For the seller

Selling a vintage watch collection

A vintage watch collection is best passed on the way it was built: the important watches and the everyday ones together, with their boxes, straps and spare links. Most of the harm is done before the sale, by polishing, servicing, replacing parts, or selling the best watches off first.

Watch collections are rarely just watches. There are boxes, papers, bracelets taken off years ago, spare links in an envelope, a tin of old straps, a notebook kept by the collector. All of it counts. Here is what to know before any of it leaves the drawer.

What not to do before you sell

  • Do not polish the cases. Sharp edges and original finishing are a large part of what a collector looks for. A polished case cannot be un-polished.
  • Do not replace dials, hands, bezels or crowns. Original parts, even worn ones, matter more than new ones. A faded bezel or a dial that has turned is often exactly what somebody is looking for.
  • Do not have everything serviced first. Buyers who know watches would rather see a watch as it is.
  • Keep the paperwork and the extras together. Boxes, guarantee papers, receipts, spare links and original straps belong with the watch, and they are easily thrown away by someone who does not know.
  • Do not take the best watches out. The watches the collector was proudest of are what make the rest a collection. Without them it is a drawer of watches, and much harder to place.

What makes a vintage watch collectable

The reference, not the brand alone. Within one maker, one reference can be far more sought after than another. The number on the caseback usually tells you which one you have.

Originality. A watch with its own dial, hands, bezel and bracelet matters more than a better-looking one that has been put together from parts.

Condition of the case and dial. Unpolished edges and a clean, original dial matter more than whether it is running today.

Completeness. The box and papers belong to the watch. So does the original bracelet, even if it was taken off decades ago.

Seiko: why the everyday ones matter

Many collections are full of Seikos, and many people assume they are nothing special. Some are not, but not all. The Seiko 6139, made from 1969, was one of the first automatic chronographs and went to space on Skylab. The Seiko 6309-7040, the cushion-cased diver made from about 1976 to 1988, is the shape the modern Turtle still copies. Originals of both are collected seriously, and both are exactly the kind of watch that is spoiled when a replacement dial or bezel goes on.

The ways a watch collection can go

A dealer or auction house takes the watches it wants and leaves the rest with you, often after months of waiting.

Selling yourself, one watch at a time, is the most work: photographs of the dial, caseback and movement, questions about originality, and buyers who expect to be told everything.

One buyer for all of it. This is what we do. We take the whole collection: the watches that are the heart of it, and the straps, the tins, the broken ones and everything else around them. The story of how the collection was built is recorded and goes with every watch to its next owner, with the collector's name on it.

Wherever the watches are

Unseend is based in Rotterdam, in the Netherlands, and buys collections anywhere in the world. A watch collection is small enough to send, fully insured and arranged by us, and for a collection worth the journey we come to it and pack it ourselves.

Short answers

Should I service a vintage watch before selling it?

Usually not. Many buyers prefer to see it as it is.

Is it better to sell a watch collection all at once?

Yes, if you want it to go on as a collection. All at once, the important watches and the everyday ones stay together with their story, and there is nothing left in the drawer afterwards.

Do you buy single watches?

No, only collections. Mixed collections, with watches alongside cameras, audio or other things, are the ones we like best.

Why we keep the story

A collection is not a pile of objects.

It is years of somebody deciding what was worth keeping, and sold off piece by piece that is the first thing to go. So before anything is sold, we sit down with you and record it: how it started, what the best of it was, the piece that got away. That story stays on every object with the collector's name, and goes with it to whoever keeps it next. You get a page where you can see where each piece ended up.

Three ways the story gets recorded

On camera, where it lives. We travel to the collection and film it properly: you talking about how it started, the room and the shelves as they are, the objects in your hands. Wherever in the world the collection happens to be.

On a call. If the collection is sent to us rather than collected, we have the same conversation over a video call and write it up, with one photograph of the shelf as it stood.

In writing. If you would rather not talk at all, answer a handful of questions in your own time and in your own words. It goes on the objects exactly as you wrote it.

It never changes anything else, and you can always say no to it. Some conversations run ten minutes, some an afternoon. Read the collections we have taken on

If it is a whole collection

We buy whole collections, not single pieces: one person takes all of it, and the story is kept with every object. Tell us what you have and a person replies within two days.

How passing it on works, in full

1The collection
What is in it
Pick everything that applies. Something else opens a line to tell us.
Roughly how many pieces
A guess is fine. Nobody has counted.
How would you describe it
There is no wrong answer here, and a lot of ordinary is a normal collection.
One or two sentences. This is the question we care about most.
2Where it is, and how it could reach us
Town and country is enough.
How could it reach us
Unseend is in Rotterdam, the Netherlands. Sending and bringing are as welcome as a visit; if it is sent, we pay the freight and insure it.
When does it need to be gone
No hurry is a good answer. It lets us plan a visit properly.
3Condition and photographs
In your own words. Broken, incomplete or untested is fine and is normal; it only needs saying.
Photographs
Three to ten photographs The room and the shelves as they stand. Phone photographs are fine, and a slow walk round on video says more than any of them.Send them to hello@unseend.com
Or attach them to the reply that comes back within two days. Any of them works, and nothing is looked at until a person reads it. Do not clean up first — the shelves as they stand tell us more than a tidy arrangement.
4The number, and the story
A number or a range, whatever you have in mind. You will get an honest answer either way.
Would you tell the story of it
Filmed at the collection wherever it is, on a video call, or written in your own time. It never changes the price.
5How to reach you
The reply comes here, from a person, within two days.
Only if you would rather be called.

Answered within two days, by the person who would come, and by email at every step after that. Nothing you send is shared with anyone, and your photographs are deleted if we do not go ahead.

This form is protected by hCaptcha; its privacy policy and terms apply.