What would you pay? The Casual Swiss Mechanical

The Splurge: Victorinox Infantry Vintage in Black or Brown & Green – $399.90 ($925)

This price is through the flash sale site Rue La La.  Amazon has the exact same watches for $15 – $30 more

Some people might think a hand-wound watch is one step too far back in the past, but you’d be surprised how oddly satisfying winding a watch can be.  Much better (and faster) than standing there swinging a self wind auto back and forth to charge it up.  And there’s none of the hypocrisy of taking off your automatic, only to drop it on a plug-in watch winder.  Winding the crown until you feel a bit of resistance is kinda like popping bubble wrap.  Only one of these will look a lot better on your wrist than packing material.  But you’ll pay for that satisfaction.  Quite a bit in fact.

Sapphire crystal, 100m water resistance, exhibition case back, 44mm but wears smaller.

$400 – $500 seems to be what this Victorinox model goes for.  Hamilton has a much smaller (38mm) mechanical casual, also Swiss Made, for $255 – $275 depending on what color dial you’re after.

And then of course there’s ditching the hand wind thing and sticking with a tried and true automatic like a Hamilton’s Khaki King.  Around $350 for that, Swiss made, sapphire crystal, and unlike the Victorinox you get a day and date display.