Three handsome watches for Hong Kong men, and the brand you should avoid

August hasn’t been the best of months, what with all the problems in the world, the abject awfulness of The Dark Tower and Arsenal’s pitiful start to the season. But now there’s more misery, at least in the gilded cage in which I toil, as I have discovered there’s a Daniel Wellington pop-up in Central’s IFC Mall.

Regular readers of this column probably wonder why I only ever talk about watches that are great and never rip pieces or brands to avoid. My reasons are that, generally, I’m an all-round nice guy (no, really) and it’s too easy to be negative. However, for a brief moment, I’m going to park my nice-guy persona and tell all of you out there that Daniel Wellington watches are for people who don’t like watches. There, I’ve said it.

OK, I’m going to go back to being the world’s nicest guy^TM. This week is a freestyle affair, with no particular theme beyond the fact that I came across three excellent watches that are worth checking out.

We’ll start with a brand and a category of watches I never talk about, not because they aren’t good but because I’m about as fit as an obese three-legged asthmatic cat. Finland’s Suunto makes some of the world’s best sports watches and by “sports” I mean pursuits that are more about survival than glory.

The Traverse Alpha Copper is the perfect piece of kit for outdoorsy types, a watch that’s been tested to military standards and is pretty much indestructible in all weather conditions. It’s a tech-heavy watch and features weather prediction, sun­rise alert and a load of real-time GPS functions including a “breadcrumb” route mapper so you can retrace your steps and avoid get­ting lost.

Best of all, with its copper colour scheme, this is a really handsome watch. The Suunto Traverse Alpha Copper is priced at HK$4,800.