I've collected yesterday my Speedmaster from the Omega flagship store in Milan: it's the first time it has been serviced after 15 years (a true workhorse) and it needed some care. The lady at the shop is very nice and she gives me some freebies, including two glossy Omega magazines and a nice Omega metallic watch box, padded inside and containing a little bag of silica gel: she explains to me that silica gel is very important in case I put my watch in a safe. A safe apparently is full of humidity and humidity is the enemy number one of your watch.

Panic. I never used silica gel in my safe at home or in the bank. Apparently bank's safes are better because they are not so air tight (mine is basically a metallic box). The ideal place for my watches is one of my bedroom drawers where I can pick them up easily and have a look at them from time to time, but this is not feasible, you need some watch rotation. My watches are each in a velvet(ish) bag or in their boxes, but I will probably buy a watch box to have them in better order.

Questions: am I running the risk of ruining my watches without any anti-humidity device? And: how do you preserve your watches?

Many thanks in advance

Paolo