligraphy and a lot of graphics become computer generated and mass-produced."
His particular favourites are those with chronographs or multiple inset faces which can be used to monitor time through a stopwatch function.
The cheapest watches he has bought are around $400 to $500 while the most expensive can range up to $50,000. He limits himself to $3000.
These days he does a lot more buying online as he doesn't travel as frequently and admits he probably has a look on Ebay at least once a day, sometimes staying up to 2am just to place bids to beat competition from other timezones.
He says emotionally it's easier to buy than sell because as with many collectors he finds parting with any item difficult. But selling the watches is not physically difficult and there can be up to 40 bidders at any one time for some watches.
"There are literally thousands for sale on Ebay."
His aim now is not to have a vast collection but to improve its quality either through trading watches or buying better ones.
