Do you like writing on dial or do you prefer sterile?

[bigvatch]

Complicated IMO. It all depends on the watch.

Some watches look stunning with sterile dials......some sterile-dialed watches look awful

Some watches look stunning partially BECAUSE of a beautiful logo and nicely-worded and placed, with the perfect amount of goobily gah.

At the same time some brands offer a horrible looking logo with too much ugly goobily gah, or not enough, too plain, etc

[geoffbot]

Preferably a little bit of text but its got to be right: I've asked myself which of the below I prefer and I'm not sure:

[NH102.22]

Preferably a little bit of text but its got to be right: I've asked myself which of the below I prefer and I'm not sure:

Mmmm I like the one on the right. JLC pulled this one off pretty well, too.

[CitizenM]

I hate writing on a dial. If I had it my way, it'd have the company's logo and that'd be that. I hate it when watches tell me what they are, as if I'd forget I'm wearing a Grand Seiko or a Co-Axial or that it's water resistant to so many meters or that it's automatic, or that the Omega logo does, in fact, mean the word Omega, or, worse yet, that GS means Grand Seiko means Seiko.

Unfortunately, I'm wearing Plato's The Republic on my wrist right now:



Still, to the credit of my AT and most Grand Seikos, at least there are no (or few) stupid numbers. As if I'm going to forget where 4:00 is or something. I hate it when there are numbers everywhere. Like, an inner ring of hours, another ring of minutes/seconds, then another ring of ticks for sub seconds...quite annoying.

[Doboji]

I actually enjoy a bit of tastefully done writing on a dial. One of my favorite watches is the world-timers and those are busy busy with text...

[WnS]

Like, an inner ring of hours, another ring of minutes/seconds, then another ring of ticks for sub seconds...quite annoying.

Oh yes, I totally agree. Sub-second markings are a deal breaker on non-chronos (sorry Seiko Cocktail Time), and what's just as nasty are the numbers 13-24 on a 12h watch. Are there really people who can't mentally add 12 hours to get military time?

[CitizenM]

Ironically, one of the worst offenders is also a company that shows us how it ought to be done:

[camb66]

Preferably a little bit of text but its got to be right: I've asked myself which of the below I prefer and I'm not sure:

All over the one one the left. Just stunning

[dbakiva]

All over the one one the left. Just stunning

one one the left too

[Eric L.]

Not a fan of sterile dials, but as long as it has some marking on it, a name, something, I am fine with it. Completely blank dials scream "no personality" to me, but I can understand how someone might prefer to have a blank dial as well.