We live and work on the Jurassic Coast in Dorset, UK in a working boat yard. We have extensive backgrounds handling thousands of watches in the world of extreme sports, and from our years running Elliot Brown, which have given us an extraordinarily deep knowledge and the confidence to challenge and disrupt accepted watchmaking norms.
That experience and uniquely technical approach allowed us to re-think how a watch could be constructed by systematically re-designing and eradicating all the usual points of weakness. We are our own customers, creating watches shaped by real life and the professionals we are proud to call customers; every one built up to an exacting standard, rather than down to a price.
We create the watches we always wanted to wear. They are the watches we craved but could never find, with real world performance baked-in thanks to our unique DNA.
Longevity is key, which is why our watches are designed both in function and appearance to stand years of hard use. They are the watches we craved but could never find, with real world performance baked-in thanks to our unique DNA.
When we label a watch as being water resistant to 200m or 300m, every one is tested twice in a pressurised air chamber at the equivalent pressure (both positive and negative) then each one is pressurised in water beyond the depth stated on the watch. The industry ‘norm’ is to test percentages of watches coming off a production line in an air pressure chamber.
Testing every watch in air pressure is not normal practice in the industry but we go even further with 100% wet pressure testing because it is the only way you can be sure your watch will perform when the going gets tough.
Our approach to protecting the movement is similar to the 100% water testing. It’s the engine in your watch, it’s made with precise components, not necessarily designed to cope with shocks and knocks so we don’t leave anything to chance. Over many years handling thousands of watches, we learned how we could create an internal shock protection system to protect the movement. One is fitted as standard inside every single Elliot Brown watch.
Crowns (winders) and pushers are essential to wind the movement, change the time and date, set the GMT hand to a different time zone, set a bezel or start a stopwatch. Every one has a direct link into the watch movement via a stem or mechanism which creates a point of weakness for water or dust to find its way into the movement and render it useless. So we set about re-engineering every pusher and crown with additional seals that deliver an extra barrier to water and dust.
These are just a few of our unique innovations designed to give you great peace of mind. They are also the reason it’s easy for us to stand behind our 5 year warranty without a second thought.
It's great to be able to say we proved something beyond doubt. We do plenty of lab testing but there’s no substitute for putting a watch through its paces out in the field. If you’re ever in Poole we have a cabinet of watch ‘survivors’ that’s worth a look.
One particularly prized example is the watch we mounted to the bow of a Clipper® ’70 Race Yacht that raced 50,000 nautical miles around the world, spending 11 months at sea, crashing into everything mother nature had in her armoury (plus ocean debris), held onto the bow only by its strap bars.
We are prepared to test very publicly like this because we have nothing to hide.
Ask how others test their watches and read the small print around use in water. You might be surprised.
You can read more about our testing here
Looks and function are vital but also how a watch feels in your hand, the weight, the balance, your interaction with the surfaces and moving parts matters deeply. It’s a hard thing to define but one turn of a timing bezel and all becomes clear in an instant. The oily smooth, tactile, satisfying feeling isn’t the work of a spec sheet, it is the result of countless hours refining, honing until it’s just so.
That’s when you get to feel how our obsessive nature grows arms and legs and it’s a good feeling.
Our mission to eradicate weakness, ruggedise key components, test every watch in water and see them complete incredible journeys with our customers and ambassadors results in collections of watches with extraordinary performance and provenance.
We remove all the usual anxieties of watch ownership and our customers praise us for it every day.
Whether it’s a military specific model, a ‘desk diver’ or a more dressy style, the DNA is the same. If ever there was a true definition of a go-anywhere, do-anything watch this, surely is a high point.
We don’t tend to take the easy path, we do things properly even when it’s harder, we’re inventive problem solvers which is how we come to own two patents.
We believe in creating extraordinary watches for ordinary humans who need a reliable time keeper that’ll journey with you, develop a beautiful patina, create stories of its own over years of ownership – not fashion seasons.
We’re doing this because we love watches, we care, we go the extra mile, treating people as we would wish to be treated ourselves, doing what we love in a beautiful setting.
