This modest little corner of the internet has existed for more than twenty years, and still attracts thousands of page-views a month. Along with the traffic, comes a steady stream of emails from aspiring and established collectors seeking advice about, and input into, potential or already-made acquisitions.
In twenty years of fielding inquiries by visitors to this blog, by far the most common question posed is, “Is the dial genuine?” And it’s a good question, because anything other than ‘genuine’ can affect the value of a watch by anywhere up to forty percent.
A word on refinished dials: they are not all equal. Some refinishers are serious about their work and take pride in producing a polished result that is as close to a factory original as is possible, but even then, a keen eye with circuitry attached to a sceptical brain can discern small variations that signal a redial.
A well-executed refinishing job is clearly better than a bad one, and will sell for more than its poor relation, but I never cease to be surprised at the good money some people continue to pay for appalling refinishing jobs that have, unless corrected, pretty well reduced the value of a watch to the salvage worth of its parts. From flourishes of creativity or incompetence that render dials about as congruous to the brand as a nun in a police line-up – to crude fakes that are passed off as original, these blights on the horological landscape can be a real trap to innocent and not so innocent newcomers.
With the value of Constellations, especially pie pans, having increased significantly over this decade, the question, ‘Is the dial genuine’ takes on more gravitas, because the monetary gap between original and refinished examples has widened. You stand to lose considerable value on a purchase if the answer is in the negative and no disclosure of its refinished status has been made, and, hence, the incentive to know what you’re buying should be correspondingly more pressing.
Below are several essays that will go a long way in equipping you with the technical knowledge to be able to tell the difference between genuine dials and non-disclosed refinished dials:
A comprehensive survey in two parts of Constellation dials is here
For good measure, an essay on fake Constellation dials and cases
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