Mindfulness
Mindfulness
Some time ago, the Digital Business Leaders Club held an in-person gathering where we learnt to take mechanical watches apart and put them back together, and had the chance to talk to a watchmaker. He made one particularly interesting point: “It is a shame when people know nothing about the watches they wear.”
That remark struck me. Until then, I had thought that the most you could say about a watch was what complications it had. I asked the watchmaker to tell me about his own watch, and he gave me its entire history: how the model came about, why the dial looked the way it did, when the model became a cult classic, and so on. It occurred to me that it would be worth learning something about a watch before buying it, so that you know exactly what you are getting.
I have had a special relationship with Casio since my childhood during perestroika. Its watch range is incredibly varied, from the simplest models—with a million melodies—to the rugged G-Shock. Neither extreme suits my style, but I have had my eye on the Edifice line for about three years. What makes these watches special is that you can wear them with a formal suit or on a weekend trip to the countryside.
A couple of months ago, I discovered an Edifice model created in collaboration with NISMO, Nissan Motor’s racing division. Since I now work in the automotive sector myself, this watch seems equally at home at industry forums and on holiday.
Here are some of the model’s features:
- NISMO’s signature red accents on the inset dials, buttons and bezel sides;
- A colour gradation on the upper-left inset dial that recreates the look of a titanium exhaust pipe as it heats up;
- The 23-minute mark highlighted in red—the number of NISMO’s car in GT500, the top category of the SUPER GT racing series;
- A urethane band processed to resemble a car tyre after hours of racing;
- An inset dial at six o’clock showing the solar-powered watch’s battery level like a car’s fuel gauge: high, medium and low.
What do you think: is this model worth buying?
