As part of the build-up to the Alliance of British Watch and Clockmakers exhibition in March, the WatchGecko Magazine and YouTube team are visiting prominent British watch brands to get their take on the industry and valuable hands-on with homegrown horological creations.
Last week, the team travelled south in the UK to visit Zero West near Portsmouth. Two days of filming in their studio resulted in a fascinating interview with the founder plus superb hands-on footage of beautiful watches integrated with parts of Spitfires, Steam Trains, Hurricanes, and Lancasters.
Who are Zero West?
Zero West HQ - Credit WatchGecko
Graham Collins & Andrew Brabyn both gave up successful careers in marketing and engineering to join forces to create Zero West. Long-term watch enthusiasts with a passion for British engineering, Graham and Andrew rode a technical and financial roller coaster to turn Zero West into a reality and evolve it into the impressive entity we see today.
HQ is in an old boathouse, opposite a channel of water which is an offshoot of the Solent. The studio is warmly lit, sophisticated and inviting, with various WW2 and mechanical memorabilia in every corner. However, do not be fooled into thinking this room is a disorganised collection of bits and bobs. Quite the opposite, it is a finely crafted and designed room with the express purpose of maximising the visual impact of the many watches on display and illustrating the incredible historical story behind each creation.
Buying a part of Dambuster ED825
Zero West HQ - Credit WatchGecko
Take, for example, the matte black PVD Lancaster Bomber DB-1 watch. Like the Hurricane or Flying Scotsman models, each DB-1 watch has within its case back a small disc of metal recovered from an original vintage machine, in this case, Dambuster Lancaster ED825, whose mission was to bomb the Sorpe Dam in 1943. Owning a small part of this iconic bomber in the back of your watch is unique enough, but with Zero West’s sales approach, you can buy and collect your watch from the studio. Here, you can see photographs of the recovery of the aircraft parts, scale models of the bomber and talk with unbridled enthusiasm to Andrew and Graham, who created every part of the watch. There may even be an enormous part of the original aircraft fuselage as well as World War 2 vintage memorabilia directly connected to the story behind this and every watch.
As a holistic watch boutique experience, this is a fine example and frankly puts to shame the generic and often over-stylised offerings from other larger brands.
Zero West Creativity
Zero West HQ - Credit WatchGecko
It’s difficult not to be distracted by the enormous Spitfire engine in the middle of the room; however, we made a point of staying on message, and one of the principal reasons we were visiting Zero West was to talk to them about the British watch industry and get their thoughts on the future.
Andrew was effusive about the forthcoming show and brand participation. As this is an inaugural exhibition, there is understandably much excitement around it, and the current state of play of British Watchmaking. When you look at the number of companies exhibiting and the special editions they are making, a simple litmus test looks exceptionally healthy and innovative.
Zero West is making two special editions for the show: complete one-offs. These are special editions from their Lancaster and FS2 Flying Scotsman ranges. Realistically priced, considering these are unique watches, we imagine there will be considerable interest in securing them on the day.
Zero West HQ - Credit WatchGecko
What makes the construction and purchase of Zero West watches a little bit more special is that they are made in this same small building in the UK. Contrary to what you may think, the watches are hand-assembled from scratch in a tiny sealed laboratory within the workshop in the building. Here, a single highly trained technician painstakingly assembles every watch by hand, which accounts for the enormous attention to detail that is a trademark for Zero West. Not only are the watches assembled in The Boat House, but leather straps are made from scratch, only a few feet away. To fully embrace British manufacturing, Graham put himself on a leather watch strap-making course, and it was both a joy and a privilege to see him create a beautiful leather watch strap from scratch and then fit it to a watch destined for export.
Zero West’s efforts were recognised when the London Science Museum reached out to them and asked whether they could integrate a part of the famous steam locomotive, the Flying Scotsman, into a watch. Previously, aviation-based watches were integrated with recovered parts, often from crash wreckage. In contrast, the flying Scotsman component was to be donated by the Science Museum during a refurbishment of the steam engine. This single part would then be separated into multiple discs, which could become part of watch cases.
As Andrew says in the interview, going from a brand battling to create a first watch to an institution like the Science Museum calling for assistance typifies how far Zero West has come quickly. 2024 will most certainly be an exciting year for them.
We thank Andrew and Graham enormously for their time and generosity of spirit and for the fabulous interview, which you can watch here.
