Once considered the "killers" of fine watchmaking, Japanese craftsmen today enjoy a well-deserved place in the sun.
The Holy Grail
The world of vintage watch auctions has gone through some kind of shock. The watch department of the auction house Bonhams held the first online auction Making Waves dedicated to ... Seiko.
The lots were 200 watches from one collection, collected over the past 15 years.
The press release spoke of the encyclopedic nature of the collection, and the Ref 5718-8000, specially designed for the 1964 Tokyo Olympics, was called the “Holy Grail of Seiko Watches”.
For many connoisseurs of the Holy Grail, it is more likely the London Crash from Cartier, Patek Philippe 2499 or Paul Newman's Rolex 6239. But if you think about it, why shouldn't Seiko be honored with such a title? After all, according to auction organizer Sharon Chan, head of Asian watchmaking at Bonhams, "In recent years, Japanese brands such as Seiko, long loved by many Asian collectors, have begun to attract a huge international fan base."
Parts of one whole
The older generation of watch enthusiasts, caught up in the quartz crisis, grew up with a prejudice against Seiko. It was Seiko that introduced the world's first "quartz", the Astron model. And it was that Christmas day in 1969 that was perceived for many years as the beginning of the end of the era of mechanical watches.
Time, however, put everything in its place. The quartz crisis has passed, the market for "mechanics" has not gone anywhere, and the Swiss and Japanese approaches to creating watches turned out to be not opposites, but parts of one whole.
“For me, fine watchmaking is the only way to express myself,” says Hajime Asaoka, one of Japan's leading independent watchmakers. Being from a line of master swordsmen, Asaoka independently produces components, dials, and polishes himself. Prices for Hajime Asaoka watches start at $ 40, are in great demand among connoisseurs (not only in Asia), and the master himself is recognized at the world level - he is a member of the prestigious Swiss association AHCI (Académie Horlogère des Créateurs Indépendants, Academy of Independent Watchmakers).
Asaoka's respectability does not negate his penchant for bullying: his Tourbillon # 1, created with artist Takashi Murakami, was adorned with flowers, a skull and the words Death Takes No Bribe.
Aesthetic flexibility
Asaoka's stylistic omnivorousness is not nonsense, but the norm. In Japan, where the sense of beauty is highly developed, there is no appraisal category “ugliness” at all. Simply put, the Japanese value the trivial and the tasteless as much as the sublime and the spiritual. Seiko, whose products are now recognized as high art, easily partnered with the streetwear brand Bathing Ape.
The aesthetic flexibility of the Japanese has already been adopted by the Europeans. The Swiss manufacture Bell & Ross works with the same Bathing Ape, and TAG Heuer has done a joint project with the legend of Japanese street fashion, DJ and designer Hiroshi Fujiwara. And this is not the first time that LVMH's watch division has worked from Fujiwara: two years ago, George Bamford's studio BWD (an official partner of LVMH) created the extremely successful minimalist Zenith model with the help of a Tokyo designer.
"It was our most commercially successful limited release," recalls head of the studio, George Bamford, admitting that "Hiroshi taught me a hell of a lot."
Love since childhood
However, not only the West goes to the East. Casio recently approached Bamford with an offer to work on the Casio G-Shock. “It’s not very familiar to our atelier, but I enjoyed working with Casio,” says Bamford.
His love for G-Shock can be called generational: George, like many of his peers who were born in the 80s, grew up on this watch.
Who knows, maybe Bamford G-Shock will be the Holy Grail someday too. Time, as we can see, puts everything in its place, and eternal watch values come both from the West and from the East.
