Text by Matteo Pini
Photography by Alex Bibby

What would it mean to create a watch of the future? In an industry that moves at a sluggish pace, where innovation seems to be limited to reissuing models from 80 years ago with different coloured straps, the notion that a watch might surprise you – might feel alien, futuristic, even magical – is almost taboo. For newcomers, the question of how to compete with the entrenched brands of Switzerland is as much ideological as it is practical: how does one disrupt a culture defined by exclusivity and permanence?

For Vanguart, the young, surgically precise and somewhat mischievous iconoclasts of the watch industry, you rewrite the rules from the ground up. You evade the traditional avenues of watch promotion – the fairs and frivolities  – focusing on word-of-mouth and intimate presentations to private collectors. You produce all pieces in-house to ensure quality control and release them in exceptionally limited runs. Most importantly, you make watches that conjure the feeling of a future arriving, quietly, on one’s wrist. “For me, a high-end complicated watch is one of those rare objects that can truly make us feel out of our reality,” creative director Thierry Fischer remarks to TANK. “Arthur C. Clarke said that, ‘Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic,’ and that resonates deeply with me.”

Perusing the brand’s Orb model certainly conjures a how-did-they-do-it alchemy. Comprised of 395 components, with a flying tourbillon and a titanium track for the orbital winding mass, its presentation is unashamedly futuristic, like something out of one of Clarke’s sci-fi stories. “The idea was to create the feeling that the mechanism is floating in space, like a celestial body suspended in a void,” says Fischer. The eureka moment came from the idea to incorporate the automatic winding mass, often hidden within the engineering of a watch, as a visual and spatial divider. “It became an essential part of the overall composition, almost like a gravitational ring around the heart of the movement.” The final flourish is the inclusion of a small diamond that gently orbits the watch – “like a moon”, Fischer adds. 

It can be easy to forget that the existence of a small, mineral-powered machine strapped to the wrist that can track the passage of time is, in its own way, miraculous

The brand’s emphasis on experience-led watchmaking has been a long time in the making. Founded in 2017 in La Chaux-de-Fonds by a team with experience at esteemed manufacturer Audemars Piguet Renaud, the brand’s first watch, Black Hole, took three years from start to finish. Co-founder Mehmet Korutürk, the only founding member without a luxury watch background, drew inspiration from his experience as a financier for a Formula 1 team. “That experience offered a front-row seat to the worlds of precision engineering, high performance, and storytelling – all essential elements in truly exceptional watchmaking,” he says. And yet, despite its undeniable tech bent, Vanguart watches are intended to be worn, “to feel great on the wrist. If it doesn’t make you feel something the moment you wear it, it’s just another object.” In recent months, actor Michael B. Jordan, NBA basketball player John Mayer and Ed Sheeran and Afrobeat innovator Adekunle Gold have all been spotted wearing the brand. 

In the 21st century, the watch has become a paradox: technically obsolete yet persistently desirable. As the phone usurps its functional role, the watch threatens to go the same way as vinyl records or Polaroid cameras: into the realm of affect and nostalgia. It can be easy to forget that the existence of a small, mineral-powered machine strapped to the wrist that can track the passage of time is, in its own way, miraculous. It is this spirit of technological possibility that Vanguart’s forward-thinking watches look to revive. “The idea that hundreds of components, many of them still crafted by hand, can come together to display functions in such unexpected and poetic ways, creates this strange and beautiful feeling,” says Fischer. “We’re constantly searching for how our next creations will reach people, take them on a journey where they’ll need to let go, be surprised, maybe even feel a bit uncomfortable at times. But the goal is always the same: to evoke a sense of wonder.” .