Brand Retrospective: The History of Seiko

I'm planning on putting together a big scale retrospective on watches in films over the summer when I have some more free time, but as a warm up I thought it'd be fun to take a deep dive into the history of some of the biggest horological brands to understand how they came to be where they are today. In this video we're going to take a look at the history of Seiko. Let's start with the absolute basics. In the name, Seiko is a Japanese word meaning exquisite, but the same term can also be used in different contexts to mean success. Seiko were founded in 1881, so there's actually a huge amount of history to cover. For the sake of a watchable run time to the video, I'm going to focus on the biggest events only. If you want to read up in more detail about any of the events in the company's history, I would recommend a visit to the museum website, which I'll leave a link to in the description. On a side note, I'm hoping to visit the museum in Ginza in person later this year, so there may well be a part two to this video in the long run. Let's begin at the beginning. Back in 1881, Kintaro Hattori, a 21-year-old entrepreneur, opened his first watch shop in Tokyo. The shop sold and repaired watches and clocks. By 1892, the business had grown to the point where Kintaro was able to open his own factory, and then start to manufacture his own clocks. The factory was named Seikosha, with sha meaning house. The clocks proved to be a huge hit, so by 1895, Kintaro began to expand his manufacturing to produce the brand's first pocket watch, the Timekeeper, which put Seiko on the map amongst its early horological competitors. While wristwatches were becoming more commonplace in the West, thanks to their prevalence in the Second Boer War, in Japan, pocket watches remained far more popular. Determined to establish Seiko at the precipice of Japanese horology and stay one step ahead of the competition, Kintaro strived to create Japan's first ever wristwatch. It was a long process, and it wasn't until 1913 that he was able to release the Laurel. Production numbers were initially limited, but Seiko was beginning to set itself apart. The Great Kanto Earthquake of 1923 is considered to be the worst natural disaster ever to hit Japan. It measured 7.9 on the Richter scale, and effectively wiped out Tokyo and Yokohama. Not only was the initial quake devastating, but it was followed by a 40 foot high tsunami, which destroyed a lot of what was left standing, and swept away many thousands to their deaths. For Seiko, their headquarters and factory were both destroyed. It necessitated a new start, and out of the ashes in 1924, Seiko released their first model ever to feature the brand name on the dial. As part of the rebuilding project, the Wako Clock Tower was built. It was finished in 1932 in a Neo-Renaissance style, and remains synonymous with the brand to this day. It's from this base, where they're still headquartered, that the brand, now fully established, could start to focus its efforts towards innovation. The two most notable in this time period were the Diashock, which as it sounds, enhanced shock resistance of the movement, and later the Magic Lever system, which was Seiko's first self-winding mechanism. In 1960, Grand Seiko launched, but I won't talk about that, or any of the other spin-off brands here, as, particularly with Grand Seiko, I can see myself making a retrospective on them individually later on down the line. I want to pause our trip down memory lane in 1965, where Seiko released the first Japanese dive watch, which was produced for the Japanese Antarctic Research Expedition. This is perhaps my favourite in the Seiko back catalogue, in terms of design aesthetics. It's no-nonsense straight edges and extremely legible dial are fantastic, and clearly still in demand today, as evidenced by the success of the Presage reissue range, of which the black variant you're seeing footage of is a part. Those of you who have a keen interest in horology will already know that we are getting to the most significant date in Seiko's history, Christmas Day 1969, which saw the launch of the Astron, the world's first ever quartz watch, and the beginning of the end for a lot of traditional watchmakers. While today a lot of people will look down on quartz for its low price point and ease of availability, in 1969 the view wasn't quite the same. This was a real threat to the establishment. How could a mechanical movement possibly compete with the Astron, which was accurate to within 5 seconds a month, and could run without stopping for an entire year? The initial price tag for the Astron was 450,000 yen, the equivalent to just over $4,000, basically the price of a car at the time. Certainly this was not the kind of watch we now associate with a quartz movement. This was nothing short of groundbreaking, and single-handedly shaped the watch market as we know it today. One thing I would add here that often gets overlooked, the Astron is a really attractive timepiece. It's 36mm in diameter, 11mm thick, and has fantastic styling. The lack of need to wind the watch meant a smaller crown could be employed, which, as you can see, clicks into the shell of the watch itself to create more symmetry on wrist. Seiko continued to innovate in the quartz space, with the first 6-digit LCD quartz screen in 1973, and then the first digital watch with chronograph functionality in 1975. As I mentioned earlier, in a video of this length, it's impossible to cover everything. Alongside the Fantastic Museum website, the company also has a timeline on its official website which is worth a closer look for more information. I'll leave a link to it in the description. Needless to say, the number of horological world firsts that they can claim is really impressive. We'll skip ahead slightly now into the 1980s to take a moment to discuss the Seiko TV watch. To me, this is just so cool and decades ahead of its time. The watch came with an LCD screen and a separate TV and radio receiver which connected to the top of the watch to provide it with signal. Another little link back to what I mentioned regarding watches in film, this model famously featured in the Bond franchise. Today, we take smart watches for granted, but there wasn't really much else like this at the time in 1982. Clearly it came ahead of its time, and the actual use experience was really quite janky, but it's a very impressive technical marvel nonetheless. This kind of technical innovation from Seiko continued in 1983 with the VoiceNote watch which allowed users to record memos and then, perhaps most impressively, in 1984 with the UC2000 which was a wrist-mounted computer that stored data like telephone numbers, addresses and allowed users to plan a month ahead with its built-in diary functionality. I have to say, I really find this period of retro tech very endearing and nostalgic. It's the kind of stuff I could see Hackerman from Kung Fury wearing. It speaks to a time of real innovation, pushing the boundaries of possibility, as opposed to now where I feel like the technology that we get is artificially made worse than it really could be, so companies are future-proofed, safe in the knowledge that we'll come back to buy the next tiny upgrade. We'll jump forwards again to 1999, the dawn of the new millennium, with the introduction of the Spring Drive movement. This is something that we now associate with Grand Seiko, but the 7R68, the first Spring Drive model, is a Seiko. I don't want to dwell on it too much in this video because, again, I can see a future where I make an entire video just focusing on this movement because I'm desperate to own one, so I'll just give the short version here. A man by the name of Yoshikazu Akahane first thought of the idea in 1977 and took years turning it into a reality. In the most simple terms possible, it combines the accuracy of a quartz movement with either an automatic or manually wound mainspring. It's a blend of modern and traditional watchmaking, and the end result is one of the smoothest movements you'll come across, with the second hand gliding in a way that very few other movements can replicate. Next up on our tour through the history of Seiko is the world's first electronic ink watch in 2006. This is not exactly a look or technology that has caught on when it comes to wearing on wrist, but I wanted to include this because I've never actually seen anything like it before. Coming just before the dawn of the modern smartwatch, which are effectively computers on your wrist, this was a format of telling the time that allowed for a lot of creativity and is certainly an interesting concept. It was recognised as such, winning the Grand Prix de Genève. It would go on to spawn other models with much more detailed displays. The final stop on our tour of the history of Seiko is 2012 with the Astron GPS Solar. This, like its namesake, was designed to be another step forward in horology. It incorporates a GPS receiver, which allows the watch to identify its location, time zone and date and adjust the time accordingly. Now of course, technology like this might seem somewhat dated given the functionality of modern smartphones, but I doubt that many people who are watching the video on the history of Seiko are the type to say, what's the point of a watch, I have my phone anyway, so I'm sure you'll appreciate the concept. I hope you've found this whistle stop tour through the history of Seiko informative. I've enjoyed this style of video, so let me know which brand you'd like me to focus on next time round in the comments below. As ever, thank you for watching, if you've enjoyed what you've seen, please consider dropping the video a like and subscribing for more content like this in the future.