This guide is for anyone who has an interest in fine mechanical timepieces.   I've been collecting mechanical wristwatches  for over 10 years, and over the years I've had the opportunity to examine or acquire a number of unique pieces.   Uniqueness to me does to equate necessarily to complexity;  in many cases, as you'll see, sheer simplicity ranks high on my list.   I consider watches unique if they have an unusual complication, or if they do something with just a small unexpected twist.  Many of the watches here are available on eBay.

1. IWC Portuguese Seven Day Reseve

This watch uses the Caliber 5001 automatic movement from IWC, a respected and well established Swiss manufacturer located in Schaffhausen.   What's unique about this watch that it has a seven day (168 hour) power reserve, while most other watches have a 42-48 hour reserve.  This means that the mainspring in this watch is extraodrinarily long.  The watch also has one on the widest exhibition backs I have seen.  It's available in stainless steel, rose gold, and platinum. This watch can be a bit hard to find, but other IWC watches are available on eBay.   Another simple and extraordinarily elegant watch (but not specifically unique) is the IWC Portofino.  Purist may not be attracted to this watch as the movement is an ETA movement.  However, I own this watch and have to say that it's probably the elegant.     

2. Breguet Classique

Talking about elegance, this is one of the most elegant watches I have seen.  The dial is made of oven-fired enamel and the numbers are handpainted.  What makes the watch so compelling is a clean, classic look with a slight off-set sub-second dial to the right of the six o'clock marker.   Breguet watches are among the very very best and it's hard to find a watch with more class and subtlety than this one.  I've seen this watch in rose gold and in white gold.

3. Martin Braun EOS

By far the most unique watch I have, this watch tell you time for sunrise and sunset.  Consequently this watch needs to be custom built to where you live.  The dual retrograph movement are driven by twin cambers at the bottom of the watch.  It's the cambers that need to be built for your location as they are the gears that simulate the movement of the sun relative to your location.  This circular motion is then translated via a simple but clever lever into a curvilinear hand movement.

4. Meistersinger 1Z Mechanik

An exercise in minimalism, this watch has just one long hand.  The dial is marked in five minute increments and the single hand tells time to within a couple of minutes of (readable) accuracy.  It's an exceptionally simple idea that should have taken stronger hold.  Often available on eBay Germany (eBay.de)

5. Lanco-fon

Available on eBay every now and then, this watch is unusual in two respects.  The first is that this manual watch has a simple percussion alarm.  This comes out sounding like a small buzz that can be both heard and felt.  The other interesting thing about this watch is that it uses a single crown to set time, date, and alarm.   This significantly increases the internal complexity of the mechanism which is often overlooked.  See if there are any available now.

6. Panerai Radiomir

Another winner in the elegance and simplicity category is the oversized Panerai Radiomir Base from Italy.  The watch has a rich military heritage which is reflect in it's design throughout.  The dial has cut-out numerals which is then set up on a sheet coated to luminiscent material so that the numbers have excellent night visibility.  This watch, unlike the Luminors does not have the sealing crown, which I have always believed is a bit over the top.