I love the photos watch face. It’s always a delight when checking the time throughout the day. However, to my chagrin, I rarely use it. Other watch faces are just more useful, so I’ll switch to them and then forget to swap back to photos.
iOS 14 and WatchOS 7 introduced new Apple Watch Shortcuts actions, like Change Watch Face.
So, this is a stupid solution to the above problem: create a Shortcuts automation that runs whenever you launch some of your commonly-used apps (e.g., email or browser). Give that automation a single action: change watch face to Photos.
Voila! Suddenly my forgetfulness is no longer a problem—the watch “defaults” back to Photos randomly throughout the day, so even if I leave it on another watch face, it tends to be that the next time I check the time one of my favourite photos is there to greet me.
(A sad side effect is an annoying “Running your automation” notification that appears each time you open these apps, but it’s worth it for me, at least while the novelty is still there!)