aoya Hida creates distinctly vintage-inspired timepieces, which feature seriously rebuilt Swiss ébauches with strikingly noticeable haute horlogerie finishes and regional specialties including Kashu lacquer, and a unique D-buckle for the strap.

Demand from collectors around the world – the US being the largest single market with around 20%, the rest divided between Japan, rest of Asia, Middle East and Europe – is steadily increasing. The plan for 2024 is to make more than 100 pieces and to grow the team, which currently consists of Mr. Hida, watchmaker Kosuke Fujita, and engraver Keisuke Kano.

The trio came together in 2012. “But back then we worked for watchmaking groups, so we were not allowed to be paid. It was a pure hobby volunteer project,” said Mr. Hida when I met him in a hotel lounge across the road from Lake Geneva.

The core team of Naoya Hida, from left: Kosuke Fujita, watchmaker, Naoya Hida, founder and CEO, and Keisuke Kano, engraver.

Naoya Hida started in the watch industry back in 1990, on the commercial side. For three decades he amassed brands like Audemars Piguet, Breguet, Daniel Roth, Ebel, Eterna, F.P.Journe, Harry Winston, Jaeger-LeCoultre, Maurice Lacroix, Roger Dubuis, Ulysse Nardin, and Vacheron Constantin on his CV. “In the beginning of my career the watches were very ostentatious with a lot of gold and diamonds. They were status symbols; not at all what I like – watches like classical Pateks, for instance Ref. 96,” he said of the sleek small seconds watch originally designed by the Stern family, a model which was in production from 1932–1973.

15 pieces will be made of the NH TYPE4A-1.

The elegance of the Jaeger-LeCoultre Reverso Soixantième Ref. 270.2.64 in 18-carat rose gold, made for its 60^th anniversary in 1991, made him stay in the industry, when for the first time he felt modern watches could be relevant for his personal taste.

Cal. 3019

“Today I try to make my ideal watches. Hand-wound, small, vintage-inspired and a lot of three-dimensional detailing and depth when it comes to, for instance, the multilevel German silver dials, and the hands. They are suitable for collectors all around the world – even big guys with big wrists like small watches. And I love large movements,” he said of the 30-millimetre 7750 movement sitting in the 37-millimetre in-house-made case of the NH2B, a hand-wound time-only watch with central seconds.

Hang on, 7750? Yes, before adding parts and finishing the movements on haute horlogerie level, Mr. Hida’s team has stripped it of the chronograph function, rotor and date. They’ve also included an extra wheel for central second, and each click of the hand winding is distinct, like a mechanical equivalent of a crunchy potato crisp.

The bi-metal NH TYPE1D-1 features the hand-wound movement Cal. 3019SS, which has a very strong and responsive winding.

All changes, parts, assembly, and decorations are made in Naoya Hida’s own factory in Tokyo. “This is why we sign the dials with Naoya Hida Tokyo,” said Mr Hida. “If we were to make a watch in Geneva in the future, we would sign it with Naoya Hida Geneva – but it is very expensive to make watches in Switzerland, and I don’t speak French, so it would be very difficult,” he added with a laugh.

Cal. 3020

Together with the quality of the movements it is clear that the golden age of mechanical watches, created between the 1930s and 1960s, is a strong inspiration. But the aim is to manufacture watches that can only have been produced in this modern age.

Naoya Hida is inspired by the golden age of wristwatches.

Mr. Hida’s sense for details is also reflected in the straps on offer, which are made by Jean Rosseau in Switzerland. You can choose between a pin buckle and a unique D-buckle, the latter with a built-in size change possibility of up to 6mm. The straps only come in a few colours, but you can choose the size of both parts – thus you have 32 different size possibilities.

With Naoya Hida straps you can without a doubt find exactly the size that fits your wrist.

Naoya Hida watches cannot be bought in boutiques – they only sell directly to clients. “We do it online and at our office in the factory. And we have three trunk-show places, one in Kobe, Japan, one in Hong Kong, and one in New York,” he said, adding that the latter two are in collaboration with The Armory run by Mark Cho.

NH TYPE1D has a diameter of 37 mm.

Naoya Hida’s watches, which retail in the price range of CHF 13,000 to CHF 17,000 (plus VAT), carry reference numbers in the style of NH Type 1 A, NH Type 1 B, et cetera, a numbering inspired by American airplanes. The first Type 1, which came in 2019, features a small seconds subdial at 09.30, and has three leaf hands. These are machined by an “ultra-high-precision machine” before being finished by hand and blued by heating them in the classical way.

Naoya Hida’s unique D-buckle.

The three iterations of Type 1 were followed by NH Type 2 A and B, which have distinct mirror-polished steel bars for hour and minute hands, complemented by a long heat-blued seconds hand which has been hand-bent at the top to fit the seconds scale at the dial perimeter.

NH TYPE2C has a dial made of Germain silver, with hand-engraved Arabic indexes.

With NH Type 3, Naoya Hida made its first astronomical complication, a moon phase. The moon disc is made of 18-carat gold, and has been hand engraved after being given a matt, textured microbead-blasted finish.

NH TYPE3B is the first watch from Naoya Hida with an astronomical complication.

NH Type 4 is the brand’s first watch with a 36-millimetre case, with softer feeling than previous models thanks to its rounded edges and domed sapphire.

Naoya Hida has become known among collectors for the extreme work on the hands.

Next year will see NH Type 5 – with a “new, completely different shape,” and Naoya Hida is in it for the long run. “I have up to 22 models in my brain.”

The development of NH WATCH Co. Ltd., number of watches made and sold per year:

• 2019: 7
• 2020: 25
• 2021: 40
• 2022: 70
• 2023: 100
• 2024: 100+α (planned)