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- [00:00]
Fiona Kruger
Foreign.
- [00:06]
Judah Loman Joseph
Hello, watch fans, and welcome to another edition of the Real Time show with me, your friendly neighborhood Judah Loman Joseph for the first time together with our humble rambler, Scarlett Baker, all the way from London, calling in on this episode, an episode that I technically should not be on because this is all about girl power. We have the queen of rock of the horology industry in the virtual studio with us, and she's here because our dear Bianca from the TRTS community twisted our virtual arm to get her on the show. So a big welcome, Fiona Kruger.
- [00:48]
Fiona Kruger
Oh, thank you. That's such a nice welcome, Bianca. Your check's in the mail, by the way. Uh, yeah, it's. It's really a pleasure to be here. Thank you so much for the. For the invitation. And yeah, that's one hell of an intro. But, yeah, I'm. I'm excited to be here and to. And to chat with both of you today.
- [01:09]
Scarlett Baker
Amazing. I mean, that's a. That's a pretty good start to a Tuesday morning. I think that was a good intro. And also to second alon. You don't know how many people have been messaging saying, like, we need to have Fiona. We really hear. Like, we want to hear what she has to say. So this is your moment.
- [01:24]
Judah Loman Joseph
It's actually your moment, Scarlett. Cause I didn't lie a word, didn't I? We were fighting within our admin group of hosts who would have the honor to go and interview Fiona. You. You basically said, if I don't do it, you leave trts. So basically blackmailed us.
- [01:41]
Fiona Kruger
Blackmail. Blackmail is always a good option.
- [01:46]
Scarlett Baker
I mean, my. My sort of stance was. Guys, you don't understand. The last time I saw Fiona, we were in the middle of Hong Kong in a nightclub together. I have to do this interview.
- [01:57]
Fiona Kruger
Yeah, exactly. Exactly.
- [01:59]
Judah Loman Joseph
So what I'll do is I'll. I'll just. I squeeze myself into this interview. I just want to do the intro question, then I'll shut up, give Skarls the mic, and then if she'll leave me a few minutes at the end, I'll pop in some questions because I have a zillion questions. And Fiona, please, if you do enjoy this hour with us, we hope you'll come back be. Because I can spend a whole hour on the amazing design you made for the Japanese pearl and jewelry manufacturer Tasaki. First and foremost, Kruger makes me think of South Africa. So I want to know sp Afrikaans.
- [02:37]
Fiona Kruger
Yeah.
- [02:40]
Scarlett Baker
Great stuff, great stuff.
- [02:42]
Fiona Kruger
I mean, like, I speak, like, pigeon Afrikaans, so not very well. And a lot of swear words. But yeah, like a little bit, obviously, because my. My husband's family are Afrikaans, so I picked up a few bits here and there.
- [03:01]
Judah Loman Joseph
Okay, so, my dear listeners, while you're listening, some of you like to browse. If you are not aware who Fiona Kruger is, shame on you. Now, all kidding aside. I'm kidding. She is. It's difficult to put her in a box. I would say she's an artist. She is a genius. She's creative. You might have seen an amazing wristwatch in the shape of a skull. That's Fiona. You've maybe seen a watch that resembles fractures cracks. That's Fiona. If you want to browse while listening, check her website, which is F I O N A K R U G E r dot com. Fiona, please just give us a little intro. Where are you from? What do you do? And then the mic is all scarls.
- [03:47]
Fiona Kruger
Nice. Okay. Well, my family's originally from Scotland. I moved around quite a lot as a kid. So I grew up in France, Mexico, Brazil. Before moving back to Scotland, I did an arts degree. So my background is actually in fine art. I lived and worked in South Africa for three years in the art scene in an art gallery, and then for a brief period for design company. And then I went to Switzerland to do my masters with the intention of getting into teaching. But it was a Master's in product design and craftsmanship, specifically for the luxury industry. And my thinking was really, you know, by very. By its very definition, because it's for the luxury sector. It's not things that people need. Your job is to make people dream. And I thought, well, with my background that I can probably do, you know, highly sort of technical kind of design work had, I thought was far beyond my capacity. And then it was during that Master's course that I discovered watchmaking, which, to be honest, I didn't think was for me. It wasn't on my radar, not really something I was interested in. But obviously being in Switzerland, you're sort of immersed in that. And it was through my Master's course where my year group was asked to design a watch for Odmar Piguet. They were one of the sponsors and I'd never even heard of them, that I sort of discovered the whole world of horology. And to be honest, I completely fell in love with it. When I visited the atelier at Audemars Piguet, where you see the watchmakers assemble the mechanisms, I just thought that was unbelievable. I mean, I really couldn't believe that people were assembling these things by hand. Still today at such a minute scale, and then visits to the Horology Museum in La Chaudfond and the Patek Philippe Museum. And it was their historical collection that made me realize that a watch didn't have to be round and flat. It could be anything that you could imagine, and you were actually only limited by your imagination. You know, they had watches shaped like angels and musical instruments and animals, and they were more kind of small, personal cultural objects. So that spoke to me as an artist, and that was really how. How I sort of got into it completely by accident.
- [06:26]
Scarlett Baker
So am I right in thinking that you went to Switzerland to go and study your master's, and in actual fact, you never left?
- [06:33]
Fiona Kruger
Yeah, pretty much. I mean, we live. We live just over the border in France. And that was a very conscious decision to not sort of live in the watch bubble. I mean, when I graduated, I didn't know that I'd be starting a business. I had no intention of doing that at all. But I'd grown up in this region of France called Alsace, which is sort of northeast, so I'm like half her from Basel. And it's a very grounding place. It's nature. You know, most of the people here work in vineyards, in the wine industry. And I like that kind of being out in nature and separate from the sort of watch world in Switzerland or even the kind of industrial side of it. Yeah, yeah, exactly. But, I mean, I'm half an hour from Ball Airport, so I can hop on a plane and go to London. And I love going to London because I'm a visitor, right? So the gallery and everything. But I think being immersed in it all the time would be sort of too much for my brain, which is quite busy. And I like a sort of quiet space to be able to reflect on what I'm doing.
- [07:42]
Scarlett Baker
Fiona, I particularly love your story because I share a lot of the sentiment that you're saying about coming into an industry that you never could have imagined you would be a part of and sort of fell into it by pure chance. So before we kind of get into the story of where you are now and how you got on that journey, I'm really, really fascina to know if there was any kind of presence of watches in your life from a young age. You know, were you wearing a watch on your wrist as a child? Was it something that anybody in your family had on their wrists? And were you aware of that?
- [08:16]
Fiona Kruger
I think the simple answer is no. I mean, I'm sure that I had, like, a swatch at Some point when I was little.
- [08:23]
Scarlett Baker
I also love it when the answer is no. And you're like, well, how the hell did you get here?
- [08:27]
Fiona Kruger
Yeah, no, exactly. And I mean, my dad, I'm sure, has sort of worn watches, but it was never like, a thing. I mean, if. If he'd not worn one, I wouldn't really have noticed the difference. So it's just not. Yeah, they really weren't anything of any significance in. In my life really, at all. Can you remember this watch that you had? No. No.
- [08:51]
Scarlett Baker
That makes for an even better story. Okay, so was it very apparent for you that art and fine art or something within that kind of creative pocket was going to be a pathway that you would explore beyond sort of high school?
- [09:06]
Fiona Kruger
I think it was always something that I was interested in. I mean, I drew as a kid, so that was my sort of happy place in my pastime was drawing. And I've always done creative things and liked making things. So I was always a creative child and then teenager. And it wasn't until we moved back to Scotland and I chose art as one of my subjects. I mean, I'm sure at the time, both my parents were thinking, oh, you know, like, do something, like, I don't know, something useful. But I was very determined that I was not. Not going to study art, you know, as at least one of my subjects anyway. My. My high school art teacher, Mr. Wilson, spotted something in me, and he really encouraged me. So it was him and another teacher called Jane, Jane Roy. And I'm still in a WhatsApp chat with the two of them, actually. Oh, brilliant. And he was pivotal, the two of them were. But especially Alan was pivotal in sort of shaping the direction of my life in terms of me actually going to art school, because he really encouraged me. He saw something in me. He. It was the first time that I sort of felt like somebody that knew what they were talking about saw that I had some sort of talent. And one day he gave me a lump of clay and this image of a painting of two hands. And he said, try and do something with that. And basically, like, sort of recreate this 2D image in 3D. And I just did it. So that kind of was my first realization of, like, oh, my brain works better in 3D than 2D. And that's why when I applied to art school, I ended up specializing in sculpture. And I think for what I'm doing with watches, that approach has sort of helped. And I think it's also helped the fact that, you know, when you go to art School. It gives you a very broad sort of library of references in your brain that you can pull from. Like, what I find sort of amusing is that, you know, in the watch sector, if, you know, if a brand changes a color palette, that's seen as quite extreme, and I'm thinking it's groundbreaking. Yeah, exactly. And I'm thinking, you know, some of the performance art from the 70s that I used to watch as part of my studies, I mean, I would say that's intense. So, like, the change of our color palette is.
- [11:34]
Scarlett Baker
What kind of mediums were you typically working with then, like, during your studies? Was it all very sort of sculptural? And I know you mentioned 3D. There was. Was there anything in particular that really stood out to you?
- [11:47]
Fiona Kruger
Yeah, well, I think if I'd been allowed to be more sort of traditional, it would have been sculpture with clay. I mean, Hoda is one of my heroes, and it's a very classic sort of name to bring up. But if you've ever seen any of his sculptures or gone to the Musee Houdin in Paris, I mean, some of them are so achingly beautiful. Like, there was an exhibition of his work here, and it was the first exhibition I went to after lockdown. And I was walking around, and I almost started crying. I was telling Michael, my husband, about it, and he's looking at me like, oh, for God's sake, get a grip. It was the combination of the capturing of an emotion in an object. So you actually feel the emotion when you look at the piece, which is already something. And then this realization that a human being was able to make those works. There's something. It's like showing you the best of humanity or what's possible when we bring our best self forward. That's probably what I would have done. But what I ended up doing, because we were sort of pushed to kind of think outside the box and be more conceptual and all those kind of things. I ended up actually making wearable sculpture. So, okay. There's an artist called Rebecca Horn who I think, in sort of the 70s, was sort of part of her peak. And she used to make wearable objects that she would wear and then photograph herself in them. And then the work was the object and also the photograph. And it was sort of. I think, at least for me, it was about, like, your body as part of the piece of sculpture, kind of challenging a little bit of sort of perceptions of things. And then she also made objects that, strangely, are actually kind of mechanical, that are, like, yeah, I'd say small. Mechanical sculptures. Some of them, I think, are a bit larger. It was only actually when I was thinking about that a few months back, that it's interesting that her work does have that mechanical element to it, and that's what I've ended up being drawn to.
- [13:57]
Scarlett Baker
It sort of sounds like, in a really beautiful way, that everything was kind of lining up for you to embrace the watch industry. You talk there about, like, wearable art, wearable culture, how the body interacts with this object and then sort of emotional aspect behind it as well. Is everything how we describe watches, and yet you were sort of nowhere near this world at the time when you were exploring all of these things. So, dare I say, was it fate?
- [14:23]
Fiona Kruger
Well, it's because I have thought back on that and had the same sort of reflection that you've had of thinking. Yeah, it's either a brilliant coincidence or is things sort of lining up, or it's just kind of. As you build your life, you know, every step you take, it's like another sort of building block, and it naturally orientates you towards certain things. So, yeah, I think the base ingredients do serve me in terms of what I'm doing when it comes to horology. So whether that's watches or other mechanical objects.
- [15:00]
Scarlett Baker
And so you did your studies at Edinburgh and writing in fine art, and then from there you went on to do your master's at the University of Art Design in Lausanne.
- [15:09]
Fiona Kruger
Yeah, that's right.
- [15:10]
Scarlett Baker
When you moved to Switzerland, did you have this awareness of, you know, how much watchmaking really does penetrate the roots of Swiss culture?
- [15:19]
Fiona Kruger
No.
- [15:20]
Scarlett Baker
Yeah, nor did I. Nor did I. When I first went to Geneva airport, I was like, why are there loads of ads for watches everywhere? I don't get it.
- [15:27]
Fiona Kruger
Yeah, yeah. I mean, I didn't really get it either. I thought it was. I mean, it was a bit like, oh, you know, Switzerland, it's like mountains, chocolate and watches. But it's a kind of throwaway thing. I didn't really get how much it is part of the culture, but also that it's genuinely part of the culture in that it's an industry that people make a living from. And it's not just about them making a living in terms of them paying their bills, but there's a real culture of how people work together. And because watchmaking, for me at least, is inherently a collaborative endeavor, that culture of how people work together and collaborate to make these things, once you sort of scratch the surface, you sort of realize how important that is and how sort of imbued it is within Swiss culture.
- [16:22]
Scarlett Baker
Yeah. And you mentioned earlier on that your year group on the masters cohort had the opportunity to go to a manufacturer. Is that something that they did for every year group or was it specifically yours?
- [16:34]
Fiona Kruger
No, it was specifically ours.
- [16:38]
Scarlett Baker
Again, again, it's fate. It's fate, I'm telling you.
- [16:42]
Fiona Kruger
Yeah. I mean, since. Because, I mean, after I graduated, the university hired me as a teacher, teacher teaching assistant on that same master's course. So your job is to basically support the students when they're doing their various projects. So you're like the bridge between the student and whoever the guest designer is for the workshop that they're doing and then you support the students in developing their project. So I did that for sort of three, three and a half years and then now I get invited back as a designer for a workshop every year that's specifically to do with mechanics and, or the watch industry. So, yeah, it's been really interesting to kind of go full circle and do. Do the whole thing. But the reason why I bring that up is that since then, you know, classes have been able to go and visit different manufacturer at different brands. And it's very interesting to see that from one brand to another, they have their very own distinct, distinct and unique culture. Even though they may both be making watches. And there's some technical elements that are the same. Right. Like, it's not like there's two different laws of physics for two different brands, like we're using base level, but the culture and the approach is very unique and specific to each mizzle or each brand, if you. Yeah.
- [18:08]
Scarlett Baker
And so Audma Piguet was the first manufacturer that you went to visit?
- [18:12]
Fiona Kruger
Yep, yep, that's, that's.
- [18:14]
Scarlett Baker
The bar is set quite high there. Like, you know, you've gone for a very well known name with incredible feats and watchmaking. Like, can you remember walking around and sort of seeing these watches being made in real time in front of you and thinking, what is going on?
- [18:29]
Fiona Kruger
Yeah, absolutely. And what's interesting is it was before. I mean, I've been back since and so they've got the AP Museum and stuff now, which is incredible. I mean, when I went, that wasn't there. So it was really like back in the day. And what, what I couldn't believe was that there were people assembling movements. And I was asking one of the watchmakers, he had those, you know, the weed dishes that look like a sort of petri dish that they keep components in. Yeah. And I was asking him what's in, like what you normally put in there. And he went, oh, there's screws in there. And I looked and I said, no, there isn't. And then he said, look again. And I looked. And honestly, it looked like dust. And he showed me how he screwed it in by hand. And I could not. I honestly just could not believe it. It was like something like Willy Wonka's cricket. It was just mental. And then we went to. There was a section where they were doing their grand copy casion. And what blew my mind was that they would assemble this highly complicated watch and if it has a sound, then it, you know, it would be to check that the sound was correct and, you know, the pitch and everything. And that's somebody with a specific ear that does that job. So you spend months assembling this thing, checking it works, and then they disassemble it all, and then, yeah, you know, clean everything, make sure everything's perfect, and then they reassemble again. I mean, in terms of dedication, discipline, you know, a sort of setting the bar high in terms of a level of execution, it really is like a parallel world. And I think it's something for me akin to, like, back in the day when people used to build amazing cathedrals and they didn't worry about how much time it was going to take them. It was about making the best thing. And that, I think, is really, really rare nowadays. And that's what you find in those ateliers. I mean, the people that make the things are, for me, I think, just incredible, incredible people, 1,000%.
- [20:39]
Scarlett Baker
I mean, the first one I ever saw was Grubel Forsey and I fell at the first hurdle. I saw, like, the. The gloves that the watchmakers wear and I was like, this is genius invention. Like, they're not using full gloves for the hand. Like, whoever came up with this.
- [20:52]
Fiona Kruger
Yeah, yeah.
- [20:53]
Scarlett Baker
Is phenomenal. And then, you know, before I'd even started looking at a watch, and then that watch made me mind blown. So how. How do you go from seeing a watch manufacturer to then launching and having your own watch brand? Because that's. That's quite a jump.
- [21:10]
Fiona Kruger
Yeah. So, I mean, basically, by the time that we'd done the different visits, I'd pretty much forgotten that I was designing for AP or that's what I should have been doing. And I just want design something that I thought was relevant. I was more. It was more important to me to do something that felt authentic to me and for my portfolio than it was to sort of worry too much about their brand identity, which is not a Designer. But. But in that instance, I really. I mean, I just thought, you know, there's so many watches. We just. You don't actually. First off, you don't need a watch today and you definitely don't need more. So if I was to design a watch, what on earth could I come up with that would be relevant, not just now, but in like 200 years when I'm not here anymore? And that whole idea of time and mortality, it was just a sort of intuition of like, well, that's how we relate to time, is the fact that we're not going to be here forever. And that's symbol of a skull is a really. It's a universal symbol that everybody can recognize, regardless of culture that packages up that whole idea. And I liked the idea of designing something that even if you don't get mechanics and you don't think watches are for you, you can still relate to the object. So it was purely intuitive, really. So that was where the design for the skull watch came from. So that's actually what I designed and then presented that to ap. The guy was the head of my course at the time, thought I was completely off my rocker, but anyway, so I presented that. Obviously it didn't get selected as one of the projects, which wasn't a surprise, but I then asked if I would be able to produce that for my diploma project. And the head of my course looked at me, thinking, well, there's no way in hell you'll be able to do that. But, you know. Anyway, long story short, I did. I ended up making a fully functioning prototype in the space of about six weeks. Wow. Which I've still got. I mean, it's not watertight or airtight or made to any sort of production standard, but it works and looks quite cool, actually. And that was also thanks to the help of the lovely Peter Speakmarin, who, at the time my teacher, had mentioned him to me. I visited him at Basel, told him what I wanted to do. He was like, there's no way you'll be able to do that. Just do a 3D, like, make a 3D print and present your research. And I pull the 3D print out of my pocket. As in, like, I've already done that. I want to make this thing. And he. So he assembled my prototype for me. He gave me, like an old ITA movement to put inside so it would work. And that was really how that started. Still no ambitions of having a business or a company or making watches, until a couple of photos of my prototype ended up on A design blog.
- [24:06]
Scarlett Baker
Do you know how they got there?
- [24:09]
Fiona Kruger
Yeah, because I was emailing people. Like when you're a new graduate, you sort of email people portfolio going, I exist. Like, this is what I do, you know, to see. Well, how are you gonna. No, no, no, but I, I mean, you sort, you email everybody and. And then it's like crickets, right?
- [24:30]
Scarlett Baker
Yeah.
- [24:30]
Fiona Kruger
Okay, great. So a photo that went up and then. And over the space of a year, I ended up with about 150 emails from people asking if they could buy it.
- [24:40]
Scarlett Baker
Wow.
- [24:41]
Fiona Kruger
And that's what made me think, oh, it's not just me that finds this interesting. Other people do genuinely resonate with that and they find it interesting. So that's what gave me the impetus to think, well, let me see if I could actually make these properly. And properly for me meant making them in Switzerland so that I could really understand and follow the whole process of making a watch from A to Z. And that was really, that, that was really how it started.
- [25:12]
Scarlett Baker
I'm really fascinated by something that you've mentioned there. You spoke about time and mortality and how you want the objects that you create to sort of have their own lifespan and legacy. In 200 years time, when we're unfortunately no longer around to keep wearing your watches, would you say that you have a lot of brands, some of them designed specifically in homage to the past? You have some brands that very much designed to talk about what society and the zeitgeist represents today. Would you say you're in a bracket of design that looks to the future?
- [25:46]
Fiona Kruger
Yeah, I, I don't know if it's necessarily about looking to the future, but it's more about a design that's about something real, about something universal and about something that's got meaning, you know, something that's really meaningful. I think I'm also just very aware that. And again, this is my process when I'm. When I'm designing my own pieces, Right. If I'm, if I'm designing for a client, so say, for example, like for Tasaki. So it's obviously my sort of personal approach and you know, the sort of library of stuff I've got in my head that I can pull from and my creative process, but it's not about me in that instance, then it's really about the brand or the client and I sort of turn into a mirror and I reflect back to them, the best bits about them. So they are my subject matter. But when I'm designing for myself, I think I just have this real awareness that, like, okay, so we're going to be using really expensive materials. Likely, I'm going to be asking a whole bunch of people who've dedicated their life to specializing in a certain skill set to give me their time and their energy to make these things. Surely, at the very minimum, for my part, the base idea needs to be meaningful, because otherwise it just feels, I don't know, a little bit sort of wasteful, I guess. Yeah. And I'm not. The thing is, once the piece is made and it leaves, like, it leaves me, it's not mine anymore. And I have no expectation of anybody who looks at my work to understand all the meaning and all the stuff that went into it. It's more visually, it has an identity, and. And people see it and they feel something from it, and if that's all that they care about, that is absolutely fine. But if you do want to learn about it and you sort of scratch underneath the surface, there's a reason why behind every single choice. So there's this kind of web of meaning that sort of knitted, like, behind the making of all of the. Of all of the pieces. But, I mean, there's artworks that I've bought that I bought them purely because I looked at it and I thought, that is brilliant, and I didn't really need or want to know more about it. It just made my heart sing, and I bought it. And that's just sometimes enough. Yeah, absolutely.
- [28:30]
Scarlett Baker
I mean, there's something very stimulating about your work in the fact that if we line up three models, for instance, we take the recent Face of Tazaki watch, we take the fractured, and we take the skull watch. There are three very different visual outputs. Yeah, but all still under your vision. If you were going to sort of tie a link between how these three watches really summarize your approach and your vision to watchmaking, what would you say is the underlying threat between the three of them?
- [29:01]
Fiona Kruger
I think it's probably my ability to take an idea. So whether it's like a big philosophical idea or something, that's more, you know, an. An idea of, like, a brand. Because I can't remember whether it was with you that I was sort of talking about this, but to me, brands don't exist. I mean, they just don't. It was. Yeah, even a brand is an idea that everybody buys into, and the more people buy into it, the bigger the brand is. So. So I think what I do is I take an idea and then I'm able to go, okay, visually, what does that look like? And then I Translate that into some sort of symbol or visual identity. And then I'm able to translate that into mechanics so that it's now not just a symbol, but it's a narrative that is also, you know, able to come to life when you wind it up. So I'd say it's that sort of thing that is the kind of underlying thread, really.
- [30:12]
Scarlett Baker
And I do have to mention here to the listeners that we were together for Horology Forum in Hong Kong, which was incredible, and for anybody that doesn't know, it's this a great get together of collectors and speakers and brands and figureheads where we sort of share conversations and have panel talks about the industry and how it moves forward, problems we're addressing and facing and et cetera. And one of the panels that we did have was to create a watch in real time based on the crowd's participation. And Fiona, I don't know how you did it. Within the space of about 20 minutes, you designed a watch from scratch by taking feedback, the most random feedback from, from a crowd of us enthusiasts. And you came out with something that was very different to what you have in your collection. But albeit it was so fascinating to see your brain just work like on the spot and understand how you translate references in such a nuanced way. I don't know how you did it.
- [31:09]
Fiona Kruger
Yeah, I mean, to be fair, that was way more difficult because, because of everybody giving feedback. This makes me sound like such a sort of dictator. But I don't want to listen to you. I just want to design what I think would be great. Yeah.
- [31:26]
Scarlett Baker
There was someone that was saying tropical dials like non stop, I swear.
- [31:31]
Fiona Kruger
Yeah, yeah. Oh, actually, yeah. Also I think it's worth sort of mentioning, obviously, massive shout out to the Siddiqui family, who are behind Horology form and Dubai Watch Week. I mean, it is pretty exceptional that they've, you know, sort of created this platform with a genuine want to just have a moment for people who are enthusiasts to be able to exchange and, and have conversations about different things and learn from each other. So, yeah, it's, it's amazing actually, what they've built.
- [32:02]
Scarlett Baker
Absolutely. One thing I've been dying to ask you, and I don't think I've ever actually asked you this before, Shape is something that I really see as this sort of striking standpoint in your work, and particularly with the fractured model, which was the first piece I ever saw in Dubai Watch Week of your work. Why did you go for this sort of slightly tonneau shaped, but slightly not like, why was that the starting point for you?
- [32:27]
Fiona Kruger
Yes.
- [32:28]
Scarlett Baker
After the skull, of course.
- [32:29]
Fiona Kruger
Yeah. So with that one, it was actually. That piece is one of the pieces from our second line of watches, which is called Chaos. And that whole collection was designed basically from the movement outwards. So if the skull collection is about how we relate to time from a human perspective through our own life and mortality. I wanted to look at time from a scientific perspective. And I was watching. It was a series that. You know the physicist Brian Cox LeDoux? Yes. He does a lot of stuff for the BBC. I mean, I think he's brilliant. So I was watching this series that he did for the BBC where he was talking about time and there's a moment where he's standing in front of this glacier and then the glacier sort of breaks and then falls into the ocean and he goes, there's nothing in the laws of physics that says that this glacier couldn't put itself back together and, you know, jump out of the ocean and kind of refuse itself with the rest of the glacial body. It's just highly, highly, highly unlikely. And I remember sitting there thinking, I mean, it just blew my mind. I thought, I have no idea what reality actually is. What is it on about? Like, I just couldn't believe it. And so I was watching.
- [33:55]
Scarlett Baker
Was this like a Monday morning existential crisis?
- [33:58]
Fiona Kruger
Exactly. Before my cup of tea, Yes, I was watching that. And then there was another series where he was explaining. He sort of asked the question, how do we know that time moves forward? And I thought, well, that's a great question, because you just sort of assume, and it's linked to this, the second law of thermodynamics, which, again, is linked to that image which I just explained, which is the fact that things always move from order towards disorder or chaos. So that's how you know that there's a direction. And I just thought, God, that is such a beautiful idea, this whole. This visual of chaos being kind of part of the perspective or personality of time. And then from a watchmaking point of view, you know, Swiss watchmaking is a total antithesis of that, because it's all about order and precision and everything working perfectly.
- [34:55]
Scarlett Baker
So.
- [34:55]
Fiona Kruger
So for me, they were like two sides of the same coin.
- [34:58]
Scarlett Baker
It's very apt that you mention him, though, as someone who's influenced you, because Brian Cox typically talks about very complicated subjects, but does so in a very universal and interactive way and sort of breaks it down a little bit. And I think there's something very shared about that attitude within your work, like going Back to what you said earlier. You want to create timepieces that people can wear whether they understand the A to Z of horology or not. It's about the emotion.
- [35:27]
Fiona Kruger
Yeah.
- [35:27]
Scarlett Baker
Behind it.
- [35:29]
Fiona Kruger
Yeah, yeah, yeah. No, absolutely. I mean, I. I just think he's brilliant. Like, my dream would be to just go to the pub with him and be my fool's super geek self.
- [35:44]
Scarlett Baker
Now, that would be a podcast.
- [35:45]
Fiona Kruger
Yes. So, because I had this idea, like, at the same time I'd met with Jean Marc Bieder, who at the time he was at Ageno, so that was the. The company that he founded. He's an amazing watchmaker. And we'd been speaking on and off. I think I'd done a conference that he'd seen me at, and he liked the way that I worked. So we'd been exchanging. Long story short, he'd said to me, well, if you want to do something with us one day, we'd love to. And then he said to me, if you wanted to make your own movement, I think we would be able to help you to do that. And I just said, yes, because I never thought that would happen. So I thought, okay, well, now I get to design this thing really from the guts out. And for me, the movement isn't just this mechanical kind of beating heart. It's got something to say esthetically and visually as part of the watch. It's one of the sort of ingredients or like one of the colors on my. On my paint palette. So this idea of chaos, I thought, well, how would I. What would that look like? And to me, if you say chaos and you can only think of one image, it's an explosion, because there's no order there, and it's an instant in time. And I thought, well, if a movement was an explosion, what would it look like? So I took the movement and stretched the gear train out and the components so that they looked like they were, you know, being blown apart. And then that's why the bridges are shaped like they are, so they look like they're cracking. So the mechanism looks like it's kind of been frozen mid explosion. There's an artist called Cornelia Parker who did a work that's nicknamed the Exploding Shed. And I've got an image of that in my sketchbook. And she basically got the army to blow up a garden shed, and then she recreated it in a gallery, but sort of mid explosion. So you get all these fragments, and it's so dynamic, and yet it's a static object. And I thought, well, I Want to do that in a mechanism. So that's where chaos started. And basically the shape of the case was determined by the shape of the mechanism. And it looks like this kind of tunnel shape, but that's almost sort of a bit like bursting, I guess. And so let's. What's interesting is what I found is that if you've got a really strong concept, like a base idea and you know what it is, the. The object designs itself, my job is to just get out the way, like not have my ego interfere, because there's certain questions that you ask yourself that. And as. And you know, relating back to the main idea. And does it reinforce the idea? Does it complement the idea? Is it even relevant to the idea? And if it is, then the design starts to evolve. And if it's not, then you get rid of it. So, yeah, that was really how that piece came about.
- [38:45]
Scarlett Baker
What's quite fascinating actually, as well, about each, each watch that you've. You've worked on, be it as yourself, as an entity, or with a brand as well, is that the movement and how that caliber is designed doesn't seem to be an afterthought either. You know, you've changed the form of these mechanisms from watch to watch. They take this, you know, they fill the shape of the case. They're are distorted in different ways. Is that something that is essential in your design process? And at sort of what point is there an order, I guess I'm trying to ask you, in which you do approach the design, and at what point does the design of the movement come into that?
- [39:24]
Fiona Kruger
Yeah, I mean, it really depends on the parameters of the project. So, for example, like with this, with the skull pieces, the actual movement itself wasn't. I didn't design the movement and have the movement shaped like a skull. You know, for that collection, I had to buy in a movement or buy in movements. But then they've been adapted so that they really do marry with the skull shape of the watch. So, for example, with the smaller size, I was looking for really beautiful skin, skeletonized movement because I wanted to see the components and I wanted it to be integral to the design. And when I was looking at this mechanism and I turned it basically 90 degrees counterclockwise, so the crown was at 12. I realized that the. The mainspring barrel fit inside one of the eyes. So it. But then, then it, it sort of starts to design itself, right? So then you've got these warbies inside the two eyes and you can see components moving when the watch is on. So it looks like it's alive. And then at the back, the opening on the back of the skull piece is a shape. Like there's a bit of your skull that sort of that shape. So that dictated the shape of the opening, and it's related sort of to the shape of the rotor. So in that instance, I'm not designing the movement, but what I am doing is considering its aesthetic quality, and I'm marrying it within the overall aesthetic of the watch. So there's a reason why. And everything is sort of tied into each other. There was a design that I did for another brand, but because I've signed an nd, I can't sort of say who it was.
- [41:09]
Scarlett Baker
But that damn spoilers on the real time.
- [41:14]
Fiona Kruger
If you want to see the pub, I'll tell you, I'll set up for moves. But with that, it was a case of, okay, we've got this amazing tourbillon movement, and we've got this line of watches, and we'd like to find a way to incorporate the movement into that line of watches. And that, for me, wasn't about redesigning the movement, it was about celebrating it. So I basically took a couple of the. The only sort of one or two things. I was like, it can only be one or two maximum of the line of watches. That was really the identity of that line. And I got rid of everything else and used those elements to basically frame the movement. So when you look at the watch, it's a celebration of the movement with the identity of this other line of watches. So again, it's taking something that already exists and basically just shining a spotlight on it and going, look how amazing this is. So it depends. If within the brief, it's like, we don't want to reinvent the wheel, this is the mechanism, then I'll find a way to celebrate it in the design. And if it's a case of blank page, go for it. Then if there's an opportunity, then I'll do it. Because, like, for example, with a Tasaki piece, it would have been such a missed opportunity, you know, in terms of. I mean, we'd developed this mechanical foundation, I call it. So it's a kind of layout of components, a sort of guts, if you like, that then allows us to create lots of different calibers. And when their project came along, we'd already developed that. And I thought, well, I can come up with something that's really slim, elongated shape and thin if I use what we've developed. And it's a real credit to them that they trusted that process and they were up for doing it. So, you know, when with them it was all about celebrating their heritage, which is pearls and the Pearl Farm. The Pearl Farm structure is this kind of mosaic of elongated rectangles. They've used that shape and the architecture of their flagship boutiques. So it was about taking that same symbol and having it be imbued in the object from the heart, which is the caliber, all the way out to the case. And so having a rectangular shaped movement with rectangular shaped bridges in a rectangular shaped case, you know, for my inner design geek, is unbelievably satisfying.
- [43:49]
Scarlett Baker
Absolutely. I wanted to just ask you quickly. I'm going to have to leave you in the capable hands of Alon in a second. Do you describe yourself as a artist first watch designer second. Do you see them both in tandem? Like. Or how. I don't want to say. How do you define yourself because hey, it's only 10pm on a Tuesday morning. But what do you see your, your voice and your role as?
- [44:14]
Fiona Kruger
Yeah, it's a really interesting one. I mean, I think I just, I think I'm just a creative person and I like making things. I do sort of. I mean, I think if people. People are always a little bit more comfortable with. With labels, which I. Yeah, because it helps people to kind of understand you a little bit better. I guess I would say that I. In my mind, I'm an artist and it's just instead of using clay, now I'm using cogs and wheels and metal. And so that's the approach. So it's a real. There's a kind of ping pong match that goes on in my brain between the sort of design side, which is linked very much to the technical thing, but then the artistic side, which is always about what's the feeling that you're trying to convey here? And you know, what's the effect that you're trying to get? And does that material choice, does it actually give that effect or does it not? Is it. Are there too many details you need to pull it back? Or actually are you wanting to do something that's more intense so you would add more? So all of those are very sort of intuitive feeling qualities that are more associated with being an artist. But then in the work that I do, in terms of horology, you're confronted with real physical things that you need to contend with, which for me are not challenges, they're just opportunities. They're like a kind of framework. And I get to play with the framework. Like, do I stay Inside it? Do I go outside it? Do I push it a bit? Do I shrink it in? So they kind of complement each other.
- [45:54]
Judah Loman Joseph
So Fiona, what's next? What are you working on right now that you can share with us?
- [46:00]
Fiona Kruger
Well, I'm working on, I'm working on a few different projects. One of them is not a watch, it's an object. Mechanical still, but an object. But that. I mean, I'm going to be that annoying guy. You know, when people are like, I can't tell you anything. Like unfortunately, it's just timing, right? I really can't. But once things are coming out, I would be very happy to come back on and share and not be that person that can't talk about anything. But. Yeah. So there's a couple of mechanical objects in the pipeline. Michael, my husband and also my business partner and I were part of the Mechanical Arts Association. So the, the goal of that is really about preserving the know how of the mechanical art. So that encompasses watches, clocks, music boxes, automata. But it's not just about preserving it. It's also about, you know, sort of the evolution of it and making sure that going forward there's a pool of young, new, young talent, but also that there's a vision to make really beautiful, meaningful pieces going forward. So we, we do some work with them as well. I'm still teaching at ecow, so I've just finished a workshop with them, which has been really exciting. And then watch wise, we've got. Well, there's three collections that are in the pipeline. Two of them exist in sketchbooks and one of them is slowly making its way from a sketchbook into kind of cogs and springs and bits of metal. So that's coming up as well.
- [47:53]
Judah Loman Joseph
If I'm not mistaken, you've worked with Philippe Stark.
- [47:57]
Fiona Kruger
I did an internship with Philippe Stark, yeah. When I was doing my master's there was a project that I did for Bakaha. It wasn't me. My whole class did it for them. And that was exhibited during the Milan Design Week. And yeah, Philippe Stark came to the exhibition and he selected myself and two other people from my class to do an internship with him. So I interned there for about three months. I would leave here on a Monday morning, get the train at 5am I'd go to Paris, work in Paris, Monday, Tuesday, get the train back Tuesday night. And then Wednesday morning I'd get the train, go to Lausanne and be the teaching assistant. Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, and then come back on a Friday night. So yeah, busy time.
- [48:46]
Judah Loman Joseph
What did you learn from that? Period.
- [48:49]
Fiona Kruger
It was very interesting because, I mean, the way that they design is very different from the way that I design personally. Right. It's interesting because it's a big machine in terms of influence and importance of projects and the clients that they work with. But it's actually a very intimate, small, highly specialized team. So what I really learned was just from observing like how do they run their business, how do they have client meetings, what kind of things do they propose? There was one lady in the team who, who was more of a. She had more of a sort of creative presence. So she would work on things, you know, like, I don't know, say like a carpet or something like that, where her starting point was, you know, paint and paper and that kind of thing, which was much more what I'm my sort of approach. And the rest of the team are more sort of, you know, doing things on the computer, 3D, you know, very sort of technically, very, very competent. And also there's a, there's an architecture team there as well. So it was about how do they manage the variety of projects and the different approaches more from a business perspective, which was really interesting.
- [50:16]
Judah Loman Joseph
I have so many questions and I'm at several crossroads and I see the clock is literally running away from me. And I love that, that, that discussion about why time is linear or not and how do we perceive it. What blew my mind is I want to touch upon the Tasaki watch you've designed for them. Two things blew my mind is the beauty of it. But when you turn it around and I didn't have it in my hands yet, so virtually I turned it around on videos and you see a shape, movement. So we mean that it's not a round caliber stuck into a rectangular case. It's literally designed for that watch. So I automatically assumed it was a hand wound watch. But then when I start reading it about it, I understood it was the automatic watch. So can you elaborate on that? Because that blew my mind. And the second thing that blew my mind was I believe the lugs are moving on a rectangular watch. So maybe can you elaborate a bit about that design process and your ideas behind it?
- [51:26]
Fiona Kruger
Yeah, yeah, yeah, sure. I've tried for such a long time to find a mechanical automatic movement that was small and slim in terms of proportion. And I never found anything. It was absolutely impossible. And every movement manufacturer that I went to, when I would talk about a small movement, you know, no shade, this does go back a few years, but still I would ask about small movements and they the response I would get is, oh, you must mean women's movements. And then they would show me courts options, and I would say, no, no, I'm looking for mechanical and small. And they say, oh, well, we don't make anything sort of small, mechanical and automatic for women. And I was thinking, but it's irrelevant whether it's for women or not for women. I'm just talking about scale and proportion here. So it took me a while, but there was one company who I'd visited, and then I was thinking about this, and then their name popped back up in conversation, and I thought, I'm actually going to reach out to them again. And I was speaking to them, and they'd sort of designed a couple of things which were smaller. And what people don't realize is that just going down in scale to make small mechanical movements, it becomes exponentially more difficult to produce. So let's say a very easy example is just from a watchmaker and assembly point of view, the components in a normal caliber are already really small. These are absolutely tiny. It means that the tolerances are also exponentially smaller, which means that the level of precision needs to be much higher. You know, if. If you're producing components and, you know, some of them are being, say they're being laser cut or they're being CNC'd or, you know, or there's finishing that's done by hand. There does come a point where you just. You butt up against the laws of physics and you physically cannot go smaller, but you want to. So there's a level of difficulty there, even for what's considered, quote unquote, a simple caliber. So it takes an expert company to be able to do that. And when I was having a look at what they did, I thought, well, I think based on what you've already done, we could develop something which is mechanical and automatic. And they were. They had the capability to do it because they had all of the ingredients there. So that's basically where that design for this kind of mechanical foundation came from. And when Tasaki approached us with the project, their only brief was, we'd like something in a different shape. And we think something maybe squarish would be interesting. And I thought to myself, well, why would you do a watch that's in that kind of a shape? And I really needed a good reason why. And I remembered from our visits to their pearl farms, this kind of mosaic, this floating mosaic of rectangles which makes up the pearl farm. And I just thought, oh, my gosh, this rectangular shape is just inherent within your DNA. So the watch is basically always been there. I've just kind of, I guess, revealed it. And yeah, so that, that was really how that came about. And the fact that the mechanism is automatic for me is important. Sometimes you have to sort of fight for that because it would be easier for it not to be. But personally, I think if I was a buyer, there's something in that that I appreciate. And then also from a design point of view, it adds the possibility to animate the watch. So that's what we did with the Tasaki piece, is that the rotor is dial side. So you're animating this watch face, which would otherwise be static, but without adding any sort of complication. It's just by the fact that there's this component that moves. And on the version where we've done a mother of pearl dial is one piece of mother of pearl. So when the watch is at rest, so when you're looking at it and the rotor isn't moving, all of the veins of the mother of pearl line up. And then when you're obviously moving your wrist and the rotor's moving, then the light hits the rotor differently and it looks amazing. And that was also just about celebrating the materiality and the beauty of, of the mother of pearl. So that's really where that, where that came from in terms of the mechanical automatic caliber.
- [55:59]
Judah Loman Joseph
Really, I love it. If our dear listeners want to obtain your watches, the first two collections are available on your website. And please tell us where else in the world. Obviously the Tasaki piece, I assume is exclusive to them or do they have besides their own boutiques and e boutique, also retailers. So where can we obtain all these watches, Fiona?
- [56:22]
Fiona Kruger
Yeah, so with a Tasaki piece, it is best to reach out to Tasaki directly. So they sell through their own boutiques, but they also do work with partners, more so in Japan. I mean, you know, they've been making the most extraordinary jewelry. I mean, genuinely, if people are interested in design, please check out their jewelry. It's incredible. So they, they've been doing that for like 70 years. Watches, they want to do it well and do it properly, but it's a new. It's a new aspect of their business. So at the moment, the watches are available in Japan in their flagship boutiques. There's a collaboration that we did together initially. So that's available in the flagship boutiques, which are in London and Tokyo. There's a new potential flagship boutique opening up soon, I believe as well. So they'll be available somewhere else and Then the current face of Tosaki pieces are available currently in Japan exclusively. And then they'll roll it out, I'd say, over the next year or so. And then for our pieces, yep, it's directly through us. So, Fiona Kruger.com we have a network of partners who we work with. So if you're based, you know, somewhere else in the world, if you reach out to us and we have a partner in your area, then we'll link you up with. With that person. So it's a network of retailers and, you know, kind of independent specialists as well. So, yeah, if you go to Fiona Kruger.com, you can have a look at what we've got and then please feel free to reach out.
- [58:04]
Judah Loman Joseph
Do you either exhibit or attend fairs, Watch fairs where people can either meet you and. Or your creations?
- [58:13]
Fiona Kruger
We. We do and we don't. So I do. But a bit like this is going to sound very strange, probably, but you know the singer Adele, of course. Right. So what I loved about her, I mean, apart from she's got the most amazing voice, but she makes an album, you don't know she's doing it, she's working and then the album's ready, she presents the album and then once she's presented the album, she goes away again and she's living her life and working. And so we tend to sort of be like that. Like, we'll be at events if and when we've got something to show and something to share. And when we're in a period where we're working, then we're not. So that's why it's not like, oh, every year we do Geneva watch days, or every year we do this. It's really when we've got something ready and we'd like to share it with people, then we'll attend. So we've been really fortunate. I mean, back in the day, we did Baselworld a few times and that was with all of the other independents. So that was a really nice atmosphere. Geneva Watch Days. I mean, usually if we're. If we're not exhibiting, we'll go as visitors. So I tend to sort of go a bit incognito, but yeah, we'll potentially be at Geneva Watch Days this year and then we're looking at maybe doing something in the States at some point as well, because we haven't been there in a while. So. Yeah. But if. If we are traveling and exhibiting, if you check out the Instagram, we'll post things on Instagram to let people know what we're doing.
- [59:53]
Judah Loman Joseph
Thank you so much. Fiona's handle is her first and last name. So ionacruger, I want to thank you so so much for sitting down with us. I will blame Skarlz later for not giving me more space, but I kind of knew what I signed up to. I really hope to welcome you back. Good luck on all the endeavors for the upcoming year and thank you dear listeners for listening to this episode. You can find all our previous episodes on our official website www.therealtime.show and on Instagram you can find us herealtime.show. if you want to support the show, please subscribe, like rate and share it with your friends. If you have any questions, feedback and or criticism, please do send us a message. You can also DM us. If you want to join the TRTS community, you can find Scarlett on the gram via s c a r l I n t h e s h I r e scarl in the Shire. David is at d a b a u c h e r Rob at r o b n u d dds and me you can find. If you prefer to send us an email, you can just add our first name to our handle at therealtime Show. Stay sane and keep on ticking. Thank you Fiona.
- [61:24]
Fiona Kruger
Thank you. Honestly, it was such a pleasure. Thanks so much.
- [61:27]
Judah Loman Joseph
Cheers.
- [61:36]
Fiona Kruger
Sa.