COLOR-TEC “Flying Horses”. The case was made from hand forged multi-color mosaic steel
Martin Pauli, the Man behind Angular Momentum
Very few people know much about Angular Momentum, the swiss watchmaking company that specializes in artisan wristwatches and what they don’t know would surprise them because AM is a one man creative team. Sure, there are a number of watchmakers that run their own brands but they peg their personalities on their watch brand and usually don’t have the scale of work that Martin Pauli has done.
I recently spoke to Martin about his company and this is what he had to say: (more…)
The Opera by Manufacture Royale, opens up like an accordion and the unveiled chamber amplifies the sound of the movement that would otherwise be muffled by the case of the watch. Designed by Fabrique du Temps, the watch is priced at $1.2 million and is made out of 319 parts. While the case is interesting, there is a lost opportunity here because the watch is let down by the movement and hand design.
Swiss Wristwatch manufacturer, Angular Momentum, teamed up with Mobiado to create a companion piece to one of their wristwatches. Angular is known for hand painting miniature art on their watches and so they’ve created their own Mobiado 712MG Angular Momentum Edition Cell Phone with a similar hand painted art that takes inspiration from the japanese spirit of Mokume Gane which is a japanese method of metal working that was invented in the 1600s. Mokume gane is a Japanese term that literally means “wood eye metal.”
We’ve seen a number of online stores dedicated to vintage fashion wristwatches, but none of them offline and certainly none of them with a ‘Wimps stay out’ sticker running across it’s front windows, that is, until I spotted a small french wristwatch chain that not only housed a few vintage favorites but had its own eccentric look and feel.
The store’s called Chez Maman which is french for ‘In/to Mama’. I’m not going to pretend that I get the slang in the name but it’s definitely not a traditional cookie cutter watch store.
So I chatted up Eva, the owner of the store and this is what she had to say about her store:
Adnan: I like the look and feel of your store. It’s got it’s own unique flavor. What was your idea behind doing the store the way you did?
Eva: Unfortunately I don’t have any great story behind…I’m not really a “watchperson” from the beginning, but I’ve always been working with fashion or interior decoration.
Adnan: So what are watches to you?
Eva: For me the watches I sell are really only accessories, not really what you would call “timepieces”. Perhaps some of the vintage could be, because they are rare but not the new brands.Most of my clients come back regularly to buy, like they were buying jewellery or clothes.
In my shop, decoration and music is very important. It’s a concept where I want the clients to enjoy their time in the shop but also start to see watches as accessories and not only like something they buy and then keep using every day for the next ten years. I think that’s more the work of Rolex… I’ve become very passionate about watches since I started but I still can’t open one up to look inside (ha ha).
My friend Tom, who runs The Watch Lounge, recently interviewed Eric Giroud, the designer behind the Opus 9, the HM No.1 and the Glissiere Tourbillon. In the interview, Eric talks about his inspirations behind his work, his creative struggles and dishes out advice for up and coming designer. You can read the interview here.
For those who aren’t aware, The Grand Prix d’Horlogerie de Genève is a contest between high-end watch manufacturers at the Geneva Watch Festival. Below are this year’s winners:
Grand Prize of “The Golden Hand”: Greubel Forsey – Double Tourbillon 30° Edition Historique
Prize of the Watch lady: Van Cleef & Arpels – Le Pont des Amoureux
Prize of the Watch Man: Laurent Ferrier – Roller Classic Tourbillon Double Spiral
Prize of the watch design & concept watch: MB & F – Horological Machine No. 4 Thunderbolt
Chopard – High Jewellery Owl Watch
Jewellery Watch Prize: F.P.Journe – CHRONOMETRE A RESONANCE
The cost of the high complication: Seiko – Spring Drive Spacewalk Commemorative Edition
Sports Watch Prize: TAG Heuer – CARRERA Calibre 1887 Chronograph 41mm
My earlier post on the Tik tok/Luna tik straps for the Apple Nano got a retweet by Bill Geiser who is a Vice President at Fossil:
@billg: RT @wristfashion: Why the race for the next gen watch will be won by something that is not a watch http://ow.ly/3cqNI
@wristfashion: @billg thanks for the retweet. I just saw your profile. you seem like you’re working on something very interesting.
@billg: @wristfashion time will tell….no pun intended :^)
@wristfashion: @billg honestly, i expected fossil to have been all over the next-gen watch category ages ago.
@billg: @wristfashion it’s all about market timing….the ‘connecting fabric’ has only recently fallen into place
Bill is responsible for exploring technology driven opportunities for watches at Fossil. According to his Linkedin profile:
“Low power wireless connections between phones, sensors, and watches will open large new markets for these things we wear on our wrists. In this scenario the ‘watch’ functions as a remote portal to our phone or nearby sensor. The goal is to simplify & enhance the user experience. Consider, for example, the hundreds of daily, actionable alerts that will soon hit your mobile device: voice calls, text messages, emails, LBS alerts, turn-by-turn directions, and much much more. A quick glance at your wrist to see if the alert requires immediate attention is far more convenient than pulling your phone out of your pocket, handbag, briefcase, or backpack…hundreds of times per day.”
Elsewhere on twitter he explains what he means by the ‘Connecting Fabric’:
@billg: @ARJWright Modu, IXI, Moto Offspring failed because connected devices need a connecting fabric first before devices happen; aka Android, iOS
So now that the ‘connecting fabric’ is here to stay, maybe we will see some exciting new developments on the horizon.
Update:
Bill Geiser later responded to this post:
Hi Adnan, Love your blog. I’d like to give credit where credit is due: Andreas Constantinou (@andreascon on Twitter)is the author of the ‘connecting fabric’ quote referenced above. I simply retweeted it because I believe he’s right.
By now you may already be aware of the Ipod multi-touch nano is Apple’s unofficial wristwatch – every day on the internet, companies are churning their own version of a strap kit for the device. The most recent and the best one proposed is by Scott Wilson which also happens to be the first one by someone who has previously worked in the wristwatch industry. I’ve three things to say on this:
The Luna Tik strap kit
1. The wrist is prime next generation personal technology real estate. The technology to create that said next generation wristwatch is already here. The only thing that is keeping it from getting to market is the economics of building it. Traditional wristwatch companies either do not have the incentive to build because they would entering the electronics market which is riskier – higher minimum order quantity, more design investment.etc, or don’t care. So it’s either going to be a new company of dreamers like Cognitime or Mutewatch taking the risk or someone’s going to make a small enough device that others are going to build straps for and that is what the untapped potential of the ipod is. (more…)
During Baselworld 2010, I spied a man walking around with this wristwatch in his shirt pocket. My curiosity peaked, I followed him to the Atlantus booth where I found out what it is – a rather unattractive paper LED watch called ‘Patch’. I am not sure if the watch is made of actual paper but it’s supposed to be treated with a special coating that makes it water proof and shock/tear resistant. The watch weighs just 11 grams and is priced at approx USD $34 which is a lot for this ugly watch.
It may be the world’s first biodegradable watch but I’d only reconsider it if it got a face lift.
