By Jovan Krstevski
The first thing that I can think of when I see one of Plug & Feather’s stone face watches is a question of how these guys managed to put a stone in a watch. Aside from being fascinated, I do have a lot of doubt if these watches are actually capable of being called an everlasting story teller watches as the company claims. Honestly, I do like them but I somehow question their durability. It is true that stones are naturally strong, but once you subject it to the machining process, I’m not sure if you can get the right configuration needed. Well, don’t be surprised, as the company managed to find a solution to this problem, which they now call StoneStable. Don’t try to use the name as they have intuitively branded it, nice work by the way.
The company’s story is quite unique and they do deserve the chance to be read by the general public. I’ve seen watches attempted to be made from absolutely stunning ideas but the results often times fall short. In this case though, I like how each watch tells a unique story in an abstract form. The stone faces are already very artistic, which means you don’t need much other elaborate design for the watch itself. The stones used are not just your typical garden stone or a common stone you would find in a nearby river bed. These stones are exotic as what the company claims. They are sourced from around the world so yes, that in itself is quite interesting.
Their design process is quite speedy, a year of research isn’t that long when it comes to producing excellent timepieces because a lot of tested companies are known to spend vast amounts of time just for their research. Innovation nowadays is really quick, thanks to the advancement in technology. Prototyping can now be done via computers and the speed of building the prototypes can be blazing fast. So I don’t doubt how they came up with these watches in just two years of both research and assembly. The idea in itself has been with the creators for a long time so making sense of the design process can come quite quick if well directed towards a targeted goal.
Looking at the collection, there’s really nothing fancy about these watches except each of the unique stones’ composition found in each timepiece. They somehow managed to make each stone face as durable as possible with their StoneStable technique. This is practically a cheat since they added an alloy disc and a bonding agent to make sure that each stone face is going to withstand the test of time. The thickness of each stone face is also a problem in my opinion since if you really want to build something elegant, you have to consider pretty much everything that is being sought by everyone else like thickness, elegance, looks and of course durability. The excellent timepieces maybe thick but their insides are filled with magnificent moving pieces. Nonetheless, each of these watches do have something great on their own. I surmise that these watches will appeal to the ones with strong attachment with nature, yes you can take something from nature with you in an elegant fashion, you don’t have to take a huge boulder from your trip to a foreign country just to capture your memories of that place. These watches have stone faces that came from various historical places all over the world.
I will now go to the overall design of these stone face watches. I can tell you now that there is not much difference on each of the watches as they only feature unique dials. What interests me is that each stone somehow blends in with the overall color of the watches. To preserve the harmony between technology and nature, I believe that the designers adapted simple lines and intuitive form within the watches. Each of the stone faces feature a unique formula derived from nature, and the finish is something that you can’t reproduce with artificial substances so I’m really fascinated with the company’s ingenious idea.
