Made for her: Singapore brands are realising women love their watches, too
When information technology comes to watches, horology and watchmaking, it's rubber to say information technology'south no longer merely a man's pursuit.
Wait around at the poetic complications and femininely styled mechanical movements offered by the industry's biggest names and y'all'll realise that women are no longer but interested in diamond-encrusted bracelets that happen to tell the time.
And in Singapore, ane sign of the shifting times is the arrival of local micro-brands that cater specifically to the ladies. After all, in the confront of options past established names in watches, jewellery and fifty-fifty fashion, you lot'll demand 18-carat passion and a dandy understanding of what women desire to have the backbone to launch 1'due south ain brand – in mid-pandemic, we might add.
READ: Non just for men: Female person collectors with a passion for sneakers, watches, whisky
More OPTIONS FOR WOMEN
For Sherrie Han, that passion was great plenty to galvanise her into launching The Eliana Timekeeper in 2020, despite already having a twenty-four hours job every bit a senior associate at Tzedek Law LLC, and being heavily pregnant at the time.
Mesmerised by mechanical timekeeping after taking a picket servicing workshop three years agone, and dissatisfied past the lack of affordable options for women, Han set up out to make full that gap in the marketplace.
Following a successful Kickstarter campaign at the start of last year, The Eliana Timekeeper launched with three 28mm models in silver- or rose gilded-coloured stainless steel, all powered past automatic movements from Japan.
In an era that prizes convenience, battery-powered quartz watches and smart devices are even so the obvious choices, just it is beauty that Han wants to peddle.
"People wear mechanical watches because they appreciate the workmanship and finesse that goes into making one. It'due south the timeless simplicity of hundreds of gears merely working together as 1."
This, she explained, is why her watches have transparent case backs and cut-out dials – all the meliorate to admire the watch's chirapsia heart.
The Eliana Timekeeper has retail partners in Singapore (Watch Wonderland and National Gallery Singapore), Japan, Hong Kong and fifty-fifty Poland, but recent COVID-19-related restrictions take driven more sales to the brand's online shop.
Nonetheless, Han remains optimistic about her market place. "At that place is an increased consciousness almost sustainable and ethical products with a desire to purchase things that terminal, and consumers are beginning to realise that price does not equate to value," she observed.
"Mechanical watches do well on both fronts – retaining value for longer and being more sustainable than their bombardment run counterparts."
Han is now decorated designing her brand'due south second collection and looking for local partners to work with, and while she will continue to keep the watches simple and fashionable, she'due south not afraid to dream big.
"I'one thousand a huge fan of flinque enamel dials [where translucent enamel is applied over an engraved base plate], tourbillons and moonphases, so if we had absolutely no limits, I would want us to make an in-house motility with those complications and designs, and have them assembled in Singapore," she said.
READ: Singapore is designing and making watches – just Singaporeans aren't buying
PERANAKAN-INSPIRED ENAMELLED DIALS
Her goal isn't as lofty equally you might retrieve, considering another micro-brand is already working toward something similar, at least on the artful side.
Four-year-old Feynman Watches is expanding its core offer of men's timepieces with a highly limited series boasting beautiful enamelled dials, with the aim of creating Singapore's first metiers d'art watches.
In fine watchmaking, metiers d'art (French for "master of art") is a category that celebrates rare and ancient decorative techniques, such as enamelling, miniature painting, engraving, lacquering and more. Brands like Vacheron Constantin, Patek Philippe, Cartier and Hermes are famous for such dial artistry but Feynman Watches' new serial, titled Project Coalesce, wants the spotlight on a much more familiar aesthetic.
"I am fiercely patriotic," said founder Yong Keong Lim. "When people recollect of metiers d'fine art, they think of horses or Roman goddesses simply when I think about Singapore history, I realised the Peranakan fine art style would exist perfect because it is a blend of our cultures."
The lotus motifs on 2 of the models were inspired by common Peranakan tiles, while the peacock feathers allude to the many peacock designs found on Peranakan tombs at Bukit Brown Cemetery.
It'due south non only the designs that are uniquely Singaporean; they were crafted by local hands, too. Royal Insignia's in-business firm enamelist Charlotte Hoe spends two to 3 days on each dial, relying on the laborious champleve enamel technique – which involves cells or troughs being carved out of a metal base of operations, filled with vitreous enamel, then broiled at high temperatures – to deliver vibrant, long-lasting colour.
The leather for the straps are sourced locally and made by Ng Shuyi of Yi Leather, and a second, beaded strap is offered with every scout, each one handmade by Raymond Wong, a principal of Peranakan beadwork and possessor of the Kim Choo Kueh Chang rice dumpling business. The hand-wound movements might however be Swiss (the ETA 7001, to be verbal), just the watches were assembled by self-taught watchmaker Alvin Sim.
Each of the 3 designs will exist a limited edition of six pieces, and volition be available from July. It's not a lot, simply it's a start, as the brand is already working with a local woodworker for Projection Coalesce's next series, which will focus on marquetry. Declared Lim: "Our aim isn't to lucifer or catch up to the Swiss or the Japanese, but to exceed them."
METIERS D'ART FOR WOMEN
It's true that metiers d'art timepieces by the famous horology houses give the impression of barely attainable luxury, appearing to squirrel away the world's last remaining masters of various decorative arts behind chokingly prohibitive toll tags.
But new micro-brand Artemis Time Fine art is on a mission to make such crafts accessible to anybody, starting with a collection meant to appeal to women who are new to the earth of watches.
Make owners Brandon Lam and Thai Xiong noticed a lack of affordable options for women that didn't fall under the umbrella of cookie cutter offerings past fashion brands like Olivia Burton.
So after raising S$32,000 on Kickstarter in April, they got to work producing a serial of five designs with champleve enamel dials through a studio in Prc. These are meant to accept broader entreatment and so the designs are borrowed from multiple cultures, such equally Japanese kimono patterns for the "Migration" model, and the elaborate designs of Jewish union contracts, known every bit ketubah, for the "Tigress".
While high-end horology houses can charge five- to six-figure prices for their metiers d'fine art pieces considering of the precious materials used and complications included, it's still an exceedingly far cry from the South$299 that Artemis Time Fine art is currently charging for pre-orders on Indiegogo. The watches accept 33mm stainless steel cases and utilise quartz Ronda Slimtech 1063 movements. Costs were also kept low past using CNC machines to cut the dial patterns before manus-finishing.
"The smallest brush used for these dials is only five-hairs thick. I think the amount of detailing and the results speak for themselves. And so to exist able to exercise this for only S$299, I dare say we offer a slightly better value proposition than Daniel Wellington," quipped Thai Xiong.
While the women's watch micro-make infinite is still a nascent ane, Lam believes it will grow as long as designers listen to and consult the women they're selling to.
"The majority of the more knowledgeable sentry collectors I've come to know are women, and they don't want diminished versions of men's watches, rainbow precious stone-set bezels or leopard impress dials. We can't just make assumptions about what women want anymore."
READ: 'I own 470 G-Shocks': Exploring the obsessions of Singapore's watch collectors
Source: https://cnalifestyle.channelnewsasia.com/women/watches-women-singapore-eliana-timekeeper-feynman-artemis-time-248071
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