The beauty of Florence

When you think about certain cities, your mind can recall pictures of places of beauty and architecture, rolling hills or skyscrapers, and so much more as your imagination begins to try to reveal what you know about an area. For a lot of us who are yet to travel the world and thoroughly enjoy what it has to offer, it is our imagination that can really make us see what we believe to be there. Creating that beauty in our mind often lends itself to so much of us using those images to inspire. For me, even thinking about the term Florence, unfortunately doesn't instantly ping up an image of our women's watch. No, it most definitely makes me think of the simply elegant Italian city and how I can see myself sat at a little café drinking a Bellini and enjoying the warm summer sun. However, The Florence is our first watch designed for the female market and itself brings that idea of simplicity, elegance, and charm as equally as this Italian province could. 

The Florence is a great beginning to our range specifically designed for women. Women's wear is such a hard market to break into and with female watches being cheap and easily accessible, we really wanted to try to offer something that would complement our style and design and be available to those wanting to appreciate a British built watch. 

Our designs produced in house for our next women's watch have not yet shown us what is truly the 'next one', but our designs are bursting with beauty and all echo that classic PINCHBECK look, so it won't be long before a new watch is on the market.

Gentleman's Style featuring The Oxford Hawksmoor

Keeping up with high end fashion isn't something that we aspire to do. We are much more interested in creating pieces that are forever fashionable. Something that would never seem dated or old but a watch that will always make a fashion statement. 

Our Oxford Hawksmoor is one of our most simplistic watches yet showcasing uttermost elegance and style in its look and feel. Being in a larger case, measuring 41mm, the face is one of our biggest and the style that it offers is immeasurable. With a cream or blue dial, all printed with the Oxford University crest, this simple watch is there to be noticed. 

Whether you are wearing it because you love the look of it or because Oxford University holds special memories for you, this watch very much offers Oxford flair in its elegant design.
For us, designing such a piece was very exciting. It is a tribute to one of Britain's most original architects Nicholas Hawksmoor (1661-1736) who was a pupil at Wren and a near contemporary of the first Christopher Pinchbeck; They could have easily have known each other in London. As well as several University buildings in Oxford he designed six churches in the capital, and worked on a number of stately homes.

Our Hawksmoor is a real collectors piece and is a very beautiful watch to own and wear.

From The Work Bench.

A working day for us is somewhat different than most. I suppose if you are lucky enough to have a job as a watchmaker you are already guaranteed a different type of working day. Watchmaking by hand is such an art-form these days. There are very few watchmakers in this country practising the fine art of horology.

Working with time and being the one who gives people that bit of luxury with it is quite an honour. 

We could easily take for granted how easy it is to know the time and even read a clock. We all know that feeling when we have forgotten to put our watches on; you can spend the whole day feeling late or lost. Having time so close and so accessible is indeed a luxury. 
We should never think about running out of time. It is always there, we must simply make sure we use it to the best of our ability. 

When making a time piece, we have to seriously consider what the point of it is. If we are getting that wrong, then we get it all wrong. Our watches are there to tell the time and to give you that luxury of knowing, of seeing and of being part of time as it passes. 

 We try, with all our watches, to make them precisely on time so that the wearer has always got the time to do what they want. That is what it is all about. Having the time to explore, have fun, live even, and all this we put down to actually having enough time to do it. 

At Pinchbeck HQ building each watch is an event. Starting from the very beginning every part is put together to form an object that works, that has a purpose, and it is this that we are most proud of. The timepieces that are created offer so much more than just telling the time, they mark occasions, they give you moments to treasure and most of all they stop you from losing what we all want and need; time.  

Taking Time To Learn

When we started developing the business H. Pinchbeck, we came up against all sorts of stones that made us stop in our paths. As we continued to delve into how we could keep our parts as British as possible, we began to grow in understanding more and more about how British Industry worked and how individual craftsmen were developing their fine art of producing to keep up with modern needs.

It was a great opportunity too for us to build a platform, making sure that the work we started used and supported the highest quality of parts. 

As the years pass on and our techniques develop, we are always surprised by the amount we are still learning.  

Our greatest area of development comes with each new bespoke order. There isn't anything more exciting than being challenged to make something we haven't before. Recently designs have been requested on all type of backgrounds, from Mother Of Pearl to black Onyx and it is fantastic finding out about how we can make and print on these kinds of surfaces. 

For Pinchbeck, the challenge of developing our watches is always something that we are working on, in the background, slowly and finely developing our art so that what we are producing is something quite exceptional.