How Stranger Watches are Made.

From a sketch on a napkin, to a piece of art on your wrist – the process of bringing an idea to life is not quite simple. In this post we describe the process of manufacturing, assembly and testing of Stranger watches, just to give you a high level idea of what it takes to bring our timepieces to life.

Stage 1: The Design. It starts out with design ideas and mind mapping of certain components that we want represented in our watches. This is by far the most engaging, frustrating and satisfying stages of the entire process. For example, Amir watches – it took us almost 2 years to come up with the design but luckily we were a bit more confident in what we really wanted with Stranger watches and were able to progress through the design stage in less than 6 months. Our in house designer, Yenlik, creates very rough renderings in several formats to give us an idea of what a watch might look like. Once we all agree (or not for the most part which results in many arguments, arm wrestling, 50 meter dashes, Rock Paper Scissors etc), we move on to 2D and 3D renderings which fully depict the details and a ‘final like’ version of the watch. Everyone from the entire team is involved in the design process as we want to get much feedback as possible and try to consider every possibly scenario from different angles. The entire design process takes place in Miami, Florida, where our HQ is based out of.

Stage 2: The Manufacturing. The manufacturing process, which involves our manufacturer preparing a detailed Technical Specifications Document (‘TeaSeD’ as we like to call it) which we review in detail and provide feedback. The manufacturing team takes approximately a month to prepare a fully functional Samples of the watch and everyone gets a chance to “play with it” and provide honest feedback. Once the mass manufacturing starts, it takes approximately from 3 to 6 months depending on the complexity of the watch. The manufacturing of our watches is completed by our manufacturing team based out of Hong Kong. During this stage, the most important part is the communication. We hold time boxed ‘Daily Standup’ video conference calls with the entire team present and for 15 minutes discuss key highlights of “what did we do today, what are we focusing on tomorrow, and are there any obstacles”. It is a concept with derived from our Software Development background in Agile.

Stage 3: The Assembly and Quality Assurance (QA). Prior to the start of the assembly, each watch component goes through a quality visual check. The assembly is performed by hand by each of our assembly specialists who focuses on a particular component of the watch rather than the entire watch. It starts with the attaching of the movement to the dial. Once the dial and movement are attached, we pass the assembled pieces over to the Hands specialist who fits the hands onto the dial. This is followed by the process of inserting the assembled components into the Case and adding the pushers and the crown. The final step in the assembly is the insertion of the oscillating rotor and the attachment of the caseback. Once the full assembly is completed, the watch is passed over to QA for testing. The first step in the Testing is the Performance test which we perform by winding the watch and letting it run for 45 minutes to an hour. Moreover, we test our watches in various positions to simulate the positions while on the wrist. Water resistance testing is performed at two stages: 1 with a case alone and another with the fully assembled watch. Drop testing is one of the final QA steps where the watches go through a set of “drops” from various heights to ensure proper functionality when subjected to impacts.

Stage 4 is what we call “Un Momento de Verdad” (aka Moment of Truth) when we receive the full shipment, conduct UAT (User Acceptance Testing) of the watches, complete the final assembly with straps and packaging.