Some ideas are still worth completing.
I’ve spent nearly 20 years working across product design, innovation, and brand experience design, fifteen of those years in Asia. My work includes launching products from zero to market with global teams, leading a 0–1 seating brand while at IDEO, and designing furniture and systems for Herman Miller.
Alongside that work, I collected and studied vintage watches. What stood out were the ideas that never quite made it.Not because they were wrong, but because the tools of their time weren’t ready.
Some of those ideas are still worth completing.
Appeared in the 1960s.
Then abandoned.
Single-crown internal bezel systems appeared briefly in the 1960s and early 70s. The concept was clear: fewer interfaces, greater reliability, a calmer way to interact with time. The execution wasn’t. Engagement felt vague. The mechanisms demanded care. The idea was quietly abandoned.
Modern CNC machining, materials, and tolerances change what’s possible.An idea that didn’t work fifty years ago can work now, if it’s approached properly.
Progress was
slow by design.
I partnered with an experienced watch engineer and spent several years working across southern China and Hong Kong, visiting factories, testing manufacturing routes, and building relationships with specialist suppliers. The Unicrown system could not be sourced off the shelf. It required extensive prototyping, repeated sampling, and incremental refinement. Many approaches were tested and abandoned. Kintao exists because we chose that slower path.
The ideas, attempts, and people who came before. Respect for proven thinking, not nostalgia.
Clear intent. Measured progress. Improved execution. Kintao sits between the two. Respect for what came before, and responsibility for what comes next.
Chapter 1
is the first.
There are other unfinished ideas in watchmaking history. Concepts that deserve another look with modern tools. Kintao exists to complete them.