1. Design Goals

For many years, I have wanted a mechanical winding / automatic watch. There are many great designs that are affordable, but none of them represent what I want from such a timepiece.

After a colleague shared a video on the history and competition between Japan and Switzerland in the watch making space, I was even more impressed by the complexity and sophistication of these fully mechanical watch movements. The engineer in me was captivated!

Going down the rabbit hole of suggested YouTube videos after watching the video my colleague shared, I soon realized that it wouldn’t be too hard or too expensive to design and make my own timepiece.

So, to help direct the design and create a timepiece that represents, excites and captivates me, these are the general goals:

• The dial should enable showcasing the movement, but not in a messy skeleton watch kind of way. It should still look sophisticated, but not bland.

• The form of the case should feel special and unique. This forces a departure from the typical round minimal aesthetic that I am typically drawn to, but those designs do not evoke a sense of occasion or uniqueness.

• The watch should be neither delicate in appearance nor chunky. Since packaging a mechanical movement forces a certain thickness, the watch should not look fat or disproportionate in any view.