Apple Watch

From the Mac to the iPod, Apple was always the tech brand with a fashion logo. But the Watch wore it best, recalls Adam Banks

ARRIVING FOUR YEARS after the iPad, the Watch was Apple’s first new product line under Tim Cook as CEO. Steve Jobs’ company had begun, as every Apple press release reminded us, by “igniting the personal computer revolution.” Now it announced its “most personal device ever.” Having poached Angela Ahrendts, CEO of British fashion house Burberry, to run Apple’s retail operations, Cook added more luxury market veterans to shape the Watch’s appeal and former Nike employees to hone its fitness credentials. Meanwhile Jony Ive, promoted to oversee both hardware and software, formed his own partnership with longtime friend and collaborator Marc Newson. Among other projects from chairs to cars, the celebrated Australian industrial designer had founded Ikepod, known for futuristic watches like the Solaris, with its minimalist rounded–rectangle case and precision–engineered Milanese mesh strap. Days before the Watch was unveiled, Apple quietly confirmed that Newson had been hired on to Ive’s team.

The launch, on 9 September 2014, was at Cupertino’s Flint Center, an unusually large venue supplemented by a marquee in which members of the press were invited to admire and photograph dozens of versions of the Watch, as if on a catwalk. Besides a solid 18ct gold Edition, options included a Milanese loop. Ive spoke of “a device designed to be worn” — rather than starting with the form of a watch and packing a computer into it, Apple had reinvented its mobile product for the wrist. Of course, there were no compromises. Unlike the first popular smart watch, the Pebble, with its battery– saving “E–Paper” monochrome face, the Watch had an industry–leading S1 processor and a full–color Retina touchscreen that turned on as you raised your wrist — a classic user–centered gesture interaction. Fashion and tech editors agreed: Apple’s accessory was the smartest in every sense.