It was the 19th-century American typeface designer Frederic W. Goudy who sagely noted that "Those old fellows stole all of our best ideas."

It is an observation that might fairly be applied to the watch industry where, despite the wonders of computer-aided design, many of the consistent bestsellers are hand-penned originals dating back 40, 50, 60 years or more. Think of the Jaeger-LeCoultre Reverso (1931) the Cartier Tank (1919) and the Rolex Submariner (1953), to name but a few.

No wonder, then, that so many brands reintroduce models from the past, creating 'instant classics' by simply up-sizing cases to more contemporary dimensions and making a few subtle tweaks to an old design, lightly refreshing it without losing the flavour of the original. And, thanks to our endless love affair with anything 'retro,' it works every time – not least because the modern product is invariably better made, better finished and more reliable than the original piece it was inspired by.

Few brands have taken the 'revived 45' idea to such lengths as IWC, however, which this year unveiled its Vintage Collection of six watches based on some of its most successful models from the past seven decades. The pieces have been created in celebration of the 140th anniversary of the founding of the International Watch Company by an American called Florentine Ariosto Jones, who was drawn to site his factory in Schaffhausen, northern Switzerland, by the promise of cheaper labour and better quality workmanship than he could find at home.

However, it was not until long after IWC had passed into Swiss ownership that it started making truly iconic watches, such as the Pilot's model of 1936, the Portuguese of 1939 - made at the request of a pair of Portuguese businessmen who wanted a wristwatch based on a marine chronometer – and the Ingenieur of 1955, the first watch to feature Albert Pellaton's pawl-winding automatic movement.

While all of the above form part of the current IWC line-up in modern form, the new Vintage versions more or less exactly replicate the look of the originals, the only difference being that some models have enlarged cases. The great appeal of these watches is that they offer the old-fashioned look without the disadvantages that go with owning one of the 60- or 70-year-old originals, which are difficult to track down and, if you can find them, often as expensive as their new equivalents.

Perhaps the most covetable models are the Aquatimer 1967 automatic dive watch (€5,000) and the Pilot 1936 hand-wound (€7,350), as these designs have such a retro look that they almost cause a double-take when one notices that they are, in fact, brand-new watches. Slightly disappointing, however, is the €8,600 Portofino 1984 hand-wound, in view of the fact that the quirky dial of the original (in which the moonphase and small seconds indicators were positioned at three o'clock and nine o'clock respectively due to the model being powered by a converted pocket watch movement) has been 'conventionalised' by the functions being repositioned to 12 and six.

In a bid to further broaden the appeal of the collection, IWC is also offering 500 examples of each model in platinum (prices range from €26,600-€30,400); and, for the die-hard IWC fan, 140 boxed sets containing one of the six models, all with platinum cases, are available for a cool €167,500.

A sound investment? We would humbly suggest that an Aquatimer 1967 automatic in steel for €5,000 might be a better one.....