Mark Cho (Founder, The Armoury & Drake's)¶
Published on Mon, 20 May 2019 10:00:07 +0000
Some thoughts on smaller watches, a few style tips, and the virtues (and challenges) of silent meditation.
Synopsis¶
In this episode of Hodinkee Radio, host Stephen Pulvirent sits down with Mark Cho, co-owner of menswear destination The Armoury and London-based Drake's. The conversation spans Mark's deep appreciation for smaller vintage watches, his extensive travels between Hong Kong, London, New York, and Japan, and his obsessive approach to both horology and classic menswear. Mark shares a remarkable story about purchasing a stolen FP Journe Divine 36, having it confiscated, and ultimately working with the brand to create a custom 38mm Resonance in his preferred slate blue colorway.
The discussion delves into Mark's philosophy on classic clothing, the international nature of menswear traditions, and how The Armoury has built its identity around authenticity and craftsmanship. Mark discusses his preference for watches in the 34-37mm range, his collection of vintage Pateks including the 3800 Nautilus, and a fascinating survey he conducted of over 900 people examining the relationship between wrist size and watch preferences. The episode also touches on his meditation retreat experience, his admiration for designer Dieter Rams, and his approach to retail as hospitality rather than pure commerce. Throughout, Mark demonstrates his characteristic attention to detail and his belief that the best products come from craftspeople who respect their materials and customers.
Links¶
Transcript¶
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| Unknown | I love people who get obsessed with things. You can tell so much about what makes someone tick by the things that they just can't get out of their heads. Mark Cho is the co-owner and co-proprietor of Classic Menswear mecca the Armory and the London-based haberdasher Drake's. He's a tough man to track down though, splitting his time between Hong Kong, London, New York, and Japan. But from the beginning, we always knew he was gonna end up on Hodinki Radio. And this week, it's finally happening. Over the years, I've had the pleasure of getting a lot of texts and emails from Mark that start something like, Dude, you gotta check this out. And I always know that when I swipe right, I'm gonna be greeted by something that's equal parts awesome and esoteric. Mark knows the classsic, sure, but he tends to be interested in the strange variations of things that have a special story and are just a tiny bit different than the thing you think you already know. On the orological side of things, he's more than a little obsessed with smaller watches, even conducting a nearly thousand-person survey of wrist sizes and watch preferences to see if his theories were correct. You've gotta stick around to the end of the episode to hear all about that one. We also get some tips from Mark on the pieces of clothing that every guy should rely on, his love of Dita Rams, and even how a silent meditation retreat may have been some of the most productive time of his life. I'm your host Stephen Pulverin and this is Hodinky Radio. Hey Mark, thanks for joining us. Hello Stephen, how are you doing? And we got uh Kara here. Hi guys. Hi, hi. So Mark, where did you most recently get off a plane from? Uh from Hong Kong. Okay. You're a tough man to keep track of these days. Yes. I have a separate website with my calendar on it just for friends and family. So you like? I'll act yeah, oh yeah. I gotta get on this. Wait, did you make it yourself or is it like a Google Calendar? It's an embedded Google Calendar as part of my website |
| Unknown | . I love that. It's like a trick. I'm not busy enough for that, but maybe I should be. |
| Unknown | Listen, my mom loves it. Yeah, that's as long as your mom's happy. Primarily those three places. Um, and then I'm on the road a lot because I do a lot of the product development for the armory. So I spent a lot of time, Japan, Spain, France, Italy. That's mainly it. And probably m of all those places, Japan the most, just because we have a lot of different projects on the boil in Japan. Okay. That's so cool. So you need a website so that everybody knows where the are. where the heck you Sometimes |
| Unknown | , just so they know like what time they can call me. But now good catch. Yeah. I didn't say but I decided to say something |
| Unknown | on air. That's a good move. You know what? Let's let's jump right into it. You know, we we will talk about the armory, we'll talk about clothes, we'll talk about the products you're working on. But we have a literal pile of watches sitting in front of you. Beautiful watches. Yeah. Really beautiful watches. And there was one in particular that you came in with on your wrist that we started talking about and I told you to wait till we're on air. Can you tell us what that watch was? Or is? Yes. Um I have to be a little bit careful because I'm not sure how much of this story I'm allowed to tell. Okay. But um so I've collected FP Jorns for a while. And today I'm wearing an FP Jorne Resonance. And um I collected you know I I always prefer smaller watches. Yeah. And F. Jorne had a model in their range called the Divine 36, which I technically was a ladies' watch. And I don't think they made that many of them, because they were very hard to find um on the secondary market. But eventually I tracked one down, I bought it, I enjoyed it, and then uh about almost two years ago I I sent it in for servicing. And um I got a message back from FP Jorn saying, um this watch is stolen. And I was like, oh, cool. That is not what you want. No, that was not ideal. So they said, you know, you do have to provide the paperwork to show that you are, even if you're not the legitimate owner of the watch, you bought it in good faith. I said, Yeah, of course. And luckily I had you know all the emails um exchange that I exchanged with the original dealer that I bought it from, um, as well as my bank transfer receipts. And I sent that over. They said, Okay, that's great. Like, you know, we're happy with this. Um, unfortunately, we still have to keep the watch because we have to return it to insurance company. Um, and I asked about a little bit more, and it turned out that they had that watch had been stolen from their Paris boutique 10 years ago. And the insurance company had paid out for it. So that's why the watch had to go back. Interesting. Yeah. But so you know, this whole time I was dealing with Pierre Halimi, who's the USA CEO, and uh, you know, he was a great guy to deal with and we kind of became friendly and he said listen next time you're in New York um it would be great to meet up in person. I said, Yeah, of course. So I went up to their boutique uh up on 60, 60 something. And um we were having a chat, we were having a good time, and I was kind of trying to explain like what I do, what the armory is, blah blah blah. And then actually uh a very good friend of mine, uh, Mr. So who's in there right now, happened to walk in because he's actually, you know, a big fan of the brand too. And um so then it kind of clicked for Pierre like, oh wow, we actually have a lot of mutual customers. We kind of share we have a lot of overlap in what we do. U And off the back of that, we actually started doing uh joint events together. So we did an F Bijne uh armory event um a couple months ago last uh no longer now actually, probably like a year ago, um where we talked about like different strands of menswear and where they came from in the world. Um and that went great. And then he knew, because I would constantly voice it to him, that I preferred the smaller sizes. But, you know, the thirty-eight millimeter is no longer a size that they make. Right. And so he said, Listen, if you want, like we could probably sort something out. Um especially since like I love that when somebody's like, Yeah, we can we can figure it out. Yeah. And I was like, oh really? Hmm, okay. And so uh actually, very thankfully to the generosity of Mr. Soap, um we worked together to create a design. So I basically started to think about colors and models that would really be like the ultimate 38mm Jorn for me. And I know a lot of people might have chosen like the Suveron or the Etobion, but for me, like I just loved, loved, loved the resonance. And in fact, part of the love for that resonance is after Pierre had to confiscate my watch, he actually lent me his personal resonance. Dude that resonance is so Ah, you remember it, right? I know that watch. That watch is so good. I think you've seen this watch too, right? Cara, the Pierre is like really heavily worn resonance. The dial is like super faded. I don't think so. I think I gotta look that we'll have to get that watching in. the box. Link it up We'll link it up in the notes. Yeah. So I was like, he lent that to me for months. I think I had it for four months or something. And it was hard to return. Serious love. Oh yeah, that's a pretty good. lo I don't know whatoks like, but it sounds like a nice one. It was good. And so um I I was I was just smitten by that watch. And I said, Okay, I gotta make something that uh I could be really happy with um as like my own personal resonance, slash like the residence where maybe a couple of other people. And I started to like Photoshop mock up a bunch of different dial configurations, uh sorry, a bunch of different color configurations. And eventually I found this Andreas Grisky photo uh that they were having that they were showing at the South Bank um in in London. Uh that was a it was an aerial view of just this slate blue sea with little pockets of kind of taupe and tan colored islands dotted around the side. And then with just this like kind of creamy warm gray for where the waves were breaking against the rocks. And I just thought those colors were beautiful. And so I sampled all those colors and then started checking them up against pantones and matching up to a point where like, oh, this could actually really work. And so that's how we end up with this resonance, which is 30 millimeter resonance in the parking meter style. So the one which is 24 hours on one side and 12 on the other side. Um it's kind of like an ocean blue for the main dial. It's actually not white for the lettering because I've always found the white on the FP Jornes a little too stark. So it's actually a very, very warm gray. And then as a little nod to the armory, I made the A in um chronometre à résonance. I made that in gold. Um and then on the subdials, uh, I always wanted to have navy lettering on my journal um because I I've seen the repeater and I just think the repeater is so so incredible and so I wanted to try and recreate that on the uh on this resonance. And uh so I drew it all up. I I wrote it up blah blah blah I submitted it. And Pierre's like o,kay, I'm gonna give this to FP. Let's see what he thinks. This could take a while. I'm like, yep, no sweat. Like if this really happens, because frankly, like I wasn't even sure it would really happen. I was like, if this happens, this will be amazing. And when was this? This was uh twenty two years ago maybe I can't I can't even remember anymore but but it was a while okay and I was I I waited I don't I don't know anyway it was a while um but and f actually it was mostly approved. But what was really interesting was FB came back and he said rather than do both the left hand and the right hand subdial in white on navy, he actually wanted to do only the right subdial, which is the 12-hour subdial in Navy lettering, and then the left one in white, black, and red. And thinking back on it, I was like, oh God, he's so right, actually. Because obviously, like left and right, those are two different watches, actually, right? They're telling two different time zones. So you shouldn't really have the color overlap. And weirdly, it it actually um reminds me of if you look at old chronographs, like two reg chronographs, like Vashron 4072s, that sort of thing, um the the hands that are for timing are actually usually a different color from the hands that are for timekeeping. And I that never occurred to me until like French like, no, the right side has to be navy and the left side can be the old colors. It's like, oh makes sense. So yeah, we um in the end uh I actually managed to do a little set of five. And they went to basically like kind of our best and closest friends. Nice. Yeah. What was it like after all that like drama of like the stolen watch and then designing a watch? And so finally you get your watch, right? Well, firstly that part was awesome. But what was really weird was um Pierre very kindly helped me get the old watch back. because the watch goes back to the insurance company. The insurance company has already priced in the fact that the watch is stolen and not going to get the money back, right? So at this point, they'll be happy to settle for a figure if you can get in touch with the right people. And so Pierre sorted that out for me and I managed to get my old watch back. Oh gosh. So it's a twofer. And I was out, don't forget, I was out of the original money I paid six years ago for the watch originally, um, I tried to get the dealer to um to give the money back and they were not cooperative. I went back and forth a couple times. Finally I had to go to legal action, but we settled and I actually got my money back. Dude. It was a win-win-win. Yeah, that's amazing. It was a triple win. That is not how I expected that story to end at all. That's not twenty dollars. Yeah, that is good watch camera. And the resulting watch is really beautiful. Yeah, it's beautiful. Can I see it? Please, absolutely. Is that I think that's the only modern modern watch you brought, right? Everything else is Oh yeah. Um gosh, that is really beautiful. Yeah, I'm not sure why. I I I quite like modern watches too. Um but I definitely have more vintage than modern. Yeah. Yeah. Well I mean that's that's part of the fact that like your taste, like you said, skews toward towards smaller watches, which are are harder to find these days. Yes. And we're not talking smaller watches like thirty nine, thirty-eight, like you'll wear a thirty-four millimeter watch, thirty-five millimeter watch. Oh yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. I mean like the ninety the Patek ninety six has been like a grail for me. And finally I just managed to track um a platinum 96 down um from the first series as well. I I think I might have overpaid a little bit for it but but I'm super happy with it. It's really like a beautiful piece. And the ninety six is thirty point eight millimeters. Not even thirty one millimeters. Yeah. That's a great one. It's great though. Yeah. Have you seen the platinum one at Phillips? No. With the platinum bracelet |
| Unknown | . It's so pretty. Oh really? Is that new to Oc quick so is that new to auction or was that sold previously somewhere else? I think it was sold at Sotheby's. Maybe we'll have to check that out. Okay. Again, we'll link this up in the notes |
| Unknown | . I don't know. But it's beautiful. You gotta look it up. It's a platinum tile bracelet. It's Car and I are both like making faces in each other about like who's who's gonna maybe try to buy this thing, but no. It's gonna go for crazy, crazy money. Um Yeah, yeah, yeah. Uh speaking of of paddocks that are maybe a little bit underrated, uh you have one here. Uh do you have- you have a couple, but do you want to maybe tell us about the the Nautilus that you have here? Yeah, sure. So uh at at one point, um like I I actually managed to get a 3700 before they went crazy. So I bought my 3700 Almost 10 years ago. Okay. You know, when they were still like sort of reasonable prices. Standard jumbo, like no nonsense. Yeah. Yeah. And and weirdly, even then, I was already trying to find the smaller Nautilus. Oh. But people weren't really looking to sell. And this was before Chrono 24, right? So there wasn't really a very good marketplace for like finding, like even discovering sort of like off-the-beaten track references. Yeah. So I started with the 3700. And then eventually on one of my trips to Japan, I actually found a 3800. And I was like, wow, this is great. This is actually what I've been looking for. And just in case people don't know, do you want to say what the thirty eight hundred is in in sort of comparison to the thirty seven hundred? So the thirty-eight hundred is a smaller Nautilus with a second hand. Um smaller as in it's thirty-seven millimeters, I think, of off the top my head. Yeah. And um they actually made it in a lot more variations than 3700. It ran for quite a while. So I think it ran from like late 70s or early 80s, um up until the two thousands. Yeah. And um I'm sad they don't make it anymore, but um but you know, I I would recommend any collector, like have a second look. I think they're awesome. Yeah. And the version you have here as the the white dial. Yes. The version I have is the white dial. So I've had um I've had a couple of these. I've had the white, I've actually had the white gold version, which is amazing. Like, because the white gold is old enough that it starts to turn color a little bit. So if you put the white gold next to the steel, you can see that it has quite a bit of a warmer tone to it than the steel. Um, but frankly, like that one was a little too precious, and so I would never wear it. And then eventually I just I sold it and let it go. Didn't you have one with a radial dial at one point? I still have that one. You still have that one? Yeah. I've also have a two-tone with Tiffany. But basically I I collected a bunch and I let go of a bunch because I got to this point where I was like, I don't know if I really want to have like like I don't think I want to collect sets anymore. Okay. It this was like a little phase I went through and uh luckily it was like reasonably lucrative, like I made some money on all of it, but I wouldn't do it again because it's just you only wear one watch, you know. And having like six variations of basically the same watch is just frustrating in the morning. Mm. Yeah. I mean I'm all about the smaller size Nautilus personally. And I know Kara, you're a big proponent of |
| Unknown | smaller size Royal Oak. Yeah. Mm-hmm. I love the thirties. Wait, thirty eight hundred, almost the thirty seven hundred. It's kind of like the new ladies' nodels that they just came out with, but with the straight line dial. Oh yeah. Which is my theory as I've said a thousand times, but I love to beat a dead horse. Yeah. I love to beat a dead horse. Is that they did the wavy dial so that it wouldn't take over the popularity of the fifty seven eleven. Yeah, for sure. I think that makes total sense. And I'm not saying that this is a lady's size, I'm say justing it's of more modest size. Yeah. Which I think works for everybody because it's just a gender neutral world we're living in now. Especially when it comes to watches. I think Mark and |
| Unknown | my s and me would both be two guys who in the impossibility of getting fifty seven elevens, if you could get a modern thirty seven millimeter Nautilus with a standard dial for less money and less time on a wait list, like I would be all over the world. But even that one's hard |
| Unknown | to get. The ladies' one. That's true. Huh. All Nautilus are hard to get. Well that's what I was told. Yeah. I thought you'd have, you know, some special privileges. No. |
| Unknown | Maybe. Giant misconception. Maybe. But no. Yeah? Is that coming? No. Okay. Okay. Um kind of the outlier for me in in what you have on the table in front of you is you have a sub there that is not what I would normally think of when I think of the watches that you you like to wear. But boy is it beautiful. Yeah. It was um it's in awesome condition. So it is a Tudor snowflake, uh in blue and uh you know like feel that case. It is sharp. It is so fat and it's very sharp. Wow. Yeah right. Yeah I mean the beautifully visual medium of radio uh makes this extremely easy for everyone to appreciate while we ooh and ah over this. But like link it up in the notes. You could you could literally cut yourself on this case. Yeah. And I I I mean that literally. I'm not I don't I's amazing. That is crazy. Case back engravings are in wow. Yeah. Like I've never seen um a piece in that sort of condition. And so I was like, well, I've always wanted one of these anyways. And in this sort of condition, it'll probably be worth something one day. So yeah, I went for it. And actually this one is now destined for Michael Hill at Drake's. Now that I've said this on radio, he must purchase it for me. Yeah. Hear that, Michael? Yeah. But no, I've sat on this for mm maybe like six years now. Okay. Yeah. And I love it. Um but like you said, like it doesn't it's not something I I actually wear very often. Yeah. Like it just I don't know. It's not so me. I mean also like when it's in that kind of condition. It's kind of scary. Yeah. That's the kind of g I'm too I'm too hard on my things. I would I would first day I have it just like bang it into a subway pole and run it, you know? It's hard when you |
| Unknown | talk with your hands too. Are you say are you saying I talk with my No, I talk with my hands. Oh, okay. I also sort of back to myself. But yeah, I talk with my hands. I talk with my hands, so my watches are really scratched. Yeah. But that' |
| Unknown | s beautiful. Thank you. Something I do associate with you is Grand Seiko. And you have one here. Uh can you tell us about this piece? Yeah, this was um oh god, sorry, my jet lag is kicking in, so my memory is getting worse and worse. But this is the 45 GS. Um and this is in the thin manual wine version. Yeah. And they made this in date and non-date. And this was the beginning of that kind of big flanked lug style that they're really famous for now. And you know if you're a Grand Sequo collector, it's a great one to own as like an important piece in in the history of their range. Nice. You have another really interesting Grand Seiko uh that this year I think is maybe a little bit especially relevant, uh which is the VFA. Yes. I I wasn't sure if I should bring it actually. I guess I should have. It's okay. But I mean let's I remember the first time. I mean we've for people who don't know you and I have known each other for for quite a while. And uh I remember one of the first times we met, you had this watch and you were like, oh you you gotta see this thing. And I looked at it and I was like, okay, it's a it's a Grand Seiko, okay, fine. Uh and you were like, no, no, do you know what this is? And the answer was no. I had absolutely no idea what I was looking at. Uh and did a little research and that is a crazy watch. Yeah. Can you tell people about it? So the VFA um was when Seiko was actively sending their movements uh to the competition in Switzerland in Newcatel uh to get timed. And you know, this was like a competition that all the brands were participating in. And Seiko was really, really like jumping up the ranking based on uh the quality of this movement. Like the movement itself was great, the work they were doing on the regulation was great. And it got to a point where some people like they sh they stopped the competition, and somebody said maybe it's because um you know, upstarts, we' greetting a little too good at this competition. Like, I'm not gonna ruffle any feathers. Like, I think there might be some truth in it, but who knows, right? And in any case, I think the winners generally were I think Omega actually was usually like the overall winner every time those things came around. Um but Grand Tako was starting to place they placed like I think in the 50s and then into the twenties and I think they got close to like top 10 um by the time they shut down the competition. Nice. Yeah. And so this watch is is one of the most accurate Grand Secos ever, ever made. And one of the most accurate wrist watches. That's right. Ever made. Yeah. But also very dependent on whoever regulated it. So the VFA like they would have you know, it would be regulated to an extra degree um by their best watchmakers, uh, just so that they could live up to that promise. Okay. And they're basically impossible to find now. Yeah, they're surprisingly hard. But there's a there's a great guy on Instagram actually who's really been doing great research on it, Dubai-based. I think it's oh yeah. Watch DXB. Yeah. Watch DXB. Yeah. Yeah. We'll link that up too. Yeah. His uh and you know his photos are great too. Like yeah, they're really great. Yeah. He got uh he got a pan one of those new Panasonic cameras, the S1. Oh the new uh medium format cameras? It's no it's the first Panasonic full frame. So PanSonic hasn't jumped to medium format yet. Okay. Who knows, maybe. Yeah. Hmm. I wanna I wanna get into though you know, we've we've covered some of the particular watches, but I mentioned it earlier. You like smaller watches. Yes. Why do you like smaller watches? I mean, I I think I have a relatively small wrists in the first place. Um so that's one reason. Like I think proportionally it just uh looks right. But then also I I like my things to be quite low key. You know, I don't like things to stick out too much. And so having a smaller watch just kind of fits into that. And you do find it frustrating that the sizes seemed for a long time, I think maybe it's coming back a little bit, but seemed to be just getting like larger and larger and larger. Incredibly All right, spoiler alert, we've talked about this a lot before. Oh yeah. Yeah. I can't count the I I think we should probably count the times we haven't talked about this. That's probably true. Yeah, that would be way faster. Um Yeah, I mean what do you what do you think happened there? Like what do you think was going on that that for so long was just what was happening? People just wanted bigger and bigger watches. I think that the manufacturers are, as any consumer goods manufacturer would be, under pressure to come up with something new, right? And it's easy to separate something by size. So why not? I mean, separating it by size is not a simple thing either, you know? Like when you make something bigger or smaller, you can significantly change the impression, the character of the product. Um, so I think it was a reasonable approach in terms of like creating something new. But whether people really needed it or not, like whether, you know, it was going to satisfy anybody, maybe that's a question that people should should reflect on a little deeper. Yeah. Yeah. I mean I I think it's really interesting, you know, you talk about when you make something bigger or smaller, it's not just making it bigger or smaller. Like there's all sorts of things that get get impacted. Yes. And I think that's one of the things that for me makes the the 3800 so special is that it still feels like a nautilus. Like it feels right. You don't look at it and go, uh, this is like this isn't quite the original. This is oh, they did something to it. Like, it feels just as much a nautilus as a as a 3700 and like you know car, I think the 37mm Royal Oak is another great example of that. Like the proportions are are still spot on. Um I guess for either of you, are there any watches where you think that's been done and it either is another example of it working really well, or a case where that was done and it just like doesn't work? The Tudor Black Bay in 36, I think they did an amazing job with it. Yes, I agree with that. I agree. I think that one is awesome. They killed it. Yeah. What do you think about when they upsized it back up to 41 for the the one that's styled like the thirty six. I tend to look away from anything over forty million, so I don't know. Okay |
| Unknown | . I think the I think the proportions are there. But I think it's just another offering. Like I don't s I think the 36 was so exciting because it was 36, not because of like anything particularly special about the watch. I think it was the fact that this brand that typically made bigger watches finally made something that was a little bit more modest. Yeah, that's fair. So the forty one's great. It's it has the same aesthetic, but it's just not as exciting, I would say. Yeah. I still love it. Yeah |
| Unknown | no no totally. I think that's why I think like they handled that thirty six millimeter in a really sensitive way. Yes. Like you look at the size of all the markers, you look at the size of the typefacing, and you look at just the idea that all these bits are going to be closer together. And I think that we're extremely careful and extremely skilled with how they redid the proportions to make it still make sense, not just as a watch, but as a unisex watch. Yeah. Because I find that often um manufacturers will redo their watches for ladies and they'll purposely throw some things out of proportion to make it for the lady, yet like it hasn't helped. No. Yeah. It's things like often like the bracelets get too skinny or the straps, they pick a smaller diameter strap or things like the lines are less linear. |
| Unknown | Yeah. Honestly and that's the thing. The lines are less linear. I like that. And that's not a call out. That's not even a call out to what we were talking about earlier, but it's true. It's like I feel like and I just realized this as we were talkinging about as you were say like they change something ever so slightly. It's like they try to make it like softer. And it's like, oh like it doesn't need to be that soft to still be feminine, you know what I mean? So it's kind of or not feminine or just like wearable by anybody. So I think that's a really good point. I also think with the BB36 in particular, the bezel size was really important because a lot of times when you shrink down, you have to change that. And sometimes they can kind of get lost or they just like don't feel like making a new one. So then they just put the old one back on and it's too thick and then uh and then just kind of throws everything off. But I think we've talked about it before like watches are all about proportion. So if you kind of if you want to make something smaller, like you really have to take everything into consideration rather than just making the case size something to two millimeters smaller. So Yeah. I think one of the |
| Unknown | things kind of as a as a tangentially sort of related point is is the way that AP handles gem setting, right? Is like there are certain parts of the royal oak that you'll never see gem stones on. And if you do, you know it's aftermarket. Uh so like the outer edge of the bezel, like AP has acknowledged that that outer facet and it being polished is important to the overall integrity of that design. And so like cutting a bunch of holes and jamming some diamonds into it is not a good idea. And like they know that. And so if you see a royal oak where there are diamonds on the outer facet of the bezel, like somebody took it to 47th Street. Like it's not the original design. And I think brands kind of honing in on those little things and being able to say, like, this is what makes a royal oak a royal oak, this is what makes a Nautilus a Nautilus, this is what makes a black bay a black bay, and being able to translate that across sizes and across styles, across men's offerings, women's offerings, unisex offerings is a really strong thing. And it's a thing that not a lot of brands get. Like there's a lot of brands who just don't, aren't sort of like self-aware enough to understand that. It takes a certain amount of sensitivity, I think. And you know, it's funny you mentioned that so I've been reading up on Dieter Rahms recently. I like I like Dieter Rams' work. I know him best from his work for Vitsu. There's a lot of Vitsu shelving at the Army and at my apartments. And basically if you don't see a shelf at the armory, it's probably because it went to my apartment. But the you know he was saying that like the the designers who really hit their peaks are the ones who can pay attention to every single tiny last detail, down to things like do the radiuses match up, or do the radiuses make sense in the proportion of the piece? And it was interesting to hear that comment from um Dieter Rams because he was originally an architect, which I did not realize. Like industrial designers as a as a job did not exist. So a lot of industrial designers are actually architects first. And I it makes sense, right? Like you're translating a lot of those sensitivities for proportion um into very, very small physical objects. Uh for Dieter Rams' celebration a couple years back in Osaka, Nato Fukusawa, um sorry, Fukasawa, who is a great industrial designer as well, and he's actually one of the main designers for Muji, so all the really nice Muji product actually Fukushima designs. He was saying that he felt like he finally made it after thirty years of being an industrial designer when he understood how important the details were. Like it took him thirty years of just being an industrial designer to understand that these details are important. Like and he, I felt like he like you must have reached some sort of eureka moment. Yeah. Because you can say, oh yeah, the just the details are important. But like if this guy says after 30 years of making incredible products, finally I understand the details are important, right? There must be something to that sensitivity that almost escapes words and escapes like a superficial understanding. Yeah. Yeah, I agree. And I I think with watches that's what everything is about, right? Like at the end of the day, a mechanical watch is is a you know compared to other timekeeping things we have in our lives, it's a not necessary and b it's it's not as good as a performance object. So it's it's there to be a sort of like a a totem to a particular point of view. And I think that varies from watch collector to watch collector and watch owner to watch owner, but you know, that that sort of sensitivity for the details I think in varying degrees and in varying ways has to be present in anyone who cares about watches. Because if you don't care about those things, then like why why would you want to wear one of these things? Like it just doesn't, it just wouldn't make sense, right? Yeah. Actually, I wanted to add, um, because I know you guys reviewed it recently, the N Ordain model one. Yeah. Um so I bought one like as soon as they were announced because I just thought it was such a beautiful thing. And the more time I spent with it, the more impressed I was actually like the the background of those guys is um one of them is a graphic designer. And if you look at the dial very closely, you really start to see like that dial must have been designed by a graphic designer, right? Yeah. Like the way all the elements are spaced out, the use of the typefacing, um where the negative space is, you know, like they, for instance, didn't arrange anything in the center of the watch. Everything, including the logo, has been very neatly tucked onto the sides. Yeah. And if you look at it closely, it just has this like perfect, perfect balance. But it's the sort of balance that I think graphic designers get more than anybody else. Because they're so used to looking at like text objects and small marker type objects in relation to each other. Yeah, I think it's I kind of had the same reaction to the watch. I didn't spend quite as long with it, and I I don't own one. Um but it gave me the same sort of feeling, honestly, that like auto drummers watches give me yeah um shout out to bradley who's a who's a good friend but uh yeah it's uh I love when you can kind of get that whiff of a designer in the product. You know when, you pick the product up and you go like, oh, this was designed by a a person or a small team of people with a point of view who want to do things a particular way, as opposed to like, oh, somebody commissioned five million dollars worth of market research and then tried to have somebody photoshop together something that like is engineered to sell as many units as possible. Like I I much prefer the former to the latter. Yeah. No, absolutely. I mean, I guess like the scale of businesses today, right? It's really difficult to take a punt on something. That's true. Which is which is good for independence, right? Like independents can really afford to to fly their fly their own flag. T |
| Unknown | otally. But okay, so like how does that apply to like Rolex, for example? So like it came out and the whole purpose of it was as a tool watch. So do you think the same principles of design were applied to to that watch when it came out? To a Rolex? Because like for in my opinion, arguable arguably I think Rolex has one of the best designs out there and always has. Yeah. Because it is really thoughtful, it is really detail-oriented, everything is sized just so everything is proportionate, proportional. Um so like it's really kind of crazy to think like back then I don't think like were there the same design principle? Because I'm not as much as much of a design uh Uh I wasn't a nerd. But I mean it in a nice way. That's fine. Let's get real. I think Mark and I all take nerds. Okay, we're on a podcast, but watches we're all nerds. Oh god, it's high school over again. No, it's great. High school is great. But like is that would you say like the same like how like what do you think about that? About like a group of people like it was a tool watch. So |
| Unknown | Mark, correct me if you if you disagree at any point, but you know, I think often people think the word design means kind of like window dressing, like it's about making something look pretty, but in fact, like a good design is about a thing that does its job well and hopefully looks good doing it, but like ultimately, like what makes like the sub Submariner an incredible design is it is an extremely efficient thing at doing a particular other thing., you know And lo itoks good while doing it. And it looks good while doing it, but part of I think why it looks so good is because it's, you know, my one of my favorite like, you know, mantras or catchphrases is it's like everything you need and nothing you don't. Right. Um and like I'm wearing, you know, a 1016 Explorer, which I still to this day think is is one of the two or three best design watches of all time because it tells you the time really well. And it looks really good doing it. And there's like nothing on this watch that you would want to take off or get rid of or change really. What was that line you said? Take everyt |
| Unknown | hing. It's every everything you need and nothing you don't. It's kinda like Coco Chanel saying take off the last thing you put on. Yeah. Right? I'm doing a fa I'm doing a fashion. You're doing a fashion thing. I got you at the fashion thing. Yeah.. I mean I don't know |
| Unknown | What do you what do you think, Mark? Yeah, 100%. You know, it looks good because you can tell how thoughtfully that item was designed, right? Like it needs to tell the time at a glance. You need to be able to tell what's going on. And it takes a lot of iterations, takes a lot of thought actually to get to that point. You know, you have to rearrange everything, quarter millimeter, half a millimeter until things are sitting in just the right place where at a glance you immediately know what time it is. And at the same time, it actually has to satisfy a few other requirements, right? Like it has to look sturdy and be sturdy. It should probably reflect the fact that it is a Rolex, so they have to follow that design lineage as well. Um but you know, and maybe this is um a little bit more of a male thing, but like a lot of the most beautiful things for me are are always those things that follow the functionality. Um, like for instance, trench coats, right? Like I love good trench coats. I think a lot of modern trench coats are kinda stunted. Like people will take a trench coat and they'll shorten it so that it's only mid thigh. But it's like the trench coat was beautiful because it was roomy and adjustable so it could fit a lot of different people, because you know it was a military use originally. Um it was definitely going to keep you dry, which is important if you're in a trench. Um important. Yeah. And uh you know, like you can when you handle it, when you wear it like a good one and you feel how much thought has gone into it, you really appreciate it and you're like, wow, this is a beautiful thing. I guess another corollary uh corollary to this is home cooked meals, right? Like if you have a home cooked meal, you can tell like your mom spent a lot of actually not my mom, my mom's cooking is terrible. Sorry Mark's mom. Sorry to put you on blast there. She's been she's been great at doing other things. But my sister's cooking is amazing, right? And like every time she cooks me a meal, it's awesome because I know like how sensitive she was to like how to prepare this meal for the people who are gonna eat it. And I think humans will always have that sensitivity to products that were made to be consumed. Yeah. Like I I with with Japanese products, or because I deal with a lot of Japanese craftsmen, uh I've always really picked up a sense from them that you know they really, really care about their product. And I've had people ask me, oh, you know, why do Japanese people have such high quality things? How does that happen? And my own theory for it is because in in Japanese culture, like because it's a Shinto culture and it's kind of an um they because it's Shinto and I forget the other word, I think it's an animalistic, um but they respect the idea that there are spirits in all things. So there's actually a Japanese phrase who's who's slipped my minding. I think it's Yao Yorozuku Kamino Yarozuku, something like that. Um and it means that there are eight million god uh eight million gods. The idea being there's a god in every little thing around you. And because there's a god in every little thing around you, you should take care of it and you should be careful with it. And when a craftsman makes something, he is also created a spirit in this object. And that spirit is affected both by the craftsman and by the user. So there's a lot of respect in craft as a result. Because it's just Yeah. Yeah. There's a God in ever |
| Unknown | ything. Right? That's the saying? Or every little thing? Yeah. I like that. That's there we go. I'm gonna go clean up my desk when we get back. Yeah. Perfect |
| Unknown | . Um let's uh let's you've you've alluded to the fact that you work with a a a lot of Japanese crafts people. Um let's talk about what you do. So you are the proprietor of the armory. So I am the uh I'm the coproprietor because for the Hong Kong store um I share it with Alan and for the New York store I share it with Bailey of the Armory. And then for Drake's um I share that with Michael Hill. Great. Drake's one of the uh earliest Hodinky collaborators. Yeah. We did our ties way back in the day. That's right. Just because it was back then a bunch of friends goofing around and we're like, let's make some uh vintage watch ties. That sounds like a good idea. What was it, ties, pocket squares, and then eventually a jacket? Uh uh No, just the ties and pocket squares. Yeah, the pocket squares were great, too. Yeah, they were really good. Those were so popular. Not to pat ourselves on the back, but people still ask about those. Do |
| Unknown | they? Yeah. Oh, that's good to do. I feel like it's the pocket squares and the skipper |
| Unknown | . Interesting. The skipper was great though. Yeah. Yeah. I do like those zombie requests coming back. Like we have like a photo of Alan in this little A one wool bomber jacket from like two thousand and ten and we still get people sending us the photo being like do you have this jacket? Which uh which color? Uh in brown. Do you have that one? I have that one in gray. I wore it to the office. I wore it to the office on Friday Yeah. Can you put that on the Hodinky store? Yeah. I wore it to the office on Friday. That like knit uh jacket that I have. Yeah. That bomber's great. The ring jacket one? Yeah. Yeah, dude, that jacket's incredible. Oh. And I almost certainly bought it because I saw that photo of Alan and was like, Wow, that guy looks amazing. I do not look nearly as good in it as Alan does. But you know, Alan has a very unfair genetic advantage over all of us. That is everything looks good on Alan. Who's Alan? Alan is is the guy at the armory in Hong Kong. So we co-founded it. Oh, yeah. Sorry. Yeah. So for people who don't know it. No, it's fine. So for people who don't know. Listen, people shouldn't people shouldn't know who I am. Like I'm amazed I'm even on this show |
| Unknown | . This is the second menswear themed podcast I've been on. It is. Which I think makes me |
| Unknown | are done. So how would you define the type of clothes that you all sell at the armory? We used to have a tagline and then we took it off because it wasn't fitting on some labels, but um it used to be international classic artisanal clothiers. Okay. So the point was we wanted to sell classic cla but classic. We wanted to sell classic clothing. Um you know for the same reason why I ended up with Drake's like I just love classic style. I love neckties, I love jackets, uh and I wanted to be part of that canine. And so I entered into classic clothing, but we added the international because we think that that's how the world is today. Like international, as in there's so many different countries out there that actually all follow this framework of classic clothing, and yet they all have their own takes on it, not just down to the country, even down to the individual cities, you know. Um, and I love knowing about that. I love telling people about it, I love dealing with it, I love selling it, I love buying it. Uh, it just took over my life. And so you you just started as an enthusiast and then it became a business. Yeah. Funnily enough, um Like I grew up in London and when I was in high school, I was probably like a size um like a size Italy 44, 46, uh, which is a pretty small size. Like it's hard to find clothing in that size. I feel your pain. Yeah, right. So so you're you're constantly forced to go and look for stuff. And actually because I was forced to look for stuff so often, I got much more um sensitive and knowledgeable and experienced with it. Um and what happened was when I was 16, I no longer had to wear the school uniform. I was allowed to wear uh my own suit to school. So that was when I started to like look into it. And I was fascinated. Like this was before there was hashtag menswear any sort of internet resource. This would have been two oh sorry, nineteen ninety seven. Um and I would ask my dad a little bit about it because I saw him wearing suits, uh and then I'll go to shops and I ask shop people, and I'll go to library, and I'll look up books, and the more I dug, the more I was like, wow, this is amazing. Like the history is so rich. There's so many rules. Yet the rules like, in many ways, they don't make sense, but yet there is some semblance of logic behind them. And the more I dug, the more I found out, and the more I just couldn't let go, you know? And uh if you dig deep enough, like I was digging in London, right? So it was a lot of very English clothing. But if you dig deep enough, you start to discover American clothing, Ivy style clothing, you start to discover Neapolitan clothing, Florentine clothing, Milanese clothing, Roman clothing, um French clothing, and you start to realize like, wow, this is um this is very important to like the culture of a country and to the characteristics of this country's people. You know, one of one of the things you guys have always done really well at the armory since since the very early days is kind of mixing those things in a way that gives it its own sort of unique flavor. Like there's I think a an armory look and there always always has been. I mean going back, it's gotta be what? Almost ten years now? Two the uh twenty ten. Yeah. So nine years this year. Coming coming up on it. Yeah. Um and you guys did a really good job communicating that look really early on. Instagram, Tumblr, back in the day, R.I.P. Tumblr. Yeah. Um wait, it's gone? I mean, it's not totally gone, but it's like mostly gone. Just no porn now. Yeah. Yeah. No a lot of things. No users, which is tough. But that part is tough. Uh you know, I remember the the days of like, you know, logging on to Tumblr every day and seeing the new stuff you guys were putting out from at the time it was just the Hong Kong store. Yeah. And it had this really unique perspective. And then also you guys were modeling the clothes yourselves. The clothes were on people who kind of had personalities and were outward facing. It wasn't styling a lookbook with a model and then it's a different model next season or whatever. Was that something you were consciously doing or did it just kind of happen honestly, it just came it just kind of happened. Um we like for instance a lot of the early armory photography had this uh like naturally lit look, um kind of dramatic, kind of moody. Uh part of this was because we had a really great colleague, Ethan, who was at the store with us from the beginning, um Ethan Newton, who actually now has his own store called Bryce Lands in Hong Kong and Tokyo. Uh and Ethan was very happy to come in early in the morning. So he would come in maybe like eight, nine o'clock, and then shoot for maybe two hours, you know, like setting stuff up. And somehow that became our look and it was very appealing. Like it's a beautiful quality of light. Uh and so we just kept going down that track. And then the fact that we were all in it, well, I mean, we were a tiny little company. It was like three of us, like me, Alan and Ethan. And How did you then evolve that? And and obviously you open the New York store. How do you grow that from being just three guys to like a real international business while still retaining that same that same sense of of character mmm I think that we we've never really wanted to be particularly big. Like, I think in another 10 years, if the army was a total of five stores, I would be very satisfied with that. Like the armory is about doing things in a very particular way that's often not commercial or not and definitely not scalable, right? Like a big part of our business is working with craftsmen. And the craftsmen we work with have very small production capacities. So even if we wanted to grow bigger, um we physically can't get the product to sell people. Um but I'm fine with that. Like in fact recently I've I've kind of been thinking about, you know, as the 10-year comes up. Like one of my dreams, I think, would really be to only deal with like people I like or admire or respect, right? On in all forms of relationships. So I'm only gonna purchase from suppliers that I really like, and I'm only going to work with craftsmen that I really like, and I'm only gonna sell the customers that I really like. Like I really like the idea that the business just is a community like that of these various people who can rely on each other and and they they form their own little ecosystem like that. I take that. Yeah. It's a good way to do things. Well, like I I have to say, I you know, I I was almost a computer scientist and I've always loved the hard sciences. Um, but online retail has never really captured my imagination and my heart the way retail has. Like I just really, really enjoy dealing with people. Um, and I really, really enjoy creating the spaces, creating the products for them, and most importantly, dealing with the people in such a way that like you're getting to know them, not looking at them as like a wallet where money's gonna come out of, but like you should I tell people who wanna come in this business, like, listen, this business is two things. Like one is product. You should know your product very well. But the other one is actually hospitality. Like you should go into this business not just because you enjoy polishing shoes. Like you should go into this business because you actually really enjoy like helping other people and serving other people. And if you can get those two things down, um, then I think you should be okay. Like you will find your fans and you will find your place in the marketplace. Those are some good lessons right there. I would take it with a pinch of salt this time. Are there other folks in the space who you think are doing things at that at that level, like other businesses in this space who you you admire? Um I don't know. I don't I actually spend very little time um looking at other people in our space. Like I feel a bit shy about it, to be honest. And that's why we we almost never end up with like overlap with other people's stuff. Cause I always feel a bit like this is my island. I'm happy to do whatever I want on my island, and those guys can do their thing. I mean I think for instance, like uh Jake Muser dresses a couple friends of mine. I think he does a nice job. Patrick Johnson's stuff, I think that stuff's great. Um, I think uh let's see, soup supply, like the quality of that product at that price point is really great. Um I think they have a good style. Um obviously Ralph Lauren is amazing. They really have like this like they really defined a way of doing the garment business right. And the quality at especially at the purple label level really, is very, very, very good. Yeah. Sid Mashburn. Yeah. That's another company with like with like a real flavor to it, you know. But actually, I think especially if you're not gonna look at just classic menswear, there's a lot of guys like little independents I think are doing amazing things. S. E. H. Kelly in London. I think they're really good. Like those guys were ex-saval row guys who wanted to do like not quite sportswear but mock not quite tailored clothes and it has kind of a workwear vibe to it but not quite either um but it's very british right like I like products like that I like products that have a real authenticity to it. And actually, I should have mentioned this earlier. That's kind of where the international classic part came from in the Army's name. Because the idea is that you want to find products that are from another part of the world that could only be from that part of the world, that couldn't come from some other part of the world, you know, because there are like because then you really are are getting a piece of like that country's culture. Um, like one of my favorite tailors, right, is Lavrano, and he comes and does trunk shows with us. Lavrano cuts a Florentine suit, and a Florentine suit is distinct from, say, a Milanese suit or a Neapolitan suit or any of the Saval Row suits. And it it's's very it's very much a reflection of Italy. Italy being a group of little warring states that eventually got mashed up into a country, like all those states, wanted to be their own people. They wanted to be distinct from the people to the north, to the south, to the east, to the west of them. So that's why even though like Milan is only three hours from Florence on a train, right? Like a Milanese suit is very different from Florentine suit. Like they wanted to set themselves apart. And I love how that finally comes out as like a product. And so I'm always looking for that sort of authenticity when I'm working with a craftsman or a new supplier. But actually, as the armory has kind of gone into a new phase, like we're doing more and more private label products, products that we're designing in-house. And then with those products, um we really, really enjoy actually mixing together people who might never have met in the first place. So for instance, like we have um a shoeline at the Armory now that we make in-house, uh that we just call the Armory Shoes, because we couldn't think of a better name. And they're designed by Johe Fkuda, who is one of the best bespoke shoemakers in the world, and he was trained in the UK. But Johe has a very particular style that's very UK flavored, but also his own influences. We put him together with a factory in Northampton in the UK. You know, Northampton is very well known for making very good good UL to choose. And that's like a combination that wouldn't ever have happened, you know, like a Japanese bespoke shoemaker previously would have just stayed a bespoke shoemaker, but now we've kind of put him together with a good factory and then with us helping on the sales side and the marketing side and just like turning it into something that is a nice blend of different things, you know. Yeah. That's awesome. Oh, speaking of that sort of product, actually, um, I know 'cause you have one, the City Hunter jacket that we did. Yeah. Which was kind of a cult uh a cult favorite at the Hodinky office and beyond. Oh that's great. Well, you know who else likes it now? FB Jordan. Oh. So he bought one for himself and one for his brother. Interesting. Yeah. All right. We actually redid that model. Um so there was the City Hunter one, which is what you have, and then I updated it into the City Hunter Two. Um and so FP has a City Hunter 2. 'Cause originally I wanted to make it um for like the FB Jordan Collectors Club. Yeah. Uh and I I liked it so much I was like, oh man, I'll I'll put it on the R in our shop first, then I'll figure out like a special version of this later. Yeah. For people who don't know, it's kind of like a I would say it's like maybe halfway between like a sport coat and a shirt jacket. Yeah, exactly. It's like it's a little more structured than you know a typical shirt jacket. It still has a lapel. Yeah. Uh but it's not the sort of standard like notch or peak lapel you'd see on a on a spore coat. And we tried to add like modern production techniques to that. So for instance, we use what's called a TPS seam. So that's a seam that doesn't fold in on itself at the join, like it's actually just two surfaces mated at the edge. And you need special machinery to do that. And you usually don't see that in menswear, you know. But I thought it was like such a cool technique. And you know, for this sort of product, for our in-house product, I wanted to take it to like a new place, like not necessarily a classic place, but something that grew from a classic place. Nice. So along those lines, I wanna I wanna ask you a couple quick clothing and men's shopping tips uh while we have you here. Uh and then we have one more watch thing I want to touch on before we close out. But um if a guy's gonna buy one suit, what suit should he buy? One suit. Um one suit. That's a tough question. Are you talking about like a configuration of a suit or a brand or okay? Configuration. Color, cloth, cut. I mean easiest would be a navy something or other, because you can always use the jacket on its own. Um for me I always like what's called the three roll two. Um so it's a three button jacket where the top button uh is not really usable and it just rolls to the middle button. If I was to do it as something that was a bit more versatile, I would probably change the buttons from a matching color, which is what we you would use for a suit, to a slightly contrasting color, like just a dark brown horn rather than a navy button. Probably do it with flaps. You can always take the flaps out when you're using a sport jacket. Pocket flaps, yes. So you can take the flaps out when you're using a sport jacket, tuck them in when you're using a suit. In terms of cloth, honestly I think it's always a mistake to try and buy one suit for the entire year, especially for somewhere like New York where it's extremely cold or extremely hot. Um but if you had to, I guess some sort of worsted Italian or English, like eight to nine ounces in weight. Um I wouldn't go for like the darkest shades of navy. I'd go just one shade lighter, you know? Like it's a little easier to split up that way. It's a little bit more versatile that way. You can wear it with brown shoes a little easier. Yeah. I think everyone at some point should always own like close to a midnight, if not a midnight navy suit. I think those are super sharp, especially with black shoes. Like almost like an alternative to a tuxedo. Yeah. But if you're only gonna have one suit, I think it should be a little bit lighter in blue. Perfect. Men's clothing is so versatile. Yeah. That's the whole point. I sleep in mine. Great. Oh, it's just too much. Yeah. One pair of shoes. Ooh, that's a tough one. Actually, wait, no, that's a very easy one. Uh dark brown suede. Dark brown suede laceup. Dark brown suede lace up. Yeah. Caps or no caps. Uh go with the caps. Okay. Go with the caps. And even uh go with a little bit of punching. Okay. Caps and punching. We're getting f |
| Unknown | ancy here. Caps with a toe cap. Yeah. And the punching are the holes. Yeah. That's right. There we go. Catching on. That's our expert right here. |
| Unknown | I I told you. You are the expert now. You already talked about trench coats. Who do you think makes the best trench coat today? Coherence. Yeah. Without it. |
| Unknown | That's where you were going there. I have a confession. Yes. I have a mid-thigh trench coat. But I was twenty when I asked for the case. Remember I said a new one now. Remember I said you were the expert? Yeah. We |
| Unknown | have to get some sound effects in here. Button I can hit. Yeah. I mean listen, like there's nothing wrong with it. Like nobody's too warm to enjoy it |
| Unknown | . Now that I'm older, I'm like, that was stupid. Every time it rains you're just like the pants are wet. It's all just like everything I'm just like, all right, well this is stupid |
| Unknown | . What mark is the thing that when you see guys wearing it, you're just like, why the hell do you own that? Like don't don't wear that. Yeah, come on. I must be a diplomat, so I obviously never ever say that. Of course. Of course. You're always very kind and polite to your customers. Will you tell us after the show. No. Actually, to be honest, uh I I actually have tried to be I I try to be as as non-judgmental about these things as possible, right? Because some guys might not understand. Like some guys might have never kind of come across the right things in their lives to have clicked in their head, oh, actually that's a better way to wear it. And you know what? Hey, some people look at what I wear and think it's totally stupid too. So I was thinking someone just don't care. What's one thing you'll never wear? We'll go that way. Oh yeah, there you go. What's one thing you just never wear and you can't see yourself wearing? Yoga pants, I guess. Fair. That's a good call. Fair. That's a good I I I hope I can say that. That's a good call. Like I just I just don't think men's legs are particularly good looking. Let alone my legs. No. Dra a nice draped trouser is for sure the way to go. Yeah. All right. Uh and what is the one piece of clothing you love that you think is maybe underappreciated that you think every guy should like go out, get one, try it, you're gonna love it Okay, so you're talking about something that I think everyone should have, but might not have. Yeah. Because it's so underappreciated. Yeah. Or even just that guys don't wear enough. Oddly enough, because I'm I'm gonna work on it soon. I think a band collar shirt is something that men should own and yet you see surprisingly few good ones, if at all. What's a band collared shirt? So a band collar shirt is a shirt without the collar. It's just the collar band. Oh, you can never straight |
| Unknown | . Yes, exactly. Yeah, it's a collarless. Yes. Seth Rogan was wearing one on Late Night with Andy Bravo. Andy Cohen.. Andy Cohen On Bravo. Andy Bravo. Sorry, Andy, if you're listening. Um, which you aren't, but it's fine. And it actually looked great. And he was wearing it with like a safari jacket. And it was very, it was very chic, I thought. And I noticed it. I was like, oh like I've I haven't seen I haven't seen that look yeah and it looked great so |
| Unknown | it's not it's not that common. I'd like to we've started to work on a couple prototypes. Maybe we'll have something next year. Yeah um women's shirts they |
| Unknown | have collarless I they make collarless shirts for women, the button ups without that. Yeah. Cause they also |
| Unknown | make those like there's also um the I forget the Indian name of it, but Chinese people use a similar v design too where there's a collar band, but it doesn't actually button at the neck. So the gap is actually much bigger. Like a like a Nehru collar. Exactly. Yeah. Like a Nehru collar. Interesting. Yeah. That one is also something you don't really see outside of like very traditional dress for menswear. Okay. Mm. So we'll stay on the lookout for that. Armory what, like twenty twenty twenty, we're gonna see a uh band collar shirt? Maybe. You know, we kinda do things at our own pace. All right, cool. Uh so the last watch thing I wanted to get to is uh you did a survey last year, uh kind of like some some gorilla market research online uh trying to get a sense of people's wrist sizes and the watches that they like to wear the sizes of watches they like to wear based on those wrist sizes um this is some truly obsessive, obsessive level stuff. Uh and I mean that in the best way possible. Uh and we didn't talk about it really ahead of time, but you brought us printouts of the graphs that you were able to create from this survey. So you can hear the the rustling of papers uh on mic probably. Um but I think this is really interesting. Um, you know, first off, about how many replies did you get to this total? I got nine hundred and twenty five. That's crazy. That's a lot of things. I had to discount the women, unfortunately, 'cause I only had like eight women. Okay. I think one was my mom, one was my sister, so it's all right. It's a classic problem. Yeah. Um so you got over nine hundred replies, which is is serious data. And what surprised you the most from this data? What what finding it? I was pleasantly surprised by the sizes that um people were selecting as their optimal size. But I have to say I I kind of want to start on from the beginning of this. Like I did the survey because of the Hodinki comment section actually. Like I was starful. I was so tired of seeing people argue about that's a ridiculous size. You know, oh 40 million is ridiculous. Oh 34 million is ridiculous. Everyone was just ridiculous. Everyone was just telling each other they were ridiculous. It was just ridiculous how ridiculous everyone is. Yeah. You know everyone's wrong all the time. And so I thought I'll just do something about it. Like I'll actually just go out and ask as many people as I can and try and get some real data. And then we can at least like maybe come to some conclusions. Or maybe if manufacturers can look at this and start to think differently about their product line that'd be great. So um I very purposely actually started the survey with the question what size is your wrist? With no indication of like uh a measurement, just are you small, average, or large size? Because I think that people perceive their wrists to be much smaller than they really are. And uh that's exactly what came out in the data. Like fifty percent of people think they have small wrists, and then forty percent of people think they're average, and only about seven or eight percent of people think they have large wrists, which is kind of absurd, right? Like 'cause it should be a bell curve. Like it should be like, you know, like small and small and small and large and everyone else is in the middle. But it's not. And then I asked them if they could to provide their actual wrist measurements so that I could see how these things were overlapping. Yeah. And as you might imagine, small and average overlap hugely. Like you could they're almost the same population. Yeah. That's crazy. Again, the visual medium of radio, we uh can't can't show you these graphs. But yeah, the the two line up almost exactly. Yeah. I was I was surprised by the watch diameters that people said they preferred. You know, just if you if you talk to any, you know, kind of like watch retailer here here in the US, you know, you'll hear that its watches, you know, 42 millimeters and over. It's it's everybody wants giant sports watches. And I I guess we can account to some extent for the fact that, you know, if they're replying to your survey, it's a bit of a self-selecting uh pop population here uh to some extent but really the the bulk of people want according to this want something in the sort of like 36 to 40 millimeter range yeah like i i felt like i was a good person to do this survey because I don't really have a horse in this race. You know, I love vintage. I love modern. I sell a little bit of vintage in the shop. I sell a little bit of modern in the shop. And ultimately I don't consider myself a watch retailer, right? Like um I think if you were to put this survey in say a brand boutique, like it would have it would skew to whatever the brand's selling right now. Yeah. You know? Um and so I set out my questions in this way. I said, if you're to have only one watch, your primary watch, what size would it be? And then they could people could just fill in whatever number they wanted. So yeah, you're right. Like primarily people are picking 36 and 38 millimeter. And then it tails off a little bit, but there's still a very significant portion at 39 and 40 millimeter. But then as soon as it gets to 41, it drops off really significantly. Yeah. Um and then I added a a question. Now if you had a secondary watch, like a weekend watch, you know, like a like a non-dressy watch, what would that be? And overwhelmingly that was forty millimeters. And then a little bit of thirty-eight, a little bit for thirty-nine, a little bit of forty-two. Um so I don't know, Steven, what do you think? I don't know. I mean I I think it's I think the findings are interesting. I think you know it it says also I would assume that the people who found this through through you um have at least some sort of sort of overlap in terms of the the style of clothes they're interested in, their sort of outlook, their perspective. Yeah. And so I I think this is a really interesting portrait of not just watch preferences but the ways that like watch preferences and and other preferences might interact. Like what this tells me is that the sort of person who is wearing maybe you know a Liverano suit or a ring jacket suit who's interested in having like a beautiful handmade shirt, um wearing a pair of shoes from Northampton, is interested in Vitsu shelving. Uh like that kind of person tends to want something that's that's a little more understated. And I think that that tracks, you know, like that makes sense to me. And it makes sense that that would track regardless of whether your wrist is is sort of small, medium, or large, but that you would you would want something that was sort of like proportionally understated based on on you. Yeah. Yeah. Absolutely. Cool. Yeah. Well, this is awesome. Um we have to start wrapping. So I wanna make sure we get to the Hodinky questionnaire. So I've got a couple of good uh rapid fire questions for you and then we'll close things out with our our cultural recommendation. Sure. What's a watch that's caught your eye recently? Can I give more than one? Sure. Um there's a new Japanese independent, Naoya Hida. Yeah. Uh he did a beautiful piece. I'm really interested in that. Thirty seven millimeters, very classic styled, made in Japan. Um and using a lot of like Jap Japan's precision manufacturing um guys as the suppliers for a lot of the parts. That one's super interesting. Um what else? Well that new paddock with head which is the the weekly calendar. Yeah. That one is amazing. Yeah, that was beautifully done. Um Oh, uh the Grand Seiko uh with not just the diamond dial, but also the diamond case, the one done in the micro artist studio. Yeah. Spring drive thirty-eight millimeter. That one's incredible. I should have that coming to the office to shoot some photos of in the next two days. I am uh very excited to see it. Oh wow, and it's the real working one? I think so. Fingers crossed. Fingers crossed. Can I go see? I'll honestly I'll shoot you a note. Yeah, I'll shoot you a note if it comes by. Um Cool. What's um what's the best place you've traveled in the last year? You know, I pr I don't take holidays very often. Um I went to um God, what's it called now? I went to Kuroshiki, which is West Japan, uh, for a work trip because I was trying to find new suppliers, um, supp specilificallyers of canvas, and that particular part of Japan like specializes in um industrial canvas. Uh, and that was just like a great trip because it was great to see this new part of Japan and it was like you could see a lot of Japan's industrial past there, but a lot of it had slowly closed down to you know, like Japan is a country in transition, like every country out of manufacturing and into other industries. So that was super interesting. Um I don't know if you want to cut this one or not, because it's a little bit long. I went on a meditation retreat. Wow. Um so that was the first holiday I've taken in nine years. And uh, you know, I went for work reasons. I went because I thought, you know, I'm pretty busy, my mind is kind of a mess sometimes. Like I'd like to learn to be a little bit calmer, um, a little bit more focused. And so uh I found out about this thing called vipassana meditation and I've been wanting to go for a few years, but you know it's a 10-day course for a new student. You can't do anything less than 10 days. Um and I hemmed and hard for years, but finally I was like, whatever, I'm gonna do it. I'm gonna do it. So I just cleared my schedule. I went in and it was really, really intense, but it was kind of life changing too. And I stayed for I could I couldn't do ten days. I managed to I managed to do four days and then uh my mind just kind of gave up. And this is like vow of silence, you're eating minimal food. Yeah. Like there's there's like very little sort of like sensory interaction, right? Yeah. So it was in the new territories of Hong Kong, which is not a place I go to very often. Um so it's really like the countryside of Hong Kong bordering China. It was beautiful there, like very peaceful, very quiet. You take noble silence, so it's no speaking, no interaction with anybody for 10 days. And the meditation schedule is very intense. And I've never done meditation, so it's extra intense for me. Um so you start at 4 a.m. and then you proceed to do about 12 hours through the day. Um and then you go to bed and you just do that over and over again. And they slowly slowly teach you like more and more of the technique. So does it just Okay, wow. |
| Unknown | So what like d what do like what do you think? You just sit like is meditating about thinking or is it just about like not thinking or like practicing not thinking? It this one is |
| Unknown | about is actually more than about practicing not thinking. So you learn to f as a newcomer, you learn to focus on your breath without any other cue to focus you. Because some meditation they'll tell you like, oh, like um have a mantra or focus on an image or something as a way to like keep your mind still. This one just says try to not think about anything else and just notice your breath, but not attach to it. Like that's the whole theory behind this type of meditation is how to not become attached. And as a complete theory, like, it's fascinating. Like it's really an incredible way to live. I don't know if I could do it, um, but if you could achieve it, like people talk about enlightenment. I think there is some sort of enlightenment in there. That's amazing. Yeah. |
| Unknown | Yeah? I wouldn't last a day. Yeah. Not talking would be very difficult. Me neither. That alone is such a challenge. But I think that's fantastic that you did |
| Unknown | that. Well what happens is when you're in environment that's that silent, rather than um feeling like your rather than your mind finding peace, you actually get the opposite. Like all those things in your day-to-day that distract you from your thoughts in many ways kind of keep you sane. And by the second day, I was feeling a lot of stress. And by the fourth day, I was basically having like borderline anxiety. Right. Because it was just you and your thoughts. But yeah, because my mind will always wander. And they tell you from day one, like your mind will wander as it wanders. Um do not condemn it. Just try and bring it back to the exercise of noticing your breath. Uh and you know, your mind just constantly, constantly wants to do something else. In fact, it was a very productive time for me in terms of work because I spent most of that time as my mind was wandering thinking about new work projects or like thinking about what I wanted to do. And when I when I finally like had to give it up because I just like mentally couldn't take it anymore, um I asked the old guy who let me out, because the whole thing's run on volunteers. It doesn't cost anything to take this course and it's a it's a wonderful thing. Um I asked him, you know, why do you why do you come here? He said, oh well, you know, I come here for health reasons. Like it's really, if you can master this technique, like it really helps to calm your body and it's quite healing in some ways. And I and he asked, do other people leave? And he said, yeah, of course people leave because it's a hard technique to master. And I said, why do you I said why do you think I left? And he said, it's because you're too attached. And it's true. Like that's exactly what it was. I was so attached to my work that I couldn't let it go and spend 10 days without it. That's awesome. That's great. That is also Congratulations. Maybe the best answer we've ever gotten to that question. That's great. Continue. Sorry. What's the best piece of advice you've ever been given and who gave it to you? This might be just recency bias, um, but probably on that course thing I went on, uh they teach you two things. They teach you one thing called equanimity. So that's the idea of not becoming too attached to anything or too averse to anything. As you become attached, you become desperate, as you become desperate, you crave it, and then you create misery. Because if you can't get it, you're miserable. And the same, but in reverse for if you're reverse to something. So you know, you hear this phrase like, oh, people should step back and like like if something's bugging you, just step back, you know, it's fine. But it's never fine because you're like, no, that thing's still there, it's bugging me. So the flip side of that is you must always remember that there's impermanence. Nothing in the world will last forever, be it good or bad. And if you can understand that, then actually you can start to find equanimity, right? Like, I love these watches, but you know what? They'll go one day. That's just life, right? Or like this chair I'm sitting in is real uncomfortable. But you know what, I'll get up out of it in a couple of minutes. So perfect. Well we're gonna get you out of the chair real quick. We got one more question. What's uh what's your guilty pleasure? I still play a lot of video games. Yeah. Yeah. All right. Yeah. Let's do cultural recommendations. Uh Mark, what is something that you think the listeners should go check out when they're done listening here? I'm gonna give you two answers for this. One cause like this first one, I don't know if it's gonna be too controversial for you. Uh I've been reading this book called Hidden Persuaders by something Packard, I I forget the name, but I guess you guys can link it. Uh Hidden Persuaders was written in the late 50s and uh it talks about the start of motivational research. So prior to motivational research, marketing when you're trying to sell something to a customer was just about like, you should buy this stove. It's hotter than your last stove. You know, it was very like cut and dry, and it worked on the assumption that your uh your customer is going to act rationally. Uh motivational research was when they really start to dig into like unconscious, subconscious, pre-conscious impulses that will cause people to act irrationally. So, like, why do you put a convertible in the showroom window to attract people to buy sedans? Okay. Got it. And it was kind of chilling, honestly, reading this book because I feel like we are living the legacy of that now, 60 years later, right? Like advertising and marketing has become so woven into the fabric of society that I don't really know if we'll ever escape it. Is it even something we want to escape? You know, I mean I'm a I'm a merchant. Like obviously it's important to my livelihood to have people be m like attracted to what I'm doing. Yeah. That's super cool. That sounds really good. That' |
| Unknown | s probably gonna be a lot better than my recommendation. Um You say that every time and they're always good. Well, last week I recommended Beyonce on Netflix. So if you haven't watched that yet, go watch it. And then my I think I'm gonna stick to TV. Uh don't watch GOT because I fell asleep during the episode last night. That's a controversial take. Anyways, I already read what happened, so I'm gonna try and rewatch it after this. But I started a new show called Dead to Me. Oh yeah. On Netflix. With uh former Hodinky radio guest. Yes, I don't have cable, so I have Netflix. But yeah, so James Marsden's on it. Which I didn't know when I started it. But it's very funny. It has Christina Applegate, for those of you who are old enough and remember her from what it was that show she was on? So you're clearly not old enough to read that. I am, but like I can't remember what it's called now. But uh it was um Married with Children. Yes, Married with Children. Yes, yeah. And Don't Tell Mom the Babysitter's Dead. Okay. Great movie. Um so anyways, it's a very funny show, and it's about a woman whose husband dies in a car accident, and she meets this other woman in grief counseling, and they befriend each other, and I won't give it away. But um it's very it's funny. Awesome. I'm only halfway through, so I'll let you know what happens next time. Cool |
| Unknown | . Uh mine. You know what I'm gonna recommend is I started reading this weekend this trio of books written by Ansela Adams, the famous landscape photographer. He wrote these three books called The Camera, The Negative, and The Print. And they're about as back to basics as you can get for photography. Umiter lally, like the first couple of chapters are about like how cameras work, like the physical principles that allow a camera as an idea to work. And I found it really refreshing. I mean, I've been shooting photos for, you know, well over half my life. Um and it was really nice to just go back to like real first principles and think about like, okay, like what is taking a picture? And like what do you have control over? What don't you have control over? In what ways are you making a picture versus taking a picture? Um and really think about like, you know, digital versus versus film. Obviously, the whole the whole series of books are written about about film. And yeah, it was just really refreshing. So even if you're somebody who just, you know, likes to shoot on your iPhone or take family photos, if you're interested in the idea of photography. They're really easy reading. They're all pretty slim volumes, um, but they're really, really fascinating and and offer some insights into the mind of I think one of the great photographers of all time. That's an awesome one. I'm gonna check that out. Yeah. Cool. Well, thanks for joining us again. This was super fun. And uh hopefully you can get some rest now. Yeah. Not on an airplane. Oh, I'm gonna go eat dinner. Perfect. Live it up. Awesome. Thanks, Mark. My pleasure. Thanks, guys. All right. Bye. Cool. This week's episode was recorded at Mirror Tone Studios in New York City and was produced and edited by Grayson Korhonen. Please remember to subscribe and rate the show, it really does make a difference for us. Thank you and see you next week. They're not going to be able to do that. Yeah. |