If you are a Disney aficionado, or you are the parent of smallish children, then you will be familiar with the character of the vintage doll repairer in Toy Story: large spectacles, special eyeglass and an amazing leather case that, when opened, features tiny drawers containing screws and other repair paraphernalia – and he is not to be rushed in his work.
This skill set, and some of its features, cross over to the art of watchmaking – a hobby that began for Simon Porter ACSI when he was studying for his PhD in Mechanical Engineering at the University of Bristol.
“I bought an old pocket watch from eBay and set about the task of taking it apart and putting it back together again,” he says. “This process taught me a great deal about how mechanical watches work, and on a large enough scale that I wasn’t struggling too much with my amateur’s lack of finesse.
“I began reading up on horology and was soon looking through the course material for online watchmaking schools. Most of them started with the same movement, so I figured that I should too! I purchased a kit from one of the schools, which came with all I needed to build a movement, together with a case and hands and lots of drawings, and I set to work. Needless to say, my first effort would not have won any beauty prizes, but the sense of pride in building a fully functioning watch that kept reasonable time was huge.”
Simon has made eight ‘skeleton’ watches for friends as gifts and as commissions. “I don’t see it as a business, as the money I charge for commission pieces just covers my costs and leaves me a bit of pocket money, enabling me to pursue my hobby,” he says.
Time after time
Each watch takes Simon between four and six weeks to make. “When I am building a watch, I tend to try and work on it at least four times a week, in short bursts of 30 minutes,” he adds.
“The biggest obstacle when watchmaking is one’s own patience. It is very easy to be on a roll and want to keep going to the next step, before having a lapse of concentration and ending up on my hands and knees looking for a screw.”
Simon feels that the vogue for big watches plays to his strengths, as these larger watches are the type he currently makes.
He says: “Anything smaller, at this stage, would be a little too challenging! Skeleton watches, where the movement is clearly visible through the case, are all hand-wound – just good, old-fashioned clockwork.”
Essential bits of kit for this hobby include a selection of tweezers, a set of micro screwdrivers and a movement holder to fix things in place. In addition, a set of eye loupes of varying magnification and a bright light allow him the degree of vision and illumination necessary for work with tiny components.
The essential attributes of a watchmaker are, according to Simon: “Steady hands, patience and impeccable housekeeping – a speck of dust in a movement can easily ruin the timekeeping of a mechanical watch. A watchmaker also needs a sense of imagination and the ability to envisage how a three-dimensional mechanism fits together.”
Simon takes inspiration for his watchmaking from some of the master watchmaking brands of past and present: “I very much admire Harry Winston. His Opus series well and truly pushes boundaries, both aesthetically and in terms of pure engineering.
“My favourite watch brands are Rolex, Breitling and Panerai. I like Rolex for its unrelenting commitment to quality on a large scale. Breitling makes fantastic-looking pilots’ watches, but is also an innovator; its Emergency watch has a built-in emergency transmitter that broadcasts for 48 hours once activated and has saved lives. I like Panerai for its no-nonsense aesthetic and good looks.”
Have any of Simon’s colleagues at Nils Taube Investments in London, where he works as an equity analyst, shown any interest in his horological passion?
“Indeed, they have,” he says. “I made a watch for a colleague as my very first commission.”
Have you got an interesting hobby? Contact Lora Benson at lora.benson@cisi.org. If your story is published, you will receive £25 of shopping vouchers.