SPOTLIGHT ON: 6000 Series Gold Automatic

WH5144.FC6065

You would be forgiven for thinking that this is a woman's watch (indeed I went to the trouble of going back and checking because I couldn't quite believe it either) but this is in fact a full size man's watch. Not even a mid-size unisex watch,,, not only that but this watch was being sold just 20 years ago!

I'm not a fan of the 6000 series watches anyway, to me it's a Kiriumish bezel with a very pretentious and rather unnecessarily ostentatious case, and in gold it looks even more OTT. But add in the 'purple/violet' strap (it's not blue, though it may appear at first to be so, it is listed in the catalogue as purple/violet') and matching face and this has got 'as worn by the Prince Regent in Blackadder III' written all over it.

I mean 'Lawks a Lordy' this is some kind of statement watch we're talking about here. And there's plenty more where this came from as well, a glance through the catalogue shows all sorts of rather tasteless 6000 series, with bits of gold here there and everywhere. All of which makes you wonder how they managed to go from this to the F1 Kirium which I own in just a few short years.

It's night and day in terms of class. What I find hard to believe is that people were actually buying watches like that in the late 90s. I mean, we all know the 80s was a decade of crass decadence and if that watch came from the late 80s it would make a whole lot more sense. Perhaps it's no coincidence that the takeover of TAG by LVMH came in 1999?

Case diameter looks to be somewhere in the high 30mm range, possibly even 40mm, but I can't get a definitive reading on that. An eBay search turned up surprisingly few gold 6000 series, with prices ranging from £600 to a diamond encrusted bezel version approaching £4000. Can't help thinking that no amount of diamonds are going to persuade anybody to shell out £4000 for that when for that money they could get a very nice new TAG Heuer!