Watches, Stories, & Gear: H. Moser Opens their First US Boutique, the Friendship Trailer, and a Familiar Face Enters the Watch Industry

“Watches, Stories, and Gear” is a roundup of our favorite content, watch or otherwise, from around the internet. Here, we support other creators, explore interesting content that inspires us, and put a spotlight on causes we believe in. Oh, and any gear we happen to be digging on this week. We love gear.

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Fred Savage Enters the Vintage Watch Verification Game 

While actor Fred Savage is still mostly associated with his iconic run as Kevin Arnold in The Wonder Years, his stock has risen in recent years within the watch community, coming out as a serious collector, particularly of vintage watches. Now he’s turning that enthusiasm into a new business venture, Timepiece Grading Specialists. The mission of TGS is to provide authentication and valuation services to vintage watch collectors (they’ll also provide services like, well, servicing, and storage, for additional fees), and as this article in the New York Times notes, watches that have passed through TGS have already been sold at auction via Sotheby’s, complete with their TGS assessment. We’ve seen many celebrities embrace the watch community, but few have taken the step of entrepreneurship in the way Savage has, so it will be interesting to see how he fares in the notoriously fraught world of vintage watch authentication. 

Gary Gets a Suit 

Several years back, Gary Shteyngart achieved a level of viral fame in the watch community that, frankly, would be hard to recreate today, when The New Yorker published his “Confessions of a Watch Geek” essay. If you haven’t read this piece, it’s a must, and would belong on any list of top pieces of watch writing ever, if such a list were to ever be made. It’s honest, kind of whimsical, and highly specific yet completely relatable (at least if you’re a watch collector, but probably also if you’re deeply involved in any enthusiast pursuit). Recently, Gary contributed a new piece to The Atlantic which strikes me as something of a spiritual sequel. “The Man in the Midnight-Blue Six-Ply Italian-Milled Wool Suit” chronicles his experiences and thoughts about being fitted for a custom suit, and the way he describes how expects a perfectly tailored suit to make him feel will almost certainly resonate with watch collectors – there are many parallels. 

Friendship Gets a Trailer 

Friendship was one of the most talked about movies coming out of the Toronto International Film Festival last year. The film stars Paul Rudd and Tim Robinson, and it’s honestly hard to find an early review or reaction from TIFF that wasn’t some version of “this is the funniest movie ever made.” So, hopes have been high for months, and after getting a look at the first trailer, it feels like it might be at least somewhat worthy of all the hype. While Paul Rudd is certainly a known comedic entity at this point (he has been for decades), Robinson still flies somewhat under the radar. His fans, of course, are enthusiastic, but he’s not a “movie star” yet. In what looks like a turn as an obsessive sociopath (the type of role he was born for) it seems more and more likely that he’ll be a household name soon enough. 

Moser Opens Silicon Valley Boutique 

In a sign that the customer for a high end independent watchmaking continues to change, H. Moser opened their first standalone boutique in the United States this week in Menlo Park, CA. It makes a statement that Moser is centering their first US boutique in Silicon Valley, the home of America’s tech industry, and, of course, no shortage of well heeled watch collectors. It signals, perhaps, that many newly affluent tech workers are more inclined than ever to explore the world of indies, traditionally a corner of the watch world that is filled with insiders and long-time collectors who have seen it all. To celebrate the opening, the brand has created a special boutique only edition of their Streamliner Tourbillon, cased in yellow gold with a skeleton dial. This boutique only edition is limited to just 17 pieces. 

RIP, TV

If you only read one think piece about the decline of the TV experience this week, read Alex Weprin’s in The Hollywood Reporter. Weprin chronicles a dramatic shift in how what we think of as “TV” has changed in the streaming era, and makes a convincing case that as long-time broadcast exclusive programming that has never been streamed gradually makes its way to various streaming platforms (like this year’s Academy Awards), it may very well mark the true end of cable television as we know it. What’s really interesting is what happens after programming like the Oscars and various sports and news broadcasts make their way to streaming. Will we see tighter consolidation and bundling from streamers, similar to how cable changed through the 1990s as it became more and more accessible? Time will tell, but it really feels like we’re entering a new era at this very moment. 

Honda and Nissan End Merger Plans 

It was only last month when we told you in this very column that automakers Honda and Nissan were set to merge. Now, according to Car and Driver, it appears the deal is off. Rumors have been swirling for the last week or so that the deal might be crumbling, and it was just made official in the last few days. Speculation is that the talks fell apart thanks to a “take-it-or-leave-it approach” from Honda to acquire Nissan, and hesitation from Honda execs on the acquisition because of debt on Nissan’s books. Whatever the cause, there don’t appear to be too many sour grapes – the companies reportedly have agreed to continue to collaborate on software and electric vehicles.