Watches

Are Wooden Watches Any Good?

A wooden watch keeps time as well as the movement inside it, and every watch here runs on a Miyota Japanese quartz, a movement family found in a great many steel watches. The wood changes how the watch looks and how it feels against the skin, not how it runs. Judge a wooden watch by how its case is built and what it is rated for, because that is where wood and steel genuinely differ. A steel case with a wood bezel keeps the seal a watch depends on, while a bamboo case puts the wood where you touch it all day. Both sit under hardened mineral crystal, which resists the light scratches that mark acrylic. Quartz also asks very little of the owner: there is no winding and no need to wear the watch daily, and when the battery eventually runs down it should be replaced promptly, since a spent cell left inside can leak onto the movement.

Water Ratings on a Wood Watch

A water rating comes from a pressure test in a lab rather than a list of activities, so it always sounds more generous than it behaves. A steel case rated to 50 meters handles rain, handwashing and a splash, a bamboo case rated to 30 is meant for light rain and splashes, and neither is a swimming watch. On the leather models the strap is the weaker part, since water stiffens and darkens leather long before it troubles the case. Take the watch off for dishes, and if a strap does get soaked, let it dry at room temperature before wearing it again.

Choosing Wood, Dial and Strap

Most of the range comes as three woods, two dial colors and two strap colors, and the quickest way to choose is in that order. Walnut is the darkest wood with a straight, plain grain, zebrawood carries bold dark stripes, and bamboo is the palest, with several tones side by side on one bezel. A white dial reads fastest at a glance, while a black dial sits quieter under a shirt cuff. Match the strap to the shoes and belt you wear most often, black or brown, and the watch will look planned alongside everything else. Those two colors are also the safest guess for a gift, since most wardrobes already hold one or the other. For a watch with no leather at all, the all-bamboo model runs on a bamboo link band that is sized by removing links.

A wood watch pairs naturally with a bead strand on the same wrist or the other one, and the solid wood and lava pieces in Bracelets repeat its material without competing with it. To match the strap to what you carry, the leather wallets and belts are in Accessories.