IN THE MARKET
Founder of Bamford Watch Department, George Bamford, on being a specialist in the art of watch customisation and his latest collaboration with fragment design
ON HIS COMPANY…
I never set [Bamford Watch Department] up as a business. I was on holiday and someone said, “I really like that on your wrist; I’d buy one”, and that’s how it started. It’s all about personalisation. This was my hobby business and it just snowballed. People were emailing me on my Hotmail account.
ON CUSTOMISATION…
Everyone is offering bespoke: Gucci, Louis Vuitton…
So it’s not a buzzword; it’s a reality. And the watch world is probably a few years behind. But we’ve been very lucky. Last year, we signed a contract with LVMH [to be the official authorised customiser] of Tag Heuer, Bulgari and Zenith; it’s really bloody amazing.
ON THE COLLABORATION…
We’ve worked with fragment [design] before, but this is something else. It’s a beautiful watch and it’s exclusive to Dover Street Market. Hiroshi [Fujiwara; founder of fragment design] has been a friend of mine for about 10 or 11 years. He’s almost a godfather to my kids and he’s someone
I love and respect. To work with him, and to have his editing eye, to pare back the design... It hasn’t been simple because it’s hard to create pure perfection.