INTERVIEW: Mr Otto Springs a Surprise Interview on the TAG Heuer Enthusiast!

Mr Otto William: Now the table has turned. Gladly we will extract information from the interviewer himself, this will be fun. Let's start!

First thing first, why Tag Heuer ? What's with the love for Tag Heuer?

Why TAG Heuer? I don't know, it's like something that's always been there; right from building a model of the Williams F1 car when I was about 12 years old, I loved the Techniques d'Avant Garde logo and just the exotic nature of those words made an impression on me at that age, even though I didn't know what it meant or what the company did at that time (some kind of aviation business I now understand). However, I kind of lost interest in F1 when I discovered Heavy Metal aged 13... I still watched it but not as religiously and I didn't buy magazines like I did before and most of my time was spent listening to music and trying to play the guitar!

I spent the late eighties forming a band, which then ran it's course right before Nirvana came along and temporarily rendered 80% of Metal redundant, so I came back to the sport fully at the end of 1993, just in time to watch all the 1994 races, and given what a tragic and dramatic year that was it's not surprising that I was gripped and fully rediscovered my love for F1. I was a Jean Alesi fan first and foremost, but since he was driving for (a completely useless) Ferrari at the time, mostly I just supported whoever had the best chance of beating Michael, because by ramming Damon off the track in Adelaide he totally offended my 'British' sense of fair play... hahaha. So by default I supported the Williams and subsequently the McLarens and of course I saw the TAG Heuer logo on the McLaren cars and I think this sunk in over the years, so that when I started to take an interest in watches a few years later there was only one brand I was going to gravitate to.

Quite why that has turned into the obsession that it has I don't know... I bought my first TAG Heuer in 2004 (actually, my first TAG Heuer was an eBay fake a couple of years earlier, but we'll gloss over that I think!) and I made do with that for about nine years, perfectly happy, like a normal person who has one nice watch to wear when they go out. Then in 2013 my wife and I had some insurance policy mature and SHE suggested we should both use our 'free' money to buy a watch. I figured I'd go to Bicester and get a Formula 1 for £800 and pocket the balance, instead I bought the Aquagraph and had to find another £400 to pay for it! I didn't take that at all lightly, but it was by far the coolest watch in the shop and I would have regretted it if I hadn't. Right from my first TAG Heuer I realised that it's (usually) better to buy the one you really like than one that's a cheaper alternative, because if you do that you'll eventually wish you'd bought the one you really wanted.

And then a few years later I started to get more and more obsessed with the brand, strangely I was never that interested in other brands, I think because all the other brands that appealed to me were so far out of my price range that there wasn't any point in even looking at them. None of the close competitors to TAG Heuer ever really interested me, the Omegas for example. And the more I learned about TAG Heuer's 'bad boy image' in the watch world, and how much of an outcast the brand seemed, the more it appealed to me. I guess you could see a parallel with Heavy Metal in that sense, that despite it's immense popularity it's still seen as the black sheep...

Then I guess I started my blog in October 2016 and since then it's just snowballed from there, with watches, catalogues, hats, coats, bags, coffee mugs, water bottles,... hahaha! I had a big box under my bed but now I've built a cabinet to put some of this stuff in so that I can actually see it.

I see, now that is interesting to know how some brands can really have impact in someone's life.

It's certainly had an impact in mine, it's a daily thing for me to keep my blog going, but I enjoy it so it's not really a chore. Well sometimes it can be if I don't have any inspiration, but mostly it's great!


We all learned from the forum that you recently visited the Tag Heuer headquarter. What can you say as watch enthusiast about their facilities ? Are you impressed ? What do you think that can be improved, as a relentless supporter of the brand ?

Honestly, that whole trip was something completely extraordinary. First off, I hadn't been on a plane for over ten years, and then I got to visit the HR Giger museum in Gruyeres which was something I never, ever thought I would do. This was the fulfillment of a dream all on it's own, ever since I discovered Giger through the Alien films and later through the cover of Celtic Frost's 'To Mega Therion' album in 1985 and subsequently through his art books like 'Necronomicon I & II'. But even while I was there I was acutely aware that it was merely an appetizer for the trip to La Chaux de Fonds the next day... so really, just getting off the bus and walking up to the factory in the blazing heat was so exciting (and I'm not someone who's given to over-excitement) and so... otherworldly almost, that I wasn't in any mind to be disappointed or unimpressed. To be honest, walking through the car park I was blown away just seeing the TAG Heuer logo painted on the concrete, hahahaha... I was honestly like a little kid, hahaha.

I think it's kind of strange, when you get to visit a manufacture and you realise it is basically on an industrial estate. It's a very nice industrial estate, very clean and tidy and smart, but still... it's not exactly 'romantic' is it? We tend to have this idealized vision of watches being crafted together on mountain tops, I mean we know this isn't the case, but it's part of the 'dream' isn't it, it's part of the sales pitch if you like, and part of the reason we are prepared to 'overpay' for luxury products.

So the building itself is, when you take a step back, a factory... it's a nice factory, right enough, but it's a factory. People who live there drive by it every day and probably don't even notice it... it's not like it has some mystical aura about it, only to lunatics like me, hahaha.

The museum is impressive though, it's quite shocking to enter the museum. The reception is quite ordinary save for the watch pictures on the walls, but once you are permitted to enter the museum it's like walking into a spaceship or something. There's a sliding door to the left of the reception desk and you walk through into this dramatically lit room and it's just like 'Wow!'... I loved it in there, I wish I could have spent the whole day in there really, 45 minutes was such a short time to get round it all... but you know, it was amazing to be there at all

The testing facilities are also quite impressive (albeit in a different way), especially when you realize that they do testing for other brands as well. They obviously take that side of things very seriously (as they should), and they certainly have a lot of machines dedicated to ensuring their products aren't as fragile as we think they are.

The manufacture I visited is only one of four in Switzerland I believe and while they do a lot of work there, a lot of it is 'design' oriented, which isn't really something you can 'see'. They showed us silicon models of watches in the design process (obviously not 'new' models) and I saw prototypes of older watches (including the Grand Monaco, which never went into production), but really the main thing they do there is final assembly and testing.

I can't honestly say that there's anything I could state needs improvement, I think they have a pretty good handle on what they are doing from my perspective, and if other companies also use their testing facilities that must tell you something I would think?

I've seen some "transformation" in your collection, what I can define as a shift, from chronograph to more of a three-hander watch recently. Am I correct in this observation? What do you think caused the transformation?

Yes, I think you are correct, and subconsciously I might say that it's partly because I'm a slightly wary of chronographs going wrong and costing money to fix! Every time I buy a chrono off eBay there's this awful moment when you get it and you have to test it... I've got one quartz chronograph that doesn't function properly and another one that's a bit flaky and it does annoy me a bit. I've never yet had a problem with the main hands of a watch, so that's probably part of it... but also, I guess it's just the way things have gone. I sold my blue chrono Aquaracer and replaced it with a blue Aquaracer three hander, but then I've just bought the Pilot which is another 1/10 quartz chrono... which works perfectly thankfully!


Broadly, watches can be specified into dress, diver, aviation, and racing. What is your favourite category to have and why?

Definitely not Aviation watches, as much as I love my TAG Heuer 'Pilot' watch, generally speaking 'Pilot' watches do nothing for me at all, especially the ones with the enormous 'onion' crowns. I don't have much use for dress watches as such and generally find them quite dull. Sometimes I might find one I like, like the TAG Heuer Twin Time (yeah, I know they aren't really 'dress' watches) or those grey Carreras I reviewed a while back, but it's just not me. I definitely gravitate towards the diving and racing watches, hard to say which I prefer, but probably the racing watches... my two most expensive watches are Carreras after all. It's funny, I'm drawn to chronographs even though I never use them, they cost more to service and they are more likely to go wrong.... but they just look cool, and that's what it boils down to at the end of the day I guess.

That said, I really like dive watches too... but looking at my collection, I do have a LOT of chronographs don't I?

Your answer definitely has a connection with my follow through question. What do you think of luxury sport watches or as some people termed it "adventure watch". You know, bracelet, water resistant between 100m or less, mostly only 3 hander with or without date function (AP royal oak, VC Overseas, and most recently, Autavia calibre 5).

I liked the Autavia a lot more when I got it on my wrist than I did from the pictures, but it never convinced me enough to add it to my 'wants' list. I do like the Royal Oak (but prefer the 'Offshore' versions), I'm not so convinced by the Vacheron Constantin Overseas... I don't know, since maybe the last two years I have found that I expend very little energy analyzing other brands as I'm so focused on TAG Heuer, but I can't help but question exactly what I'm getting for my money when talking about steel watches at £10,000+

Let's move along. What is your personal view about a watch company that is more about maintaining and perhaps improving its already superb quality with less radical design of the product itself from year to year or should I be blunt, Rolex? Compare that to Tag Heuer approach; which approach will you take should you be the CEO of a watch company ?

I can honestly say Rolex has never really spoken to me... I find their whole brand a little bit 'dull' to be honest and there isn't really even one Rolex watch that I genuinely aspire to own. I also find it kind of funny that to the man in the street that Rolex is the 'ultimate' watch, but when you learn more about watches you realise that Rolex isn't quite what it seems... I mean before I got more into watches that was my impression, I'd never heard of Patek or any of the other high end watchmakers like Greubel Forsey or MB&F.

It must be kinda boring to be a Rolex fan, I mean if they put a different bracelet on a watch (not even a new bracelet mind, just a different bracelet) that's considered a seismic shift! How do you write a blog with that to work with? Hahaha. The 'Best & Worst of 2019' post would be a quick read wouldn't it?

When I look at my collection, it's so varied even though it's one brand, I like that. I couldn't collect just Rolex, if I liked Rolex I'd have to have something else... you know it blows my mind that people collect Submariners, they get excited by a line of red text, I'm sorry but I don't get it.

But if I was Rolex I would be cautious too, I mean come on, what a position to be in. If people are queuing up to buy your products why would you be wasting time and money producing limited editions, new bezels, dials and bracelets? They are playing a blinder and reaping the rewards, but... for me it's boring; although they do have some spectacularly ugly versions of some of their watches, which almost makes them interesting!

So for me, TAG's way is better. I know people moan about there being too many limited editions, and that's probably true. I mean just look at this year, I can think of nearly 30 off the top of my head, that's more than one every fortnight... but a lot of those are region specific, so it seems worse than it really is, most people wouldn't know about most of them, it's only people like me and the Calibre 11 crew finding them and posting them that raises awareness, but again the man in the street wouldn't know about most of them - not least because most of these special models never even make it to the stores. But these models aren't really for the man in the street, or the man who has one or two watches, really they are for people like me, and more realistically people like me but with deeper pockets...

There is this famous mantra in the watch community that goes like this : "I would never spend more than (certain amount of money) for (certain name of brand)". Do you think this is justified and why?

To some extent it's a financial decision and I get that. If you lay down £8000 on a Submariner, you won't lose much if anything and that is a consideration that can't be ignored. I mean, I wonder how the Nanograph will fare in the future? It's about £21,000 new... I can imagine that dropping to £15,000 in a year or two maybe? It's difficult because I never buy a watch thinking I'm going to sell it, but on the other hand, I firmly believe that you never know if you love a watch until you own it, so there's always that nervousness about a watch purchase and the potential for loss it involves.

But then again this applies to brands in every price range, there's only so far you would go for a Rolex I would have thought? I can't see that a £100,000 (new) Rolex would be a great investment either as it's pushing through the ceiling for that brand. Ultimately the market defines what these ceilings are, if you could be 100% sure that you would never sell then you could make a decision to pay £100,000 for a Rolex or a TAG Heuer based solely on your feelings about it and nothing else. But how many of us can say that 100%, really?

Still, the thing about that is that the obvious answer is buy it pre-owned and let someone else take the hit, just like with cars... I wouldn't buy a Nanograph new, that's for sure, but pre-owned it could make a lot of sense.


I lose count on how many watches you puchased over this year. Has it crossed your mind someday you flip most of them for ONE grail watch? Which one would you rather, a cabinet full of watches in a wide range of styles but none of which is grail watch or having no more than 2 watches, but one of them is grail watch?

Hahaha, well... yes obviously it has crossed my mind that my collection adds up to a lot, I mean I could potentially sell everything and buy a Royal Oak Offshore, but... a) that would be a bit boring, b) I wouldn't feel comfortable wearing a single watch that cost £20,000+ and c) I really don't have a 'grail' watch as such... which sounds a bit odd I know. I guess if I did have a grail watch it would be a V4 Monaco or something, but again I really don't think I'd feel comfortable wearing something like that. So, no I think I'll stick with my larger collection of less expensive watches.

What do you think of people that wear 2 watches? One on each wrist.

Does anyone actually do that... apart from the late General Schwarzkopf?


If let's say Tag never purchase Heuer in the first place. Heuer will still be Heuer. How do you imagine it would be different than what it is now? And would you still be a supporter of brand?

Ha, good question... but I think if TAG hadn't purchased Heuer it's possible that Heuer wouldn't even exist anymore. I guess it would have been different, but how would it have been? There's this idea 'out there' that it would have been so much better, but I don't buy it. The market changed and Heuer would have had to move with it; I assume most of the people who were there at the end of the Heuer era were there at the start of the TAG Heuer era so while we might not have had the 'plastic' F1, we'd probably still have had the S/EL and the 4000... I don't think 'Heuer' had some magic wand that would make everything perfect, and if they had then why didn't they wave it in the early 80s and make some of those 'wonderful' watches they were making go disappear?

I think it would have been better if TAG had bought Heuer and saved the company but not changed the name, then I think a lot of the negativity would have been avoided in the first place. I only really have one 'Heuer' era watch and that is my 3000. As much as I love it (and I really do, despite it's unusual look), I wouldn't say it is in any way superior to my S/ELs, which are probably my next oldest pieces...

Would I still be a supporter? I don't know. If they made the same watches then maybe, but the logo is one of the things that first drew me to the brand so I'm not sure... I never got as excited by the 'Heuer' logo on the Ferraris of Lauda and Reutemann as I did by the TAG Heuer logo on the McLarens and latterly on the Red Bull. Speaking of the logo, when it first changed to the more stretched logo I thought it looked odd, but now I think it looks much better. Quite surprising really, considering the impact it had on me over the years...


Now I don't know if you have any, but please name few other brands that you think are cool and you might purchase in near future. Please try and try harder if you must.

I have my late father's Citizen, which is nothing special, but it amazes me. It lives in a box and every time I pick it up it starts moving... I've never wound it! How does it do that? Hahaha. Okay, I know that's not what you meant so I will try and answer you properly. The watch I tried on and genuinely wanted to buy was the Breitling Avenger Hurricane 45mm, the black and yellow one with the Breitlight case. But it was £7500 or something like that, which is too much for me... but generally I'm not a fan of Breitling, especially now that they want to be known for their 'retro' pieces.

I also tried on a Cartier Santos 100 in black DLC with a black dial and a red second hand one time and that was very nice. I do like Richard Mille, but that's completely out of the question. Probably the brand or watch I am most likely to buy that isn't a TAG Heuer (if money wasn't an issue) would be Audemars Piguet, and specifically a Royal Oak Offshore. Aside from that there are some Hublots that I quite like, and maybe Zenith. I'm sure there have been others, but nothing is springing to mind...

Grand Carrera. Yay or Nay?

I want to say Yay, but I've owned one and sold it... and I look at them sometimes and think they are cool and sometimes I think they are quite awful. I did see a chronograph on Watchfinder a while back (I either reviewed it or it's in my pile of 'to-do' posts) which was a black and gold GC Chronograph on a rubber strap, that was really nice, but as always the PVD case was chipped...

I was quite excited at the idea of the Grand Carrera coming back, but now it seems to have gone to the same scrap heap as the Autavia chronograph, so...  I do have a very nice Grand Carrera catalogue though, and I wouldn't mind one of the 300 Limited Edition blue dial chronographs they made for the Japanese market.


You know, we both are Tag Heuer fans; but although it's not definitive and it's never a rule set in stone, neither of us own one of the most iconic of all Tag Heuer pieces, I refer of course to the Monaco. Do you see yourself getting a Monaco in the future?

It's a glaring omission from the collection isn't it? And I once came so close to buying a Monaco 24... but, it didn't happen. I think if I get a Monaco now it will probably be the Calibre 12 one in the Monaco 24 case, I think that is very nice. They are in the outlets now, so it's presumably it's been discontinued, but even there it's £4300 or something... I don't know if I like it enough to pay quite that much. Hmm, I think the Monaco is always going to be this elephant in the room for me, there's not that many that I really like, and it's not something you can seemingly get a bargain on, so it will probably just drag on and on without resolution until... well, until I eventually get one I guess. Hahaha.

But to tell you the absolute truth, for me the 'resin' Formula 1 was more of an 'icon' that I had to get than the Monaco. Because ultimately the Monaco belongs to 'Heuer' and not 'TAG Heuer'. I guess the Monaco 24 belongs to TAG Heuer though... and it's definitely more in tune with my tastes. If I come into some money at some point I think a Monaco 24 or a Calibre 12 in a Monaco 24 case will definitely be on the cards! I definitely wish I'd bought a '24' from Bicester Village when I had the chance, they bottomed out at £5000!!!


Last but not least, we jumped into the questions without having properly given you the chance to introduce yourself. I was trying some machine-gunning interview style with you, so please tell us about yourself. I've known you first as Aquagraph (my screen name on the Calibre 11 forum), clearly a watch that you love and are associated with, but please do tell us about the person behind Aquagraph and tagheuerenthusiast.com

Well... I'm 50 years old, and I live in the UK. I work in the engineering sector and part of my job is supplying the Formula 1 supply chain, which sounds a lot cooler than it actually is, haha. I'm married for 26 years and I have two cats (one of which is called Mr Biver!) and I still like Heavy Metal and Formula 1. I also like electronic music as well, I got into that about ten years ago, first through Depeche Mode and then discovered all the other sub-genres of that kind of music, some of which are very melodic and some of which are loud and shouty.

I like art, particularly Dali, Giger, surrealist art and also Laurie Lipton who does the most incredibly detailed pencil drawings. I have had a go at painting myself, but it's not for me I don't think, I used to draw constantly when I was a child but I seem to have lost a lot of that ability over the years. I am also a frustrated drummer, I've only sat behind a drumkit a couple of times, and had no clue what I was doing, and yet I can drum like Dave Lombardo on a desk with my fingers... hahaha.

Other than that, the past few years watches have become a major interest and investment of time (and money) and I'm pleased that my wife shares my interest in watches and TAG Heuer (not quite to the same degree though, obviously), it certainly makes it easier to justify another new watch, although at this point it's getting harder, her eyes were definitely rolling big-time when I brought home that F1 Senna the other day...


Well that's all I have for now. Thank you for the turning table opportunity. Hope you enjoy this rather surprise interview. Until then, have a nice day. Mr O, signing out!

Well, thank you Otto, it was my pleasure!