Growing up in a generation reared with the convenience of having all life's necessities compacted within a single handheld device, the usage and functionality of wristwatch may come off as superfluous to many college students. For many years the awful trend of bulky, toy-like sport-watches has dominated the mainstream youth-fashion with time pieces that came in every candy-color of the rainbow. With the rise (or rather, rebirth) of heritage fashion, the menswear scene has (thankfully) chosen a new time-piece to be the iconic style of the trend— the Field Watch.
During World War I, the field watch was born from soldiers needing to make access to their time-piece (at the time were all pocket-watches) more convenient. The idea of a man strapping one's pocket watch to the wrist was born—genius. Today many fashion houses use these same vintage style watches as a template for their own reproduction designs. Don't get me wrong, these aren't your grandfather's wrist watches— although many menswear enthusiasts would surely applaud the authenticity of owning/fashioning a functional vintage time-piece. The new generation of vintage styled Field Watches are usually built with the modern touches of water resistant mechanics, scratch-proof glasses, and watch-straps almost any color/pattern that a quirky prep could come up with. Yes, that means that with the many field-watch producers out there today, there are just as many producers of field-watch-straps who can provide you with your guilty desire to fashion the bright colors of your former-favorite Casio G-shock collaboration watch (sorry, this watch doesn't come in BAPE camo, nor does it growl when the backlight is on—well, at least not YET).
A new Field Watch could cost an eager fashionable consumer anywhere between $25 (Timex) to $99 (L.L.Bean) to $395 (GANT by Michael Bastian, among many other menswear designers that have chosen to produce their own field watches). The beauty of these watches is that no matter the price of the watch, the aesthetic of a rugged military field watch can still be preserved. But of course, the savvy-eBay-enthusiast will surely still be able to snag a steal online-auctioning on a vintage or new time-piece.
Personally, nothing irks me more than to see a beautiful watch go to waste for the preference of one's iPhone standby screen. So most importantly, if you're going to wear a watch– use it!
Lance Dornagon is currently a Junior at Fordham University, studying Finance (major) and Business Law (minor) while being a workaholic retail associate. When he's not hitting the books or on the sales floor, Lance enjoys dancing, blogging, and sleeping (barely). Born and reared in Queens, NYC, Lance is excited to write for Fordham's Fashion for Philanthropy Blog and share his experiences in the Menswear Fashion Industry.
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