Lex Borrero’s collecting life didn’t begin in a boutique, at an auction preview or with a family heirloom.
It began on Canal Street in New York, where fake watches sparked a real fascination with what a watch could say about a person.
Today, as president of the Miami Watch Club, Borrero’s perspective is shaped less by trophy hunting than by memory, risk and the people watches bring into the room.
At a glance
- Lex Borrero, president of the Miami Watch Club, traces his collecting obsession back to early days in New York.
- His most personal watch remains a first Rolex that tested his finances and became a symbol of persistence.
- His collection spans modern statement pieces, vintage watches and a dream Audemars Piguet Royal Oak perpetual calendar.
Canal Street and the idea of time as identity
Borrero’s first serious pull toward watches came during the early part of his career in New York City.
Walking through Chinatown, he saw sellers offering counterfeit watches on street corners and became fascinated by the idea that time could be worn as a visible expression of personality.
He wasn’t yet thinking like a collector with access, allocation history or reference numbers at his fingertips.
He was simply trying watches on and imagining what it might feel like to own the real thing.
That detail matters, because it frames his collecting philosophy in a way that feels unusually direct.
For Borrero, the watch was never only about mechanics or status. It was about aspiration becoming tangible on the wrist.
The Rolex that became a personal test
The watch with the deepest story in his collection is his first Rolex.
Not because it required years on a waitlist or some elaborate dealer negotiation, but because keeping it became its own kind of ordeal.
At the time, Borrero was working at an Expedia call centre and financing the watch while also trying to save enough money to travel to New York and pitch his music to labels.
On one trip, Spirit Airlines offered four free flights to a passenger willing to give up a seat.
He accepted the offer and lost his job as a result.
The Rolex became financially painful, eventually damaging his credit and going into collections, but he refused to give it back.
He eventually paid it off, and that history has turned the watch into something far more personal than a first luxury purchase.
It became proof that he could commit to something difficult and see it through.
A dream Audemars Piguet with real consequences
Borrero’s collecting stories aren’t all sentimental. Some carry the kind of sharp trade-offs only collectors really understand.
One of the most dramatic involved an Audemars Piguet Royal Oak skeleton perpetual calendar, reference 25829BA.
After building a strong relationship with Audemars Piguet by buying Royal Oaks and developing his account, Borrero saw the skeleton perpetual calendar on a friend’s wrist and recognised it as his dream watch.
The friend agreed to sell it only if Borrero sold him all of his AP pieces.
He did exactly that.
The move cost him his relationship with the brand, and he hasn’t been able to buy from Audemars Piguet since.
Still, Borrero has no regret about the decision, which says plenty about how he values emotional certainty over tidy collecting strategy.
Louis Vuitton, vintage and the Miami Watch Club effect
One watch in Borrero’s collection that still divides opinion is his Louis Vuitton Tambour Convergence.
Some collectors have been hesitant about spending serious money on a Louis Vuitton watch, but Borrero sees it differently.
To him, the Tambour Convergence represents a new chapter for Louis Vuitton watchmaking, and that willingness to look beyond traditional hierarchies is part of what makes his collecting taste interesting.
His eye remains led by design and dial colour, the same instincts that drew him in at the beginning.
Over time, though, his collection has moved further into vintage than his younger self would likely have expected.
That evolution feels natural for someone who sees every watch as part of a journey rather than a permanent endpoint.
He doesn’t dwell on watches he has sold or missed, because for him ownership is an experience rather than a fixed archive.
The Miami Watch Club has expanded that idea beyond the watches themselves.
Borrero describes the relationships built through the club as transformative, and that may be the clearest expression of his collecting world.
The watches are the entry point, but the lasting value is often found in the conversations, friendships and shared obsessions they create.
There is still one watch he thinks about more than he should, an Audemars Piguet Clover in platinum that he has yet to see in the metal.
That unresolved fascination suits his story well.
For Borrero, collecting isn’t a race toward completion. It’s a sequence of moments, some costly, some improbable and some still waiting on the wrist of the future.
