What happens when a bunch of industrial designers who’ve designed some of our favorite tech gadgetry decide to focus their talents on making a watch? You get the MINUS-8, a timepiece for guys who are tired of the plastic, oversized, overpriced crap we’ve been asked to strap to our wrists lately. The Minus-8 is different. It’s a raw, consciously crafted, time machine. Well, actually, a machine that tells time.
Named for the GMT -8 time zone (or as we call it, the Pacific Time zone—the company is headquartered in San Francisco), Minus-8 watches are tooled from hard stainless steel that’s been PVD coated (a process developed by NASA to make materials stronger and more corrosion resistant), and precisely stacked, layer by layer, to give the watches a bold, distinctive look, strength to stand up to years of wear, and a unique depth to the face that gives it an arena-like look. It’s like having a modern Colosseum on your wrist.
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Each of the four styles has a sapphire crystal face and three of them feature a thick, durable silicon band that’s NFC enabled, so you can pair it with your smartphone and program it to initiate a single action. Sure it only performs one action, but it’s a hell of a lot better looking than any smart watch.
The Layer 24 features three dials on its face to give you a 24-hour clock, weekday, and month. The more streamlined Layer is for guys who like a simpler watch, with just the date cut into the face. If keeping track of your lap times is important, go for the Edge, the only Minus-8 in the collection with a stainless steel link bracelet. It boasts a stopwatch that tracks minutes, seconds and tenths of a second. And for those who like to keep it simple, there’s the Zone with a clean face, free of any extra dials that may distract. It does feature a split-color design, to look like a time zone boundary.
Minus-8 watches are available at minus8watch.com, and range from $198 to $598
