an Ordain are one of our fave brands here at The Nortern Watch Co magazine. Why? Well it isn’t often that you find any brand capable of producing hand-enamelled dials, it’s a very rare skill. Even more so to find that being applied in the UK, where employment laws, factory rents and overheads make life very expensive for anyone who wishes to manufacture stuff.

So here’s good news from an Ordain on their fume dial range;

The Model 1 is now available with our signature Fumé dial. Developed by our team over several years, this painstaking enamelling technique has now been further refined to exaggerate the smoked effect and add more depth to the outer perimeter. Available in a range of colours, each Fumé dial boasts a lustrous coloured centre and impressive smoked edge. While the Blue and Green Fumé provide the new Model 1 with a familiar and dazzling vibrance, they are accompanied by the addition of two new colours – Payne’s Grey and Plum. The latter of the two brings with it an irresistible and brooding warmth, and to us, the Payne’s Grey embodies the very definition of ‘fumé’ with its sultry smokiness.

They also make the watch hands in-house too, which is another set of old school skills we should all celebrate. Watch manufacturing was once a big deal in the UK, with places like Warrington, Prescot near Liverpool, London, Dundee, Cheltenham in Gloucester, Ystradglynais in South Wales and Edinburgh all hosting several makers and freelance suppliers.

Production is taking place in Scotland at an Ordain’s factory and delivery is expected in Feb 2021. Price is just under £1800, which isn’t cheap for an ETA 2824 powered watch, featuring a 38mm case and 50m depth resistance. But the price reflects the huge costs in producing something this beautiful in small numbers.