Telling Time VI: In Wacky Ways

In this sixth of a series of posts, I'll present a few wacky ways of telling time.

I'm not talking about making the day 11 hours, or putting 45 larger minutes into the existing hour - just displaying the same old time in an unconventional fashion.

This is a Silberstein Wandering Eye watch. The hour appears within the eye, and the outer edge of the eye points at the minutes. The second hand revolves conventionally, with a few twists and turns for amusement. I came very close to buying this but passed it along to my friend Alec.

Keeping to our same watchmaker, this colorful watch is called the Titanium Pikto Smileday. A single hand (the red end) takes care of the hours and minutes (carefully marked on the perimeter of the dial), and the wavy yellow hand indicates the seconds.

The smileday indicator above the date and 6 lets you know the day of the week. The watch is displaying Friday, when people smile at the thought of the weekend.

This is an Audemars Piguet Starwheel watch owned by my pal Graham. A set of 3 transparent discs, interlinked on a lower wheel, indicate the time on scale at the top of the watch. As the discs rotate, the hour number (printed on the wheel) appears against the white background, and a small arrow points to the minutes.

A Urwerk watch uses a similar concept (but different mechanism) to indicate time. This Model 110 is one owned by my buddy Jonathan. Revolving rectangles with pointers are moved along a scale to indicate the time. Notice the scale is on the right side, so it's most likely to peek out from under your cuff if the watch is worn on the left arm.

This Ferrara watch belonging to Graham uses two separate tracks and wandering hands to point out the time. A conventional second hand in the center revolves as usual.

Although there are dozens more ways to indicate the time, I'm going to stop with a watch from MB&F. This model is known as the "Chocolate Frog" because it's brown - and well  - I think you can see the frog-eye appearance for yourself. Revolving domes indicate the hours and minutes.

Max Busser (the creator) calls this watch a work of art that happens to tell the time.

Smile!