The Inverter is a kickstarted, sub-$500, 34mm automatic mechanical watch built around Citizen's Miyota Calibre 9000 movement, augmented with a custom module that makes the watch run backwards, so that it can be mounted so that the movement is exposed (beneath a sapphire crystal), with the back of the watch becoming its "face." Read the rest
Check out the new "Swatch x You" artist edition from longtime Boing Boing pals eBoy, the pixelmasters whose dingbat font FF Peecol birthed our own Jackhammer Jill mascot! With the new Swatch, you get to choose from a variety of eBoy characters in a pre-determined pattern to "design" your own watch. From Swatch:
Three designers, never-ending 8-bit paradises. The always-surprising pixel creations by the Berlin-based trio have been on the cover of numerous magazines, ad campaigns and many art galleries. Since 1977, eBoy keeps building, pixel by pixel, the most original digital environments and characters that invite people on a journey of discovery and wonder.
For many years, we've celebrated Tokyoflash's glorious and impractical contributions to horology: the company has set itself on a long path to imagine what a watch can be in an era where we all have unbelievably precise, self-setting timepieces in our pockets at all times, playfully experimenting with what a watchface can do while still telling the time (nominally, at least!). Read the rest
Roger Wood (previously), the bonkers steampunk assemblage clock sculptor, just sent this to his Klockwerks mailing list: "This is what I created in February." Read the rest
A year ago, the Norwegian Consumer Council commissioned a study into kids' smart watches, finding that they were incredibly negligent when it came to security and incredible greedy when it came to surveillance: a deadly combination that meant that these devices were sucking up tons of sensitive data on kids' lives and then leaving it lying around for anyone to take. Read the rest
The Lifeclock One: Snake Edition is a $300 licensed replica of the countdown timer watch worn by Snake Plissken in Escape From New York: it's very cool looking and faithful to the original prop, but regrettably, the designers have added in a bunch of "smart-watch" features (Bluetooth, an app, text-message and app notifications from your phone) that raise the price, create needless attack surface, and add complexity. Read the rest
Cajiso's "paper watches" wrap a watertight tyvek wristband with a magnetic closure around a cheap-and-cheerful LED watch mechanism, yielding a $28 novelty/fashion item that can be printed with arbitrary bitmaps and are thus available in a wide variety of patterns. (via Red Ferret) Read the rest
In an age of ubiquitous, self-synchronizing phones, timepieces are increasingly a form of kinetic sculpture. Read the rest
Redditor/machinist Spdltd was commissioned to create a steampunk, Arduino-powered electromechanical clock that uses a combination of belts, dials and needles arrayed across the wall to tell the time. Read the rest
The Nixie Machine 2 is a huge (1.2m long!), expensive ($30,000!) nixie clock whose tubes are modern Nixies, scratchbuilt by Czech engineer Dalibor Farny. Read the rest
The last time we wrote about the Casio F-91W digital watch, it was to note the odd connection between the timepiece and suicide bombing, but that's not the only extraordinary activity pursued by aficionados of the watch: they also love to mod 'em. Read the rest
The Geo. Graham Orrery Tourbillon integrates a mechanical solar system model with meteorites as planets. It is just $330,000. From Graham1965's description of the dial:
Blue lacquered dial with Geo.Graham Tourbillon Orrery inscription at 4 o'clock 3 scales - from the outside to the centre: hours and minutes scale, Gregorian calendar (365.25 days - Earth indicates the date), Zodiac scale (12 astrological signs - Earth indicates the zodiac sign). Counter-clockwise reading. Solar system: The Moon (from NWA4881 meteorite, Ø0.90 mm) The Earth (Kingman Turquoise, Ø3.20 mm) Mars (Tissint meteorite, Ø1.70 mm) The Sun (pink gold (18K) - hand-engraved Tourbillon bridge with 2 Phoenix heads inspired by George Graham decoration and a close set diamond at the centre (Ø2.50mm). Counter-clockwise reading. Off-centre skeleton pink gold (18K) hands with black Super-LumiNova coating
(via Uncrate) Read the rest
The $38 Millennium Falcon wall clock is handmade to order from plywood, birch and MDF by Hamstercheeks in Nottingham, UK, who uses a laser-cutter to turn orders around in 2-5 business days (the clock itself is an AA-powered quartz sweep movement). (via Geekymerch) Read the rest
J. M. De Cristofaro used an ex-Soviet IVL2-7/5 VFD tube as the core for his Cyberpunk Wristwatch, which adds steampunk notes in the form of a brass "roll cage" around the tube. Read the rest
French watchmaker Jean Jerome created the HDD Watch in 2014 with a successful Indiegogo campaign, recycling 1" hard drives for the movements. Read the rest
If you're one of the 60% of Pebble employees who didn't get a job offer from Fitbit, the company's new owner, you're probably not having a great Christmas season -- but that trepedation is shared by 100% of Pebble customers, who've just learned (via the fine print on an update on the Pebble Kickstarter page) that the company may soon "reduce functionality" on their watches. Read the rest
