Bausele in the NY Times

A Bit of Australia in Every Watch

At Bausele, timepieces contain beach sand, red dirt from the outback, tile from the Sydney Opera House and more.

Bausele_Christophe Hoppe_New York Times_Smartwatch_OceanMoon

Picture: AnnaMaria Antoinette D'Addario for The New York Times

By 

Australia has some of the world’s most celebrated attractions, from Bondi Beach to the Great Barrier Reef.

So in 2011, when Christophe Hoppé founded Bausele — marketed as the country’s first premium watch company — he decided to showcase such places. After all, what could be more distinctive than a timepiece with red earth from the outback in its crown, or a case made with Australian rock?

Even the brand name had a connection, devised from the first letters of three words in the mission statement: “beyond Australian elements.”

The idea was “to be different,” Mr. Hoppe, 44, said during an interview this summer in London. He was in Europe for meetings and to see a supplier who helped make Vintage 2.0, Bausele’s first IOS- and Android-connected watch, introduced on the company website Sept. 6.

The watch, priced at 750 Australian dollars ($507), and now available at 525 dollars for preorder, has a 1970s-style design with a 40-millimeter case and simple dial. It works with an app on the wearer’s phone to track your mood, how you sleep and your number of steps.

There also is a tiny kangaroo on the dial as “a bit of fun,” Mr. Hoppé said — as Australians “don’t take ourselves too seriously.”

With the debut of the new timepiece, Bausele now has seven collections, starting with the minimalist Noosa, a quartz men’s and women’s model named for Queensland’s fancy beach resort and priced from 495 dollars.

(...) For the rest of the article click HERE

Back to blog