Hi All
Been thinking about some of the "British" watches.
All of them have foreign (usually Swiss) movements (e.g. Rodgers London, Christopher Pinchbeck of Lincoln, Simon Benney, Meridian Watches*)
Many, many more British brands design here and manufacture abroad (although many or most do the final assembly and other handfinishing here in the UK. Examples include: Dent, IWI, Schofield, Christopher Ward, Time Factors, RLT, Offshore, etc*)
*N.b. here an acknowledgement is due to Robert Loomes, whom I am loosely quoting from this post he wrote at pistonheads here: http://www.pistonheads.com/gassing/t...ish+watches%3F
I suspect that both Pinion & Peter Roberts could also be added to the first list but I am not 100% sure. And, of course, Robert Loomes himself uses NOS Smiths 1215 movements, made in Cheltenham in the 1950's.
Anyway, I also recall Eddie saying that Petra and Konrad Damasko actually bought a machine to make their own movements. A quick look online seems to suggest that Damasko is now 20 years old and have been producing and using their own in-house ebauches since 2010 - making them a "manufactory" like Nomos.
How hard (i.e. expensive!) would it be to do something similar in England? Especially now with ETAs becoming harder to get.
And with the likes of Seiko churning out millions of very very well made movements at very very low prices would it even be worth it?
I was just wondering about the possibility some all-English movements for all those brands listed above. It always seems a shame that the single biggest and most important part of a "British" watch is made is Swiss (or even Chinese).
If Damasko can start doing from scratch it in Germany why can't we do it here?
What would it cost to do this? And how viable would it be as an enterprise?
Who'd be interested in looking at this with me and getting some investment to re-start the British watch-making (NOT just movement re-housing) industry? It would be nice to turn the current situation on its head and buy-in cases to house British movements.
Edit: sorry, not ALL have foreign movements: Roger Smith makes his own of course! Good info here: http://great-british-watch.co.uk/british-watchmaking/
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