Wood
Wood, together with leather, is the most important material influencing the appearance of the final product. That’s why we take great care with wood long before we start making with it. Unfortunately, we do not own a large garden or orchard where we can harvest the wood that our ancestors planted. Fortunately, we do not need large volumes for our products, especially watches. A few large logs from a single tree are enough. Oto we can choose more carefully and all the wood we process we have personally found and selected. And that’s how we know where the story of your watch began.
We don’t claim to use only the finest wood. Rather, we try to use the most interesting parts, which are often in places where the tree has been damaged in some way, or a branch or root has grown out of it, and that’s where the interesting artwork was created. Such parts of the tree are more difficult to process. And we have to be careful which part can actually be used and which is really unusable. That’s why it’s not rare that we mill the body of a watch two or three times before we have a base that makes sense to finish. Because it’s only during the grinding process that you find out that there’s a crack or other blemish somewhere. While this approach significantly reduces productivity, it results in a watch that is truly unique. Plus, we’re processing material that others would have used in a stove.
From the moment we select a piece of wood as suitable for further processing, it will never be touched by any other hand than our own. That is until the watch is ready to be shipped to the store or directly to you.
We dry the wooden logs in our warehouse for at least a year. Then we cut them into boards, which are further dried for at least 48 hours at a temperature of 45 degrees. After resting for about a week, they are then planed. Only then are the planks ready for final milling, sanding, oiling and final polishing, which takes an average of another 14 days to four weeks before the watch is complete.
The amount of woods that we have personally selected and are preparing for further processing is slowly growing. We are currently processing the following:
Acacia
Woodcut, acaciaThe wood has a yellow-green narrow sapwood and a golden brown, shiny heartwood. The summer blood vessels (pores) are arranged in a circle to accentuate the summer rings. The pith rays are numerous but less pronounced. The wood is heavy, tough, difficult to work; it decays and breaks down a lot.
Hard, heavy wood is mainly used for highly stressed parts of products such as pins, pegs, wheel work, handles and tool handles. Only the darker heartwood is suitable for construction purposes. Its colouring and texture make it attractive for small art objects and accessories. In wine-growing areas, acacia branches serve as excellent stakes for grapevine grafts.
Acacia has poorly shaped and often very curved trunks, making it one of the less important timber species, especially for industrial processing. Acacia wood burns well. The bark, leaves and seeds are slightly poisonous due to the alkaloid content
Volume weight of wood: 761-800 kg/m³
Stock wood: grown near Smolín
Birch
Birch wood is creamy white, sometimes greyish, brownish and pinkish, without lustre. It is uniformly dense, medium-hard, strong and bends well. It is much easier to cut (with chisels) when raw than when dry. Like most woods. It is poorly weather-resistant, particularly subject to rot and fungus.
Birch has always been used for heating, especially in logs for fireplaces. When dried in the air, the wood dries without cracking at the perimeter and in the log (up to a diameter of about 15 cm), which is why it has long been favoured especially by turners. To this day, it is still used to make corbels, vases, candlesticks, roots and straws. It mordants well and accepts glue. It is also cut into veneers when grown into thick logs. Brooms are still made from birch twigs.
Wood volume weight: 550-590 kg/m³
Wood in stock: grown in Medlánky, Brno
Beech
Woodcut, beechIt has no colour-coded core. Mature wood and sapwood are light (skin) pink. The reddish-brown colour, known from various products, is obtained by hydrothermal treatment – steaming. The heartwood of beech is very often false, coloured brownish-red. It is easy to distinguish unseasoned beech from steamed beech, especially in cross-section, because it does not follow the shape of the rings and its outlines are more distinctive in colour. Steaming beech wood largely eliminates the colour differences between the false heartwood and sapwood.
The wood of beech is uniformly dense, the pores are fine, the grain shorter, and the pith rays are distinct on all sections. The wood is relatively hard and heavy, yet it is well and cleanly worked.
Beech wood was made famous by the Thonet company, among others, for the famous ‘thonettes’, chairs made of bent wood, which are still in production. It is used in the furniture industry, for bentwood furniture and for slicing veneers, mostly for “cheap” uses such as plywood. It is very easy to machine, stain and glue. Last but not least, it has a good calorific value.
In the past, dry distillation of beechwood produced methanol (wood alcohol) and was also a material for the production of wood gas. However, it also has its drawbacks – it is poorly resistant to biological pests, especially fungi, and also works hard.
Wood volume weight: 620-720 kg/m³
Stock wood: grown east of the village of Chudčice
Oak
Oak wood has been one of the most sought-after woods since time immemorial. It has a relatively narrow, light brown sapwood and a wide, uniformly brown-coloured heartwood. The central and tangential sections show distinctive ‘mirrors’ (cross-cut wood rays). These make it possible to distinguish oak from elm or ash.
The basic characteristics of oak are hardness, strength, toughness and durability. Of all our woods, it is the longest lasting, not only in terms of weather conditions, but also in terms of alternating wet and dry conditions. It was used to make barrels, mill wheels, hammers, bridge piles and footbridges. Oak wood has always been popular in the furniture industry. In England, an entire century was named after it – the age of oak (1500 – 1600). It is used both in solid wood and for slicing veneers. Carvers and sculptors work with oak, it can be cut with chisels and across the grain. It is good for gluing and staining.
Wood volume weight: 600-760 kg/m³
Stock wood: grown in the valley below Landstejn Castle
Hornbeam
Cut with wood, hornbeamHabr is the hardest of our woods and can only be compared to acacia or sycamore with this property. The wood is dense, uniformly grey-white to brown-white. Colour changes can be found in older pieces around the pith. It is stable when dry. However, it breaks the rule about the durability of hard and heavy woods: if it lies in damp, outside on the ground, it will soon ‘rot’ and begin to decay. But even standing it will not withstand the weather for very long.
The wood takes glue and stains well and is lustreless. It imitated ebony. It is still used for pins, bolts and screws, for wedges, planes, handles, etc. Because of its stability and hardness, it is also very important for the manufacture of musical instruments.
Wood volume weight: 720-820 kg/m³
Stock wood: grown east of the village of Chudčice
Pear
Cut wood, pearThe wood is uniformly grey-pink to brownish-red in colour, with infrequent but quite pronounced wood stains. The leaf rings and pith rays are almost imperceptible, the pores very fine, barely visible to the eye.
The wood of the pear is dense, hard, lustreless and very homogeneous. It is very easy to work, stain and polish, works very little and does not break when it is cut down. However, it is less durable. Pear is one of the most interesting and sought-after woods.
It is processed into ornamental veneers, and is suitable for the manufacture of objects requiring dimensional accuracy and dimensional stability (rulers, jambs).
Stained is used to imitate ebony. Pear wood is particularly sought after for fine work.
Wood volume weight: 600-740 kg/m³
Wood in stock: grown near the village of Staré město pod Landštejnem and in the city district of Medlánky, Brno
Apple tree
Apple tree wood is beautiful and decorative, like the wood of other fruit trees it is suitable for turning, it is used for making golf clubs, but also for smoking and burning in fireplaces. The only condition is that the trees must be felled in winter. The heartwood is light red, grey-brown or reddish-brown, the sapwood is pale cream. Similar in appearance to cherry and pear. The apple tree is the densest Czech wood next to the hornbeam (and if we do not count the boxwood, which is nowadays seen only as a shrub).
Volume weight of wood: 670 kg/m³
Wood in stock: grown near the village of Dolní Bolíkov
Juniper
Juniper wood The fragrant, light, strong and very durable juniper wood is used in carving and turning, for pipes, sticks, and in Scandinavia also for making boxes for storing small quantities of dairy products such as butter and cheese, and for making wooden butter knives. It is also suitable for smoking meat, to which it imparts a delicate spicy flavour.
Juniper belongs to the conifers, it does not have resinous ducts but has a pleasant smell. It has a narrow yellowish sapwood and a beautiful reddish-brown core with a purplish tinge. The inflorescences are sharply demarcated.
Volume weight of wood: 550 kg/m³
Stock wood: grown near the village of Staré město pod Landštejnem
Bird crane
A deciduous deciduous tree of the rose family, a close relative of apple, pear and other fruit trees. It is a so-called pioneer tree that grows in a wide variety of habitat types. However, it thrives best on poorer, more acidic soils. It is also abundant in the open countryside, where it has often been planted as avenues along roadsides.
Its wood is relatively hard and flexible. It is used in carving and turning, in wheelwrighting, for making staves for barrels, sticks, handles, veneers, musical instruments and tools. It is widely used in the furniture industry, for the production of veneer (sliced and peeled) and plywood, as well as for paneling and parquet. It can be used for the production of pulp and paper, particleboard and fibreboard.
Wood volume weight: 830 – 1050 kg/m³
Wood in stock: grown in the urban area of Žabovřesky, Brno
Apricot
Apricot is a member of the genus Prunus, but unlike the others it is not very suitable for machining because it breaks and cracks. However, apricot wood is suitable for smoking, but only with reservations, but beware of the higher proportion of resins. It is commonly used as fuel. Apricot wood smells very nice and intense when worked. The colour of the apricot wood is very beautiful with a deep orange-purple colour.
Wood volume weight: 560-760 kg/m³
Wood in stock: grown east of Slavkov u Brna and in the urban area of Žabovřesky, Brno
Mulberry
Mulberry is widespread from China (white mulberry) to North America (red mulberry). Black mulberry comes from the Afghanistan/Pakistan region (from where it spread to ancient Rome). Botanists report that there are approximately ten to sixteen different species.
The wood is golden yellow to orange in colour with a very fine texture and shimmering hues. It is very robust, resistant to moisture, fungi and wood-boring insect attacks. Despite its high density, the wood is very flexible and can be bent easily. Mulberry wood is used to make musical instruments because of its good properties. It is very durable and instruments made from this wood have a good sound. It is suitable for making furniture, from bowls to benches. It is necessary to take into account that the wood changes its shade over time.
Volume weight of the wood: 850 kg/m³
Wood in stock: grown on the edge of a carpenter’s colony in Kraví Hora, Brno
Walnut
Cut wood, walnutWalnut has wood with a broader grey sapwood, with a grey-brown, sometimes even dark brown heartwood, which has distinctive colour streaks and swells. It has larger, scattered pores, numerous medium-sized rays, broader flight rings, pronounced on the tangential section. The walnut wood is medium hard and dense, with a homogeneous texture, very workable and polishable.
The Royal Walnut is one of the most cultivated trees in the world. It is cultivated for its fruit (walnuts), as an ornamental and shade tree, as a honey-bearing plant and for its high-quality and relatively fast-growing wood.
The wood of the walnut tree is of high quality and grows very quickly. In addition, it is a low-maintenance tree, so it can be grown over large areas at low cost. It is also used for furniture and rifle stocks. It is mainly used in the production of decorative veneers because of its beautiful colouring and pattern. Walnut is excellent to work and is therefore also sought after for carving and turning.
Wood volume weight: 500-680 kg/m³
Stock wood: grown in the village of Předklášteří
Bluma plum
Cutting wood, Bluma plum
Volume weight of wood: 660 kg/m³
Timber in stock: grew west of Osek nad Bečvou
Plum
Plum The sapwood is a knotty yellow, sometimes greyish, the kernel is most often pinkish, but occasionally it takes on deep reddish-brown shades. A peculiarity of plum trees is that, if they have dried standing, they have a burgundy to mahogany brown pith, sometimes with a smooth transition to purple shades.
Its wood is brittle and not very tough. It is therefore good for turning, cutting and sanding. Cuts with a knife, chisel or plane leave a slight sheen on the surface. Therefore, I recommend not to sand plum wood, but to use a planer and plane it.
Well-dried plum wood does not crack further, even if it is cut into very small pieces and used for further processing (beading). Even if they have a hole in the middle and their walls are really thin.
Volume weight of the wood: 660 kg/m³
Wood in stock: grown west of the village of Červený Hrádek
Cherry
The wood of the cherry tree is hard, strong, flexible and tough, with relatively distinct rings. The sapwood is narrow, creamy pinkish to yellow, the heartwood reddish-brown, reddening and darkening with time in the air. Cherry trees growing in forest stands have slightly darker wood. Sliced veneers, solid planks or planks have a distinctive pattern. It is well worked and has a slight sheen. It is poorly cut with chisels through the grain, but is suitable for turning and joinery. It breaks up and “works” a lot, and the cross-sections must be dried slowly and thoroughly interleaved.
It is used in furniture making, in artistic joinery, for making chairs, tables, pedestals, lining, cornices, balustrade posts and polished inlaid coffered ceilings.
Wood volume weight: 560-760 kg/m³
Timber in stock: grown in the area of the defunct village of Košt’álkov near the Austrian border and in the Medlánky district of Brno
Thuja
The wood is very light, soft and relatively low in strength, but resistant to rot. The heartwood is light brown. Wood is used in the manufacture of products and products that are in contact with water (boats, water buildings, etc.).
Volume weight of wood: 550 kg/m³
Wood in stock: grown in Medlánky, Brno
Cherry
Woodcutting, CherryCherry or just cherry is a fruit tree of the rose family. Cherry wood is popular among woodworkers for its strength and beautiful reddish-yellow colour. It is mainly used for making small items and in the furniture industry.
Volume weight of wood: 560-760 kg/m³
Stock wood: grown on the outskirts of the Brno district of Útěchov
Willow
Cutting wood, WillowWhite willow and willow have wood similar to poplar wood. It has a typically straight grain, fine texture without striking patterns. Wood stains are mainly visible on longitudinal cuts. The leaf rings tend to be wide, the sapwood is almost indistinguishable from the heartwood, slightly yellowish to brownish, the heartwood has a reddish tinge.
Willow wood is more fragile and less durable, it does not have the homogeneity of lime wood. Like poplar, it sways when cut diagonally or perpendicular to the direction of the grain, the grain in the spring growth of the rings is rolled out. It accepts glue mixtures and stains well.
Volume weight of wood: 360 kg/m³
Wood in stock: grown in Předklášteří
Glass
The dial of each watch is covered with a clear material. In our case it is always glass, either mineral or sapphire. If the watch is fitted with a flat glass up to 31mm in diameter, sapphire glass is usually used. But because of the more difficult processing of sapphire crystals. For large, spherical, convex or custom made, we use mineral glass. Their greater availability and variety of shapes allows us greater design freedom. There’s nothing worse than killing a pretty body shape with inappropriately shaped glass.
Mineral
At the sixth level of the Mohs scale (feldspar) is mineral silicate glass. This is the most widely used watch glass, although sapphire crystal is starting to nip at its heels. Due to its composition and the manufacturing technology used, it has a higher hardness than plastic materials. The high proportion of quartz (SiO2) and the surface hardening ensure greater resistance to scratches and impact damage. Nevertheless, it can be damaged during normal wear of the watch. Diamond paste is used to polish the indentations, but the process is laborious and the result uncertain. Replacing this glass is a relatively cheap affair.
Sapphire crystal
is a very brilliant, brittle and very hard glass. Sapphire is a blue variety of corundum with a hardness grade of 9, and its natural deposits are scattered all over the world. It is often replaced by industrially produced sapphire. Synthetic sapphire is transparent and is formed by crystallizing corundum (Al2O3) at very high temperatures. Chemically, synthetic sapphire is therefore the same as the natural sapphire used in jewellery, but without the tinge of colour. Artificial sapphire was first discovered in the 19th century. It was first used in this form in watches in the 1960s.
Sapphire crystal is very scratch resistant. An example of a material that is capable of causing an indentation in it is diamond. However, sapphire crystal pays for its high hardness by its fragility, which is caused by the high stresses of the molecules in the crystal lattice.
Leather
The straps are the largest visible mass on a watch and will greatly affect the final impression of the product. In addition, they have a major impact on functionality. Without them, the watch could not be worn. Their quality has a major impact on how even the most beautiful watch will wear. Whether it will be comfortable or completely unwearable. That is why we have decided to make our straps only from high-quality leather. We use lamb, deer and beef. Natural leather is very comfortable to wear and adapts to your hand. The wide range of its processing allows us to adapt the straps to individual models, so that all parts complement each other as much as possible, creating a harmonious and very elegant and pleasant to wear whole.
Stones
Cobic zirconsWe often use stones to decorate the dials of our watches. Most often Cubic zircons, which are harder than most natural gemstones, are the biggest competitor to natural diamonds in terms of perfection and availability. These sparkling, pure gems, free of blemishes and inclusions, with a perfect cut, complement our products perfectly. They are available in many colours.
Metal accessories
Metal accessories are one of the few parts that limit our expansion so far. We can’t make these ourselves yet and are forced to buy them. These so far unfortunately include, hands, crowns and strap buckles. We are trying to take proper care of these elements as well and are looking for reliable and quality suppliers, especially here in the Czech Republic.