KUOE Old Smith 90-002 No-Date, Automatic NH38 Movement, Black, Replacement Belt Included, sliver, ミディアム

Product Information

Japan is not a country that you necessarily think of when it comes to boutique or micro brand watch manufacture, yet about 3 years ago Mr Kenji Uchimura launched his own micro brand watch company, with watches entirely manufactured in Japan. Since there isn't a lot of info here about Kuoe watches, I thought there might be interest in a Week On The Wrist update. A netsuke is a miniature sculpture, originating in 17th century Japan. Initially a simply-carved button fastener on the cords of an inrō box, netsuke later developed into ornately sculpted objects of craftsmanship. Kuoe is a Japanese brand out of Kyoto, founded in 2020 but conceived nearly 10 years prior. The brand seeks to recapture the elegance and simplicity embodied by watches from the 1940s to 1970s. The brand now has three models, the Old Smith 90-001 and 90-002 (reviewed herein), and the recently released Holborn. None of the models exceeds 35mm, staying true to their vintage inspiration. Kurono is a sub-brand of Hajime Asaoka, one of the high end watchmakers based in Japan. You could say that Kurono is the affordable little sister company, using Miyota automatic movements to achieve that.

With a case size of 35mm it sounds like its probably a bit on the small side but the cream dial on this example visually doesn’t make it seem that the watch is undersized on my 7 1/2” (19cm) wrist. A gently domed, scratch-resistant sapphire crystal protects the dial, and the anti-reflective coating is very effective. The unguarded, signed crown is my least favourite thing about the watch. I’m not keen on its shape and find it a bit too small and fiddly. It’s easy to pop the crown out but not that easy to change the time or wind. Water resistance is 5 ATM/50 Metres, which is fine for a watch such as this. The Royal Smith Dial And Hands Kuoe comes from Kyoto and seems more grounded in the traditional, with retro inspired watch designs, pleasant aesthetics, and discreet case sizes. They source their movements from Japanese brands, and put much value on making do with everything local. The KUOE Royal Smith/90-004 watch comes with a luxurious Italian leather strap with a gloss finish. The Royal Smith/90-004 model is limited to 50 pieces of each color. Japan is one of those countries that has risen to challenge the status-quo of the watchmaking industry, bringing some incredibly good mechanical timepieces to life recently. The Japanese watchmakers have started producing some of the best watches the world has ever seen, and not only that, but they’ve covered all price categories as well.The technologies used in the creation process are nothing but high end as well, and the brand simply represents the best of what Seiko’s over a century of experience in watchmaking has to offer. Besides these big prolific companies, there are plenty of smaller, independent watchmakers that have the qualities Japan is known for, like the excellent craftsmanship and the attention to detail that have made the big brands what they are today. Their inexpensive watches were also tough and resistant to the every day wear and tear, a quality much appreciated all over the world. You surely remember your first childhood watch. If you had one, it was probably a Casio. And very likely one with a calculator. Later on, everyone would want a Casio watch with a digital calendar, which the brand was the first to create.

Citizen is among the most powerful watchmakers of Japan, winning its place during the ’70s, when they became one the few to produce inexpensive and highly accurate quartz watches, offering them to the entire world. Thank goodness I had an 18mm strap available. It’s not a popular width, given the larger sizes of modern timepieces. But my loose formula for acceptable lug width is L=[1/2(C)], where L is lug width, and C is case diameter. With a 35mm case diameter, you’re left at 17.5mm, which rounds up to 18mm. (If you want to know what case diameters work with what lug widths, it’s C=2L+/-2; 18mm lugs work well on cases sized from 34mm to 38mm.) Now the Old Smith is not a Netsuke - but the finesse with which all the tiny details of dial & hands, the graceful case architecture, the fit and finish of the watch means that the Old Smith feels as if has the eye of one of those old Netsuke master craftsman has been at work here.

The name of the brand is associated with the Eastern countries, as seen from a European perspective, mostly referring to the Asian continent and the coveted treasures that used to come from there in the past. The ‘Old Smith 90-002’ manages to capture a major part of the design language of the MoD specification but then goes beyond that and does something very unique it adds a very Japanese level of detail, craftsmanship and artistry.

They try to connect the entire country in their watchmaking process, using materials from several regions and a wide variety of crafts and specialists. The result is that their watch designs are inspired by the entirety of Japan as a country and culture, without being limited to a specific region.I have long had a liking for watches with a military orientation or provenance. Think CWC, Smiths, Hamilton, IWC, Timor etc… The cases of their watches are incredibly complex and superbly finished, and house sourced Swiss made ETA movements further customized by themselves, but don’t expect their timepieces to be cheap. A new boutique watchmaker based in Japan and born in 2005, Minase’s story began as a machining workshop and continued with making watch cases for other brands before making the leap into watchmaking and starting creating their own timepieces. In terms of movements, they do source them from the likes of Seiko and Miyota. When it comes to design, they’ve got solid choices, from automatic chronographs to solar powered pieces, Bauhaus designs, and square shaped dress watches. And the most important price is their accessibility, allowing people to enjoy unique timepieces without breaking the bank.

So now we have that out of the way, let’s take a closer look at the specs and details… The Royal Smith 90-008 Case Their pieces aren’t by any means spectacular, but pleasant mechanical timepieces that are characterized by reliability and a beautiful simplicity. There are a few well known Japanese brands that produce watches for the mass market, like Casio, Seiko, and Citizen, but these aren’t the only ones. Citizen

One thing that few watchmakers and Knot does is that it allows their clients to customize their watch as much as possible, choosing a design, case and dial colors from their wide range of watch bodies and pairing it with one of their almost two hundred straps. Naoya Hida has learned the trade and honed his skills working for the likes of Vacheron Constantin, Jaeger-LeCoultre, F.P. Journe, and Breguet, before launching his own company in 2019. Grand Seiko watches include some of the greatest marvels of the mechanical watch world, and are certified with a standard of precision that exceeds even the Swiss COSC in its strictness. MoD watches were manufactured by multiple companies, they all had several common design features, most noticiibly the dial and hands, which had to adhere to a set of strict design parameters that produced maximum legibility under all lighting conditions and allowed for the wearer to have an ’at a glance’ comprehension of the time, every time.