Do It Yourself Swatch Haring!

So for those of you who missed out on the Swatch Haring/Mickey Mouse drop (I managed to get 2 out of 3) Swatch is giving you the chance to harness your inner 80s street artist -

Courtesy of Swatch (and Henki)

So I rolled up my virtual sleeves and teleported myself to a cold and snowy Ohio morning at Oberlin Middle School back in 1981 in Mrs. McEvoy's art class, where my ham-fisted and poorly executed art projects garnered a raft of Cs given most likely out of sympathy rather than even being good enough to earn that average mark ; ). 

In fairness, I did the work, I just could not execute anything vaguely resembling something aesthetically pleasing. But fortunately Swatch had me covered with a "Henki-Proof" system of design.

So if like me you missed out on Kinetic Mickey, lively-up yourself and head over to the Swatch x You page and make some 80s magic!

SWATCH X YOU and Henki Time

The Monday before BaselWorld found me a wee bit groggy after touching down in Zurich and "training" it in to Biel/Bienne.  My good pal Rod Hess and I had some time to kill prior to attending the Watch City / BaselWorld kickoff event, so we went on a field trip to the SWATCH campus.  

We drove around and looked at the usual things, and then something caught my eye.  So Rod pulled over and we got out of the car to take a closer look -

No, it was not a Sonic Burger!  It was a SWATCH concept store with sort of a Jetsons meets retail feeling.  As far as I understand it, the store is new and will continue to develop.  I was worried that perhaps they had not opened yet, but we were welcomed in and looked around.  

And there in pride of place was the design station for the SWATCH X YOU -

Now a bit of Henki history, my mother was a very talented artist and at the never-too-late age of 52 embarked on a career in fashion design.  Suffice it to say, the artistic/creative gene did not land in my personal DNA pool.  But SWATCH has the solution for me and my fellow would-be watch designers.

The system is pretty simple, you pick a background pattern and drag the outline of the SWATCH over the pattern (there are quite a few to chose from), and once you've completed the process, you submit everything, pay at the counter, and your watch immediately goes into "production".  If you live in Switzerland, you can have it delivered to your home.  But fear not!  For those of you not able to visit Biel/Bienne, or who do not live in Switzerland, you can do the same thing online at the SWATCH site.  

So I "designed", I confirmed, and yes, gentle reader, I paid.  I received an email the very next day that my SWATCH was ready (I was already on a train heading to Grenchen), but I had arranged for the new Henki Time original to be delivered to my friend who would bring it to the fair.  The day after, it was at my friends, and then hand delivered to me!

So if you always wanted to design your own SWATCH (within the provided patterns) here's your chance!