subject: Casual Or Glamour Design For A New Watch [print this page] Long gone are the times when watches were simple time telling instruments. Today, they have become a part of our lifestyle and as such, they make statements about our personality or social status. Because of this, wearing the right watch for the right occasion may prove a challenge, even for those of us with a keen sense of accessorizing. A distinction which all of us probably had to make when buying a new watch was between several design types - elegant, casual or total glamor. Which one is better?
A harder distinction to make when choosing between the many types of watch design is where casual stops and glamor begins. Designers walk a very broad path between conservative and innovative, where casual is in between, but more towards conservative, while glamor design may be tempted to focus more statements than on functionality - this not being always true, of course.
Casual design watches can be picked up from the crowd by the way their dial looks. As the main feature of conservative design is based on combining minimalism with elegance (white dials, thin indicator hands, roman numerals), the casual design adds several elements on the dial, mainly in the form of additional, smaller dials, used to provide users with additional information. This information ranges from the direction of the North Pole to the value of atmospheric pressure or even the time in several other cities around the globe. While adding multiple functionalities can justify the trend to a certain extent, the question still remains how many times a day the user is interested about barometric pressure.
As such, we may conclude without fear of mistake that dial is the main feature which sets apart different watch designs. Other elements are there to make the difference too, but they are harder interpreted, as they may vary with various factors. For instance, one can say that metal hand straps are sign of a utilitarian approach to the design of a model, while others may argue that there are such things as gold metal straps, which are still metal but denote a rather elegant or glamorous model.
Glamorous designs may be easier explained by examples of watch models targeting a feminine audience. The glamor may come from the unusually large dial, the brightness of the color or the fantasy design of the figures on the dial. The line between glamor and kitsch is easily crossed nowadays, so unless you're sure enough about your choice and are positive that an apparently glamorous acquisition will not embarrass you in front of friends or partners, it is recommended to stick to the classics.
