This post was originally published on this site

Longines fans may want to start rummaging though their grandparents’ mementos: The Swiss house is searching for the oldest Longines watch in Britain and Ireland.

The campaign, which coincides with the brand’s 185th anniversary and runs until May 28, is inviting participants to post on any online site or social media outlet photographs and stories about their vintage Longines, using the hashtags #oldestlonginesuk and #oldestlonginesie.

One of the campaign announcements has a vintage feel all its own: an intrepid mountain climber pointing at a Longines pocket watch in the center of a yellow and orange sunburst, a revision of one of the brand’s 1910 advertisements (left).

Every week Longines executives will choose what they consider to be the most interesting story to feature on the watchmaker’s Facebook page. Unusual and distinctive designs, no matter how new or old, also will be featured.

Longines hopes the effort will boost the brand’s digital presence. Its Facebook page now has almost 1.7 million fans worldwide, of whom some 70,000 are based in Britain, the Swatch-owned company said. Other brands have much broader reach online — TAG Heuer, for instance, has about 2.9 million Facebook fans worldwide.

Entries also are being accepted in more old-fashioned ways: by mail or at the brand’s London boutique on Oxford Street.

The owner of the oldest watch will receive a trip to the company’s factory and museum in St.-Imier, Switzerland, and tickets to an (unspecified) Longines event. Whoever has the best story will get tickets to a Longines-sponsored sports event. The company’s almost 6,500-square-foot museum is home to more than 10,000 timepieces – the oldest of which date back to the house’s first pocket watches made between 1832 and 1866, as well as a selection of timekeeping and mechanical instruments and the brand’s advertising archives.