Episode 143 - Interview with Tom Clemence of Clemence Watches

Published on Wed, 21 Jul 2021 21:05:00 -0700

Synopsis

This is a conversation between Andrew, Everett (co-hosts of the 40 and 20 watch podcast), and Tom Clements, the founder of Clements Watches. Tom shares the story behind his inspiration for starting his watch brand, which involves his late grandfather's passion for adventure and his World War II diary that was unfortunately lost. Tom then discusses the design process and features of his debut watch, the Photic Diver, touching on elements like the domed sapphire bezel, quick-release strap, and environmentally conscious initiatives like planting a tree for each watch sold. The conversation also covers Tom's background as an ecologist specializing in bats, his love for outdoor adventures like kayaking, and his personal watch collection.

Transcript

Speaker
Andrew Hello fellow watch lovers, nerds, enthusiasts, or however you identify. You're listening to 40 and 20, the Watch Clicker podcast with your host Andrew and my good friend Everett here. We talk about watches, food, drinks, life, and other things we like. Everett, how are you? I'm great. You know why I'm so good? Why are you so good? Cause gompf is domp and you about to drink a beer.
Everett Uh, yeah, no, I'm good. Cause I am really excited. There's two beers in front of me.
Andrew Ah, you know what you didn't do?
Everett Oh, tell me.
Andrew You didn't bring a bottle opener.
Everett But there's bottle openers around here.
Andrew I even opened it. I even opened it and prepped it for you.
Everett Yes, I've got a bottle. I've got a large bottle, a pint bottle. Is this what you call a pint? So I've got a pint bottle of Pliny the Elder. You do? You're welcome. From the Russian River Brewing Company. As you know, not quite the official beer of the show at this point, but as close of unofficial beers we have, right?
Andrew I mean, I think we've probably drank more Bush Light on this show than anything else.
Everett Bush Light cannot be the official beer of anything. It's the official sponsor of this show. And then I've got a bottle of Ale Song. Ale Song is a local farmhouse brewery here in town, which is just absolutely to die for.
Andrew Yeah, it's fantastic. They are a very vineyard feeling, very fruit inspired, French inspired farmhouse ales.
Everett Wealthy hippies making wild yeasted beers.
Andrew Yes, and I went there today. Not to the territorial one, but to the one in 5th Street Market. When you were working or just? No, I went there to drink.
Everett There was a call at the Ale Song?
Andrew No, I went there to drink today for my friend's birthday. I got a flight and I had one of these.
Everett You had one of these? Not the whole thing. I had a taster of it. The Ale Song beer I have is a farmhouse Cuvée, which is a farmhouse ale aged in French and American oak barrels. It's delightful. Delightful. Yes. So, I'm going to, I mean, which do you think I should do first?
Andrew I'd do Pliny first because, because ale song can, ale song's going to last longer. I'm concerned by how long that Pliny has been not consumed.
Andrew It's been dark. It's fine. It's a month though. It's dry hop. You're going to lose some of the brightness. The alpha acids are melting. Andrew, how are you? I'm good. I got a little bit of sleepies because it's a little late on a Sunday, and Sundays I'm a bit of a crumudgeon, more than usual, because I worked into the early hours of this morning. But good, I went to Alesong today, had a flight of beers, it was delicious. I got the, well, not done, I got a lot of work done today on my benchtop. It's pretty close to flattened level, Feeling good. Also, had a taste of Highland Park 18 today. Ooh wee. Yeah, so I have a friend group and every year for our birthdays, we all pitch in and get a bottle. And like two months, right after my birthday, which is dog shit, it was proposed that we stop pitching in like 20 bucks and start pitching in like 50 bucks. 50 to 75 bucks. Yeah. Because there's six of us that are pitching in. You can get some damn fine bottles at that price point. So this was our first little bit more spendier purchase birthday that came up. So we got Highland Park 18, got a little taste of it and it was... And you drank that today?
Everett A little bit. Yeah, just a little taster. And you drank...
Andrew Alesong. Yeah, we drank it at Alesong. We gave it to him there and we just, we broke it open at the table, which you're probably not supposed to do, definitely. But we did it anyway because of America.
Everett America. Exactly. And also, and also, and also Highland Park, which is in the UK. Yeah. Do you know what else is in the UK?
Andrew Place. I mean, a lot of things.
Everett Well, there's this guy. The Tour de France. There's this guy I know. There's this guy I know really well. We go way back. Named Tom Clements, who started a watch company called Clements Watches, and he's in the UK. You know where else he is? He's here.
Andrew At least in our ears.
Everett Hi, Tom.
Tom Clements Hey, guys. How's it going?
Everett It's going really well, man. How are you? Good.
Tom Clements Yeah, yeah. Fantastic. Really good. Thank you. Really happy to be here.
Andrew So glad you came. Not all the way. You're in your living room. We're really glad to have that.
Tom Clements Yeah.
Everett Yeah, it's close enough. It's close enough to see and hear you, Tom. It is just after ten o'clock here in the evening. We're drinking beer. It is just after six a.m. in Edinburgh. I think you may be drinking something alcoholic.
Tom Clements That's right. Yeah, this is definitely the earliest I've ever started drinking probably in my life. But I thought, you know, when in Rome, why not just go for it? So, yeah, I've I've just poured myself a few fingers of Jura, which is a nice Scotch whiskey made over in the in the Hebrides in Scotland. So I thought I'd have a have a little drink of that with you guys.
Andrew Fantastic. I loved seeing the top of the bottle. I was like, I know exactly what's happening.
Everett Well, I was a little surprised, but but but happy for it. So so it's Monday morning there. Are you going to go to work later?
Tom Clements I will be. Yes. So I don't start work for for a couple of hours yet. So I think I'll have time for for a drink and then actually work out of my system and I'll be fresh and ready to start the working day.
Everett You know, I'm a, I'm an attorney. So I regularly drink during the workday. Andrew is a cop. I don't drink during the workday.
Andrew He does not ever. So I also drink at weird hours. I like when I take and take watch pictures with a beer in the background at eight in the morning, people like, that's weird. I'm like, it's my 8pm.
Everett What do you want to go to bed?
Andrew Yeah, like it's bedtime. But when I sold beer, I used to drink all day. Yeah.
Tom Clements Yeah, well, part of the job, right?
Andrew It very much was. I'd carry bottles around and we would sample bottles at bars and it's 10 a.m., but we've got to try this. Yeah, it's our responsibility.
Tom Clements I've got to say, actually, I kind of having not cracked open a whiskey before 6 a.m., I wasn't sure how it would go down. But yeah, it's going down smooth.
Everett It works for breakfast.
Tom Clements Surprisingly, yeah, yeah.
Andrew So you're going to have the best day of your life today, too. You're going to win the lottery, all kinds of shit. I'm like, I got whiskey first thing in the morning.
Everett So, Tom, you were just explaining to us that you're a huge, tremendous fan of 40 and 20, that you listen to every episode. That's right. I may be exaggerating just a little bit there. So you're here, but we're here to talk about you because you are the owner of a brand new baby watch company.
Tom Clements I sure am. Yeah. Yeah. Clements watches. Um, so yeah, we are, we, as you say, we're, you know, we're brand new. Um, we're, uh, we're a new startup, uh, micro brand, um, as, as we would discuss, you know, based over here in the UK, um, in, uh, in Edinburgh.
Everett And how was my pronunciation by the way?
Tom Clements Your pronunciation has been fantastic.
Everett Edinburgh.
Tom Clements Yeah. Yeah. There's been no Edinburgh's. No nothing else. It's it's you've nailed it.
Andrew Your sound's a little harder on the end. That last syllable more. Oh yeah.
Everett But I can't do those sounds. I can't do those sounds. Edinburgh.
Tom Clements Well, you know, I'm not a local guy. So, you know, for all I know, I could be where there could be Scottish listeners on who are saying I'm I'm also saying it wrong. I'm actually from from England as as you may be able to tell from the lack of a Scottish accent.
Everett You sound very English.
Tom Clements And that's right. Yeah. Yeah. So I'm from from East Anglia. I don't know. I don't know how how are you guys know England, but just from the TV show Vikings.
Andrew Yeah, I was going to say we.
Tom Clements Yeah. That's it. That's that's that's where I'm from originally. And, you know, dotted myself around the UK a little bit, spent some time living in Wales as well. And yeah, most recently settled in Scotland and absolutely love it here.
Andrew What was the detour to Wales about?
Tom Clements That was for university. Okay. So that's where I studied my undergrad in a small town called Aberystwyth, which again, just a fantastic part of the world to spend three years in studying. It's a small student town with not a lot else around it, but it's the type of place where everyone knows each other. So it's a fun place to spend some time as a student for sure.
Everett And in Wales, is all of the education done in English or do they have Welsh speaking schools as well?
Tom Clements Yeah, no, they absolutely do. They have they have Welsh speaking schools and classes and all sorts. And the the university that I was at and the course that I was on was well, the course that I was on was in English. There were Welsh courses at ABBA as far as I know. We colloquially, ABBA is shortened to ABBA just because it's such a mouthful.
Everett And it sounds fun to say, like the band.
Tom Clements Yeah, exactly. Exactly. Yeah. You do sometimes get funny looks, though. You kind of like think people, people think you've gone off on a weird tangent. We're still talking about Wales.
Everett Well, very good. So Andrew's got a question. Should we dive right into it? Well, yeah, I actually I think that there's a better place to start here, Andrew. I've got a plan. Are you OK with it? Can you trust me? I trust you. Put your hand in mine.
Andrew Uh, you didn't hear the clasping of hands, but they were, they were classed.
Everett So I think that there's a fun place to start here. I don't know where we're going to go with this. I don't know, uh, if this is going to lead to anything or just, and, and then transition to something else. However, uh, so Andrew, a few months ago, got the Rona. I did. He got COVID and when he got COVID, he was sick. and we did some remote episodes. And then he got better, and he was no longer contagious. But for another, what, four to six weeks?
Andrew Yeah, I was sick for two and a half months.
Everett He had laryngitis, which I don't know if it's technically laryngitis, but the same symptoms. It was something, yeah. And so he talked like this. Like Batman, yeah. And we called him Batman. And then listeners nice listeners wrote in and said, well, that's kind of hubristic. He sounds more like Will Arnett, Lego Batman at best. And that was very fair at the time. With that said, I think we've got an actual Batman here on the show today.
Andrew Oh, look what you've done.
Everett You've been unseated as Batman, Andrew. So, Tom, you are still Robin, though. You are a professional ecologist and actually a specialist in bats. Is that correct?
Tom Clements That's right. Wow. You guys have done your homework.
Everett I'm impressed. That's how we roll, man. That's why we make the big bucks, Tom.
Tom Clements Yeah. No, that's right. I am, I suppose, a Batman. Yeah. So I'm an ecologist, an ecological consultant. And what that means is that I spend a lot of my waking hours surveying and studying the UK wildlife and botany. And a big component of that is indeed bats. So over here, I don't know what the kind of the laws are over in the States, but in the UK they're heavily protected. So we put a lot of effort into making sure that we kind of do the right thing by this little species group. And yeah, I spend a lot of time kind of shining torches into dark crevices, trying to find bats.
Andrew Yeah. Are you looking for colonies and tracking colony growth? I mean, what does that entail? Because your specialty being bats, I mean, there's a lot of upstream and downstream effects. And I think bats are kind of an indicator species, right? I mean, from my understanding of where they fit in an ecosystem. So what does that look like in your day-to-day surveying? I mean, yeah, I'm curious.
Tom Clements Yeah, yeah. So I mean, you're right, they are an indicated species, you know, you don't get bats without good habitats nearby, because that's what they need to sustain themselves, normally of the invertebrate population. So when we're surveying for bats, it will normally be, if something's going to happen to that habitat, then we need to make sure that if there are bats there, then they're suitably protected. So we'll be looking for normally for roosts of bats. So and the roost of a bat, or bat roosts, can really vary. They can be just from one bat to, you know, you can have hundreds of thousands of them in one place. And they can go in all sorts of different types of places as well. So trees, caves, lofts, pretty much anywhere that's dark and quiet, then you could get a bat. And so, yeah, our job is to us to go out and to make sure that if they are there, then we're either timing the work to avoid any impact and mitigating for it appropriately or or just if the best thing is if we can just avoid doing that particular bit of work and normally find a solution, you know, a way around it.
Everett And so do you work then for a developer?
Tom Clements So, yeah, I mean, it's not always developers. It can be a real range of different people. I'd say the day-to-day work is indeed for developers, but we do work for engineering firms as well and also sometimes just private householders who are just, you know, it can be something as ordinary as just wanting to extend their house. We'll just come in and help make sure that they do things right.
Everett So ecological consultant is essentially what you do.
Tom Clements That's exactly my title. Yeah. Yeah, absolutely.
Everett Nailed it.
Andrew Look at you. So not Batman consultant.
Everett Well, but also Batman. Yeah. That's the subtitle. So it says it says Tom Clements ecological consultant per Batman. Yeah, that's right.
Andrew Do all of your coworkers have specified a field of expertise or do you just focus on bats because that's a passion? Like that's just kind of where you landed.
Tom Clements Yeah.
Everett No, I mean... Well, you've spent some... Hold on. So you've spent some time volunteering specifically with bats before you were an ecologist, correct?
Tom Clements Yeah, that's right. Yeah. So when I was studying down in Plymouth, which is on the south coast of England, I got involved with quite a number of different bat groups. Me and my girlfriend, Alison, we kind of just did everything that we could to get as much experience, because in the UK, that's kind of what you need to get into the ecology field. But it's not just bats that we do. You know, we do all sorts of other things. Badgers, great crested newts, so kind of amphibians, things like that, and also botany. And that's kind of another big passion of mine. So I spend a lot of time looking at plants and getting quite nerdy about all the details.
Andrew How often do you come across wild hedgehogs?
Tom Clements Pretty, well, less frequently than maybe we would have once, but I actually came across one last week.
Andrew What kind of question is that? God, so fucking cool. Can you imagine seeing a hedgehog in the wild?
Everett I mean, I guess not. But what kind of question is that?
Andrew He's out. He's out. He lives in works outside of nature. He's coming. He's talking about badgers. All right. I appreciate it. I'm curious about how you come across a wild hedgehog because that's a bizarre thing to exist in the wild.
Everett You know, Tom, I'm an attorney. And one time I had a meeting with some new clients. I'd never met them before. They're developing a business. That's all I know. It's these it's these kids. They're developing a business or I don't even know their kids. I just have a meeting with a group of guys. They're developing a business. They want to just do basic set They come in. Well, so I go out to the lobby. I'm just walking by the lobby and I see we're in Eugene, Oregon. If you're in the United States, you may, you know, or even internationally, maybe shut. I don't know. Eugene's got a reputation. We're a hippie town who loves to run. In our downtown area specifically, there's a tremendous homeless population and just riffraff. There's a thing called the Eugene Country Fair here, which attracts people from all over the country. So every summer we get this influx to our downtown area of vagrants and travelers, right? So some homeless population that just comes with them, but also just people who are van life people or whatever, right? Yeah. Um, and so I had walked by the lobby. I knew this meeting was coming up and there's a bunch of like, there's a bunch of like, uh, homeless people in the lobby, like skateboards and dreadlocks and they're dirty. And I'm, you know, it's just, it's a law office and I'm thinking, Oh gosh, what's happening here? Why is this happening? And so I walk up just to check Rinda are very sweet. Uh, and wonderful receptionist is talking to these folks. And I just sort of walk by just to like, not just to be there, right? Like just provide support. And, um, she looks at me and she goes, Oh, Everett, your two o'clock is here. And so, and it's these guys, it's the hobos are my two o'clock. And these guys were professional ecologists, right? They were PhD. One of them was a PhD students. Two of them had just graduated. They're geniuses, right? They're like, uh, like knowledgists. One of them's a like knowledge. Uh, you know, one of them sort of like a more general herbologist, they're just geniuses and they're setting up this incredibly, they've got like two and a half million dollars of VC and they're setting up this business to do, you know, testing. Anyway, it was like, okay, I'm at, I'm at a point in my life where I have to reconfigure my expectations for what people are and what they look like. And It was a great learning moment.
Andrew Because those are people who get two and a half million dollars in VC. Yeah, that's right.
Tom Clements That's right. Yeah. No, that's that's fair. Ecologists, we often do look like we've just been dragged through a hedge because we have.
Everett That's right.
Tom Clements Literally.
Andrew Yeah. So wild hedgehogs, man, that's blowing me away.
Everett Watches, Tom. So at some point you're sitting at your desk or perhaps walking through a heavily forested, undeveloped area. And you think to yourself, the time has come. I'm going to do it. How do you get there?
Andrew No, I want to hear before you, the time has come. All right. Let's get the buildup. Let's let's find the, where's the spark for the idea come. And then when you like draw it, like just let's hear that, that trajectory.
Tom Clements Yeah. Okay. So, I mean, I often kind of sit and kind of wonder, where it was that this first really started for me. And, you know, there are so many different strings that I could pull out to try and kind of explain how we ended up at this point. But I think, you know, watches have always been there for me. I've always worn them and I've always loved them. You know, there's a story that I've told on my about page, which is probably the best kind of way to tell the story, which is when I was growing up, my dad, he would tell me stories. about my late, my late Papa Tom. So I should explain. So I'm Tom, Papa Tom. And my dad also is Tom, but it goes by his middle name.
Andrew Are you the third then?
Tom Clements So yeah, yeah. Okay. I'm the third, the third, the third, the third Tom in my family. And yeah, you know, my Papa Tom, he had passed away, my dad was a young man. And so my dad You know, he wasn't able to be an adult with his father and he didn't get to know kind of that side of the man that you get to know as you grow up. And life kind of interjected at points along the way. There's been a lifetime of experiences and lessons that's kind of led to this point. And watches have always been there for me. And I think, you know, So I've always had this passion growing up. And I've always been a tinkerer. You know, as a kid, I was forever taking apart pens and remote controls and things like that. And the only the only trouble was I never quite learned how to put them back together as a young kid. But who does? Yeah. Yeah. Fortunately, I've solved that problem now. But yeah, so I was a tinkerer and I was always designing and making things. And I think I must have been kind of six or seven years old. And I pulled pulled the wardrobe out from from from the corner of my bedroom. And that became my workshop. That was my kind of that was my dream. I just wanted to be a guy who made and tinkered with things. And kind of alongside that, as a young young child, you know, my dad would tell me stories about his late his late father, my Papa Tom. And, you know, my Papa Tom had had a had an interesting life that was unfortunately cut short. But he had served overseas in India during World War Two. And during his time out there, he kept a daily diary of all of his experiences. And he was out there for, I think, six or so years. So a long old time. And to the point where when he came back, he was in his early 20s. And his mother, you know, didn't recognize him when he knocked on the front door.
Everett Oh, my goodness.
Tom Clements Wow. It's just you can't imagine it, can you? Today, it's just absolutely bonkers. And yeah, so, you know, he, he saw a lot out there, but he also, he also did a lot whilst he was out there. And when he did have leave, he would go to places like the Taj Mahal and, um, and things like that. And, and, you know, not to, not to say that it was a good time, but, you know, he had some interesting stories to tell for sure.
Everett Adventures, experiences.
Tom Clements Yeah, absolutely. And then, and then later in life, once he was home as a young man, still, he, um, he lived in, in Northern England, um, near the Lake District and he would on the weekend he would take his old kind of 50s motorcycle with his with his brother Harold and they would go off and just have adventures on the weekends just on their bikes just cruising around and it just it sounded like a fantastic time and my dad would tell me these stories as as I was growing up and it just brought Papa Tom to life for me because you know we'd we'd never met him but my dad was determined to make us feel as though we had met him we had known him and I think I always kind of admire that about about my dad when I was growing up, he kind of really instilled that kind of value of family within us when he was telling us those stories. And you know, I mentioned pop Tom kept these diaries, and he'd put them away in safekeeping in a trunk in his in his family home. And, and years later, he came to retrieve them. And they're in his in this trunk with his arm uniform and a few other bits and bobs. And unfortunately, unbeknownst to him, his mum, years prior to this, had donated this trunk with all his war memorabilia to the British Red Cross. And so all those stories just, yeah, all these stories just disappeared kind of into nothingness. And it was just the man himself that was left to tell them. Unfortunately, he wasn't able to because of his early passing. And so, you know, my dad had a handful of his mementos that he would always keep at hand. It was a photo of him and my Nana, which is in fact the only one that I believe they have. A few of his war medals and his Universal Geneva watch. And, you know, I didn't really understand the significance of this at the time. I just knew that it was my Papa Tom's and I just loved it. I was fascinated by this thing. And I think that's really where the spark that you mentioned, Andrew, I think that's where it comes from. Absolutely. And, you know, Years later, you know, skip forward a couple of decades. Here I am. I'm a, I'm a, I'm a kind of fully grown adult. And, um, and I'm, I'm kind of out in the world being an ecologist and, and I've got all these other passions and interests. I'm a serial hobbyist like, like yourselves and weird.
Everett Yeah. That's a huge surprise.
Tom Clements That's a huge surprise. And 18 months ago, you know, this, this thing happened when the world, um, suddenly changed and we found ourselves with a bit of extra time on my hands. Not because I was furloughed or anything like that, I was still working, but because you couldn't go anywhere. So one evening I just kind of sat myself down in the garden and I just decided to start sketching. And I sketched a watch and I thought, hey, you know, this looks pretty cool. I really like this. And it developed and it developed and there's been an uncountable number of iterations and prototypes. And, um, you know, sort of about 18 months later, here we are, I've kind of developed Clements watches and the design, which is the photic diver. And, um, you know, it's, it's nothing groundbreaking. I'm not disrupting the industry here, but, um, it's something that I am immensely proud of. And it's something that I thought, Hey, I love it. So let's try and share it with the community. So, um, yeah, that's, that's what I'm here to try and do.
Everett Well, tell, so, so first that's, that's a fun, that's a super fun story. It's an excellent story. I love to hear about, you know, the inspirations that people have, you know, sometimes they're, sometimes they're, you know, inspirations professional or, or they're, they're, you know, inspiration, someone who touched them in their life that, that maybe is surprising. I love hearing about this person brought to life. for you as a child, I think that's a ton of fun. And the memento or the token of that, of that being this universal Geneve watch. Before we move on, can you tell us what the watch was? I assume it's just a 40s, 50s, UG watch as Andrew call it. It's a watch. Yeah.
Tom Clements That's right. Yeah. I mean, I know relatively little about it other than that it is a UG. It's, you know, it's a, 60s style kind of dress watch. It's got a fantastic, very thin gold case, hand wound, and this lovely domed kind of acrylic crystal. And it's just, you know what, I'm annoyed because it's over in the other room. I should have had it for you to see, but it's, yeah, it's just a very simple watch, but it's something that I imagine that Poppeton would have had on his wrist. You know, it was a time where watch collecting wasn't a thing, people had one watch and that one watch went with them. And so, you know, he would have lived his life with this on his wrist. You know, I'm not naive enough to think that he would have taken this gold dress watch out to India with him by any means. But you don't know that.
Everett Yeah, you don't know that. Right. Well, that's the thing that people did. So, UG, actually one of my very, very favorite watch brands, you know, Universal did everything from kind of out there casework to really somber, uh, ascetic casework. Uh, but you know, when you look back at the UG designs, I think that there's so much that we draw from today, you know, Omega draws from UG, uh, all the time. Uh, you know, and nobody really, you know, recognizes it or nobody verbally recognizes that, I guess. Right. Um, you know, but, but, the, you know, the pole router dive watches, they have this beautiful asymmetric case. And I just love, I love everything they do. So, uh, you'll have to send us a picture. Uh, you'll have to send us a picture of this watch.
Tom Clements Yeah, absolutely.
Everett Yeah. And so the photodiver let's talk about it because yeah, you, you're sitting on your back porch and you're sketching a watch and you come up with a pretty darn cool.
Andrew Yeah.
Everett A pretty darn cool idea. So, so, so as you say, You're not disrupting the industry. This is not a... Our good friend, D.U. Wu of Solus Watches is also not disrupting the industry, but doing kind of out there things. I think you're taking a much more conservative approach, but we're not seeing this watch often. So tell us a little bit about what you were aiming for, what you're trying to do, and the specific decisions you made to make this your watch, the Photic Diver.
Tom Clements Sure, sure. So I guess a lot of the style of the Photic is, well, it's something I designed. It comes from me. It's got an element of kind of vintage aesthetic to it, some charm, I like to think. But it's It's understated. Most importantly, it's not flashy. It's not kind of this big blingy time piece. It's a, it's a 39 millimeter vintage skewed dive watch. And, um, you know, it's got this fantastic thin Sapphire bezel on it, which, um, uh, I just, I'm in love with.
Andrew Um, and, uh, I dig that this, this is, this is skin diver with just the right updates. At least in my mind. I mean, the first time I looked at it when, I think first time I saw it was Mike sent us a picture of it when he was reviewing it. And I was like, Ooh, this, this is, this is what I'm looking for in that very vintage inspired, but updated dive watch.
Tom Clements Yeah. Thank you. Thanks. Yeah. I mean, you know, the, the design I, I, we, we all know that the famous vintage, watches, you know, your Amigas, your Rolexes, things like that. And I think they are gorgeous. And you see a lot of watches coming out that pay homage to those designs. But while I didn't want to do that, I didn't want to just replicate an existing design. And I didn't want to kind of piggyback too much on existing ideas. And so I guess I've kind of amalgamated some of my favorite design aspects from half a dozen maybe more vintage watches. And that's what we've kind of ended up here with.
Everett There's some Blancpain. I see. I see a little bit of Blancpain here. Yeah, for sure. Right.
Tom Clements Yeah. Yeah, absolutely.
Everett A little bit. A little bit of Explorer even.
Andrew Yeah. It feels kind of Explorey like. Yeah.
Everett Well, so walk us through your initial walk through your initial vision for this thing, because I'm always curious about that. You know, watch design, I think, is just like so many other things, but especially in 2021, or I guess 2020 designing a watch, um, you know, we've just come through probably the modern golden age of grassroots watch design. Right. Uh, and, and whether or not we're through that or not is maybe, uh, we're in it, we're in it in any event. So, um, And people attack that from a lot of different angles, but at some point you have to sit down and say, this, this is what I'm doing. And so I'm curious about the, the, this in, in for you as you're designing this watch, what was the, this, what are you trying to do here?
Tom Clements Yeah. So, I mean, it's going back to going back to my Papa Tom's universal Geneva and, and vintage watches as a whole, you know, I've, I've had a handful over the years and they are things to just behold because the details that these older watches have are just fascinating to me. Things like, it's something you don't see very often these days, but domed dials. I just love the way that they play with the light. Nice. And so that was really important to me to have that included within the design aesthetic of the watch, this very gentle dome to the dial. And I knew that I wanted to have numerals, but also some just kind of ordinary markers. And so that's that's what we've gone for. And that's kind of I guess that's where the Explorer flavor comes from, shall we say. Sure. And, you know, I just wanted to create a watch that that was that was for the kind of the modern person, you know, guy or girl, because it's a 39 millimeter case, so it can be worn by whoever. It's not too big. And yeah, I just wanted to make something that was going to be able to stand up to the rigors of every day. It's, you know, it's a common story, you know, people, people love vintage watches, but they don't love to wear them because they're worried. And that's exactly me. You know, I, when I was early, early on in my kind of watch collecting times, I went through the classic phases. I had a Seiko 5, SKX, et cetera, et cetera. And my Seiko 5, I went through three crystals on that. And it wasn't because I mistreated it. Well, maybe I did. It's because I like to wear my watches when I do things and I like to keep active. I like to adventure and I like to explore. And that means that sometimes things get broken and it means that you definitely can't wear a vintage watch.
Everett Yeah, you shouldn't. Not when you're playing, right?
Tom Clements Yeah, for sure. Because, God, that would hurt. That's really what I wanted to do. And I wanted to create a watch that could go the distance with me. And I looked around and I saw an infinite selection of beautiful watches, both micro brand, luxury and kind of entry level. But, you know, there was always this little detail, you know, oh, it's great, but I wish I drew the lugs or it's fantastic, but it's a bit too thick, whatever. And I just thought, hey, you know, let's other people are doing it. And, and, and I'm, I'm, I'm someone that loves a good challenge. You know, I will, I will sit down and I'll invest hours and hours and hours of my time to get good at something. And so I thought, you know, why not invest my time in doing this? So that's what I did.
Andrew And how'd you land at a dive watch?
Tom Clements Ah, good question. Yeah. I mean, I just love the aesthetic of dive watch.
Everett Come on.
Tom Clements I mean, when the Tudor Black Bay 58 came out, I just kind of, saw that i was just like lusting after it because it's it's gorgeous and i think that the the the very premise of a dive watch is it's a tool you know it's something that's that's rugged it's hard it's it's gonna it's not gonna break on you and it can go anywhere um but some dive watches can also fit really nicely under the cuff you know you can wear them for work you can wear them when you're out for drinks you can wear them when you're doing anything and those bezel those rotating bezels that dive watches have i just think are so practical they're so useful you know I on a classic three hander with with no bezel I think they are gorgeous fantastic styles of watches but I just love the practicality of having that bezel mostly to time pasta or eggs you know whatever yeah the soft-boiled the soft-boiled egg timer as we as we as we like to refer to that's why we have slide rules yeah
Everett So talk us through some of the specific elements. I think in particular, you know, dials are dials, right? You can do a hundred different things with a dial and by and large, they operate the same, you know, whether there's Arabic numerals or markers or lozenge markers or, you know, it sort of doesn't matter, right? But with bezels, I think that we see a lot of different functionality.
Andrew Yeah, we see a huge functionality. I think that's really where watches separate themselves from the pack and how they execute what that bezel is going to be made of, the finishing and texture on the bezel, the shape of the bezel. And yeah, so that's kind of where I was going with this dive watch question.
Everett I have curiosity. And you've done a couple of interesting things with this bezel, right? Two in particular in my head, but I'll let you tell the story. And if you don't get to it, I'll ask you.
Tom Clements Sure. Yeah. So I guess, you know, when I used to browse eBay trying to find affordable vintage dive watches, And I used to come across a lot of squalas with these amazing bakelite bezels, which I just thought just look gorgeous. Yeah, they're always cracked. And they because they're not because it's bakelite. Yeah, sure. And then they're not they're not durable. And, and so that's where I just thought, you know, what's the modern solution to this? It's Sapphire, of course. So here we are. I I set out and I designed the watch with a with a dome sapphire bezel. And it's nice and thin which just kind of you get this ring of polished metal around it which catches the light fantastically as a part of the bezel design. And then I guess the second thing that you guys are probably alluding to is the fact that it's It's got no numbers on it, right?
Everett It's got no numbers. It's a it's a countdown timer. It's a decompression bezel. It's a I mean, it's what it's all of them. It's a 12 hour dual time. It's really whatever you want it to be. I love that, you know, and it's sort of it breaks down. We hear a lot of people talk about what, you know, Mike reviewed a watch recently, and I'm not going to say what it is just because A, I sort of disagreed with him, but also because, you know, we don't need to call out companies or trash other watches. But he said, you know, to us, and I don't think he said this in his review. I don't know. But he said, the bezel's borderline useless. Like, this bezel is useless. But with that said, it looks amazing. It just looks cool and neat. And like, what do you really need this thing to do? And the answer is, you just need to be able to locate the 12 o'clock position, right? That's it. That's right. Or whatever, you know, you need to have some differentiation at some point in the 360 degrees.
Tom Clements Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, no, you're absolutely right. And, you know, I think I'd agree with you, Everett, in that, you know, you don't need numbers on a bezel. Not to say that they're superfluous, because they, of course, have their place. You know, if you take that perspective, then surely you need numbers all around your dial also, right? Right. Because we all know that these marks around the edge of the bezel represent five minutes. Wait, what?
Everett Right, right. That's why they're there. You know, Movado proved many, many years ago that you maybe don't even need marks. In just a single diamond. Because our brains do all of the work.
Tom Clements That's it.
Everett Yeah. Well, OK, so. It's an idea, it's a theory that we're talking about now, Monday morning quarterbacking your design. How did you make that decision?
Tom Clements It was an easy one for me. You know, from the very first iteration of this watch, it had this bezel, you know, it's been tweaked, the markers have changed slightly, but I just love how clean the aesthetic is. That's what it is. Um, there's actually, um, there's a handful of, of vintage sixties designs, which have this bezel. And I just, I saw it and I just loved it. And you know, this, this watch is, it's, it's, it's something that I wanted to be in love with. And so I just thought, Hey, let's, let's include this feature. Why not?
Andrew It has the feel of a sport watch without, without the numerals, without a color change, without really much on the bezel. it has the feel of a sport watch with the functionality of a bezel.
Everett But you know, it does the thing I love, which is that it's a sport watch that is incredibly, to use your word, which I like, dressable.
Andrew Yeah, it's dressable. And it's a 120 click, right?
Tom Clements That's right.
Everett Yeah. So all the... I mean, we see people sort of... I'm kidding.
Andrew I'm all about 60 click and friction bezels. So I just... even though I know nobody else is.
Everett Well, I'm not sure that's true. We do see people intentionally. We see micro brands intentionally gilding watches. I think right now I think that it's a moment in time where, um, uh, you know, in order to stand out or to differentiate yourself, you have to make a decision, uh, in in places, but you haven't done that here. It's 200 meters, 120 clicks, screw down crown, you know, Muta movement.
Andrew This is a, and not a, not a mistake, like love, love that you went with the no ghost state position.
Everett Yeah. So you've got a 39 millimeter dress diver that's full featured, right?
Tom Clements That's right. Yeah. It's, um, we haven't taken any, any, any shortcuts on this at all. It's, uh, it's got the water resistance. It's got the steel case, you know, it's, um,
Everett Is it, wait, is it 316L steel?
Andrew Because we're, I know some people cut corners. How did you guess?
Tom Clements Yeah. Yes, it is. It is the famous 316L. Yeah. How could it be anything else? Of course. But yeah. And despite that, it's, you know, it's coming in at a fantastic thickness. And I think that's, that's one of the other things of this particular watch that stands out is it's, well, thickness. I think it's thin, you know, it's a hair over 12 mil. And yeah, I mean, it just, it wears so well. And so you can dress it up as you say.
Everett You know, you you've stated on your website dimensions 10.7 millimeters of case plus 1.5 millimeters of crystal. I think that that gets us to what? Just just over 12, right?
Tom Clements Yeah. Yeah, exactly. Yeah. 12.2 I think it takes us to. So, yeah.
Everett With a dome, right? We oftentimes hear 12 plus the dome.
Andrew Plus the three millimeter dome.
Tom Clements Yeah, that's right. Yeah, yeah. We kept the dome quite subtle on this. It's a 1.5 kind of lift from the case or from the bezel. But, you know, it's there and it just works well. It's great.
Andrew I have to ask a question for Mike. The stamping on the clasp of your bracelet. that says diver. I don't remember right off the top of my head.
Tom Clements Dive extension.
Andrew Dive extension. That's what it says. Yeah. Is that in your production models?
Tom Clements Yes. That's the plan. Yeah. Yeah. I just like the way that it kind of balances out the, because it's, you know, it's the clasp has been a point of conversation and it's, it's quite, it's quite a long clasp.
Andrew All extendable clasps are.
Tom Clements And yeah, exactly.
Everett Not to call you out, I think we've seen this clasp in other watches, and maybe that's not true, but I believe we've seen this clasp, and it is long, right? And so how do you deal with that in terms of the way it feels? Is that just a decision you make?
Tom Clements Yeah, so firstly, the Diver Extension text, it kind of For me, it just fills that negative space and it just balances it. It reminds me a bit of a Seamaster clasp, actually, and kind of in the way that the text is positioned. But anyway, yeah, I mean, the bracelet and the clasp have been through several iterations. Mark 1 was just the bracelet itself was a hair too thin. So what we've done is we've gone back and we've increased it by 0.8 of a mil. And it doesn't sound like a lot, point eight of a millimeter, but it's a big difference. It makes a big old difference. Yeah. And you know, the mark two, I think it, it balances just fantastically, you know, that there is, there is the undeniable fact that this, this class has got a little bit of extra heft, shall we say, versus just a traditional kind of push class or something like that. But it's got that, that, that kind of utility, which, For me, I just, I just absolutely love it. It's always been a pain point for me when I, in the summer, I like to wear my bracelets on, sorry, my watches and bracelets, and you just get hot, your wrists swell up. I mean, I've just strapped this on just now and I can already feel it getting tight and this has been sized for me. And so it's just so great just being able to just pop it out one click. And you're right, you know, this clasp, it's been used by a few other brands and I won't name them, but, you know, I mean, I feel like I'm in pretty good company with... Indeed.
Everett I agree. Indeed. Yeah. That's right. That's exactly the thought I had in my head.
Tom Clements Yeah.
Andrew Yeah. And knowing that I like that clasp. Yeah. Yeah. And a 20 to 18 tap or a taper. Yeah.
Tom Clements That's right. Yeah. Yeah. So 20 at the lugs, 18, and then back up to 20 at the clasp. So yeah, I mean, it balances itself out pretty nicely. The thing, the reason actually that I picked this specific extension clasp is that it's got, it's got the extension, but it's also got three holes of micro adjust. And so that means that, you know, you don't always have to have it ratcheted out. If you don't want to, you can, you can tweak it. And then just when you get pretty, particularly hot when you're running or whatever, you just use a ratchet then. And it's, yeah, it works great. I think it's pretty, I'm yeah, it was, I went back and forth on it and I've had a few comments, but it's just something I just really want to stick with because it was part of my original vision and it's important to me to kind of keep that utility, you know?
Andrew I like the non-remove extendable clasp. I like that a lot because I have a couple bracelets that have to be removed to adjust to affect the ratcheting, which is not problematic. It's not like it's a huge chore to take my watch off. But it's nice not to. Yeah. You're kind of a whiner. I'm a big bitch. You should hear me when I go pee and I'm wearing a suit. Like putting my tie back on after I pee is just a nightmare.
Everett Oh man. That's amazing. Just hold on. Just take a moment of silence. Just let everybody digest.
Andrew Yeah.
Everett All right.
Andrew Carry on. Okay. So I got a question. You've talked a lot about your kind of watch collecting journey. It seems like Uh, you've had, uh, I don't know if you're a revolving door, but I get the scent. Wait, wait, wait.
Everett What? Sorry. This is so good. What is that? What is the flight? There's a flavor there that I'm having trouble pinpointing.
Andrew It's a, it's salt. You're getting salt.
Everett God. This is maybe my favorite beer I've ever had in my life.
Andrew It's so good. It's almost like a margarita. If you salted the rim of that beer, it'd be perfectly appropriate.
Everett I mean, it's every time I take a drink, I look at you like, holy shit, this is good. You should see what his pants are doing. Yeah. I'm tenting. This is, I mean, I felt this way before. So right. I think this is my favorite beer I've ever had. It's really good. Oh, man. Okay. I'm sorry. Carry on, Andrew. I interrupted you rudely.
Andrew Weirdly. How unusual of you. So I get the sense that you might be a revolving door watch guy. That they stay for a while and make their way out. Is that accurate?
Tom Clements I mean, there's been a handful of watches that have come in and gone out. And actually, in truth, it's mostly the vintage ones. Not because I don't love them, but just because I don't wear them because I don't want to break them. Yeah. You know. And so, yeah, I mean, to say I actually haven't bought a watch. Well, except for the photics obviously that have been made. But I actually haven't bought a watch for about three years now. So it's been a while. I've kind of been celibate practically.
Andrew Fasting. Yeah.
Tom Clements Yeah.
Andrew I fasted and then I went on a binge. That's right. So Godspeed to you when you break this fast. Um, what's your collection looking like now?
Tom Clements So it's pretty streamlined. I'll be honest. You know, I've got, um, uh, my, my daily wearer because I'm, I'm babying my photics at the moment. Cause I don't want to get them too dinged up whilst I'm still taking photos and things like that. But my daily wear is, is a, is a, um, Black Bay 58, um, which.
Everett Which you, you, you, you mentioned it earlier.
Tom Clements That's right. Yeah. I just, I love it. And, um, To be honest, it's, it's practically a one watch collection. You know, I've got, I've got probably about six or seven other watches, um, that get very little wrist time. Um, I've got a, a, um, Tiso Vizzo date.
Andrew Love that. Love that watch. The dog bowl. We talk about the watch all the time.
Tom Clements It's great. It's great. Yeah. I got that for my, uh, my 21st birthday as a graduation present for my, for my parents. And yeah, it's a, it's a fantastic watch. I actually should wear it more often, but, um, And then the other watch that gets the most wrist time is a G-Shock, you know, the square ones. And I just love it. I wear that when I'm out in the field doing my survey work because I break things. So the G-Shock gets strapped on for that.
Andrew But there's also badgers and hedgehogs like wild critters out there.
Tom Clements Yeah. But, you know, I'm an advocate of wearing wearing your watches, you know, not just kind of babying them too much. So apart from when I'm in the field doing my surveys, then the tutor goes on the wrist, you know, when I'm, if I'm kayaking, surfing, hiking, whatever, it's there with me. And I just love that. And, you know, once I'm done taking product photos, the photo could be there in its place. And, you know, the thing about watches, and it's something I'm sure that we all feel, you know, They are just so special. They connect you to people, not just to yourself, but they connect you to people and to your, to your memories of, of those people. And, um, you know, I'm, I'm, I'm a normal guy. I, uh, I, uh, I'm an ecologist, you know, I, I don't, and well, you're Batman. So not exactly. You are Batman. I'm sorry. Yeah. I mean, you know, the bat cave is full of lots of, lots of cool toys, but my alter ego, Tom Clements, um, is, uh, is a pretty regular guy and, and as alter egos tend to be, um, And so the Tudor, um, I came to have this, um, purely through, through, through, through, through inheritance, actually. Um, you know, I got a little bit of money and I thought, you know, I could, I could spend this on knickknacks and whatever things I'll forget about, or I could put it into something that's going to become an heirloom in of itself. And that's what I did. Um, and I think, uh, I think, you know, it's money well spent as far as I'm concerned.
Andrew If you wear it, it's well spent. Yeah.
Tom Clements Yeah. Yeah.
Andrew That's wonderful.
Tom Clements So this is staying in the collection till I'm an old man and it will be passed down to a family member, I hope.
Everett So we've got the BB58. We've got the Square G's.
Tom Clements Yeah.
Everett Anything else? The Vizidate. The Vizidate. Oh, yes, the Vizidate.
Tom Clements And then, of course, you know, there's the UG and I've got an old Citizen Eco Drive and another actually, fantastic vintage dress watch from my, let's get this right, great-great-grandfather. And that's just a lovely little rectangular gold case watch that I don't wear because I'll break it if I kind of strap it on for more than 10 minutes.
Andrew That's nice to look at.
Tom Clements Absolutely, yeah, yeah, yeah. But the daily rotation is the BB-58, the G-Shock and the Photic when I'm when I'm not knocking into things.
Andrew How did you feel about the Blue Bay when it came out? Were you fanboying over the Blue Bay? Because that did some things to some people.
Tom Clements Yeah. You know, it was a pretty special blue.
Everett That's how we know he listens. It's pretty okay. That's wonderful. Yeah. So you're a thumbs up or a thumbs down or a thumb wavering in the middle? I'm with you on it.
Tom Clements Yeah, that's that's kind of where I'm at, too. I'm with you. So, Andrew, your finger is up. Your finger is up. When does this launch? When can we start buying this watch?
Everett So it's launched, correct?
Tom Clements No, not yet. No. So this is an exclusive 1420 exclusive. It's not planned, but we'll give you the scoop. So I've told a handful of people who have DMed me on Instagram, but I haven't announced it officially. This will be launching on Kickstarter in September this year. So a couple of months time it will be live and people will be able to back it if they would like to.
Everett And so expected retail, we've got $429, which I think 499 pounds, which I think is something like $530. Is that accurate today?
Tom Clements Yeah. I mean, I'd need to double check exchange rates. Last time I looked, it was around the $590 mark. Okay.
Andrew So you're going to have people checking exchange rates before they make their purchase.
Tom Clements Um, But yeah, that's right. And of course, anybody who decides to be a backer on Kickstarter will receive it below that price. So those prices are to be announced, but there'll be some tempting savings there hopefully for backers.
Andrew TBD. And these are coming with a bracelet.
Tom Clements That's right.
Andrew And a tropic, right?
Tom Clements Yeah. So I've got the blue on the tropic here at the moment. So I know Andrew, I think you mentioned quite recently that you found your ideal, or maybe it was, maybe it was Everett. One of you guys mentioned that you found your ideal tropic, which is an FKM.
Everett Yes, that's me. You've got the tropic. That's me. Andrew's got the shitty TPU ones. Yep. Carry on.
Tom Clements They're not great. They might even be PVC. That's, that's the material that we've gone with. And, um, you know, it's when we trialed, I say we, I, I trialed, um, probably about the company.
Everett Yeah.
Tom Clements The company, the Royal way. Yeah. We, I tried out products seven or eight different straps, um, from various different places. And this by a long shot for me, at least is just, just, just my ideal. Um, it's, it's, it's the most pliable, um, but also it's not sticky. Um, so do you don't get tons of lint on it and it's most importantly, so weirdly, like I've seen a lot of, a
Everett And you've got hatching, hatching on the keepers. I think the classic design. Wonderful.
Tom Clements That's, that's right. Yeah, that's right. So yeah, it's, it's a, it's a dead comfortable, um, easy and it's got quick strap change as well on the spring bars. So, um, yeah, it's, uh, even though we've got the George Lux, but you know, it's a super convenient to change if, if you can't be able to get the tool out. So yeah, it's a, it's a grand strap.
Andrew I love quick release straps. I love quick release bracelets. Is your bracelet quick release?
Tom Clements It isn't. And I agree with you. I love them as well. But no, we haven't got quick release. We've just got the, we've just got the drilled lugs instead to help you out with taking that off.
Andrew Good enough. So I have a question related to your website and to a environmental promise that you are making. And I expect that as an ecologist, there's some kind of, I don't know, responsibility or passion there related to it, but talk to me about how Clemens is investing into the environment.
Tom Clements Yeah. So as an ecologist, obviously protecting the environment is, is it's my bread and butter, you know, it's, it's what I look to try and do. And it's, it's not just hearsay. It's something I really do care about. And so for every single photo diver that we sell, we're going to be planting a tree. Um, and it's going to be, that tree is going to be here in the UK. So we're going to help to reforest, um, parts of Scotland. And the cool thing is, is we're, we're partnered with a company called the future forest company. And what they do is for every single tree that they plant, they'll supply us with a, what three words location. Do you guys use what three words in the States?
Everett Not, I'm not familiar with that. It doesn't mean we don't.
Tom Clements It's like it's like a geo geo-referenced thing. You know, you can convert it to long and lat.
Andrew Oh, like when you buy Laphroaig and you get a one foot by one foot plot at the distillery and you can you get the coordinates for where you can go get your lease.
Tom Clements Exactly. That's exactly it. So after you've gone to Laphroaig and you've stood in your one foot by one foot plot, you'll then go to the forest that we've helped to plant and you can just hug your tree. So I think that's pretty cool. And alongside that, we're also climate positive. So what that means is we're not just offsetting the carbon that we create, but we're actually doing that twice. So by being in existence, we are helping to reduce the atmospheric carbon that we have within our planet.
Everett And so practically speaking, how do you do that?
Tom Clements So there's loads of different ways that it can be done. It can be done. One of them is planting trees. And we're already doing that. So we're not counting that towards our carbon commitment. The carbon commitment is completely separate from planting trees. It's another thing that we're doing. So it can be in helping to invest in renewable resources. It can be helping to do social projects in kind of more deprived nations whereby they use dirty fuels. And so we'll help to provide them with cleaner fuels and cleaner sources. It could even be just through funding the widespread use of low energy light bulbs. There's so many different ways, but it all kind of adds up and helps. And, you know, in terms of the relevance of that to a dive watch, because obviously that's our kind of debut model, removing atmospheric carbon will help us to reduce ocean acidification. That will help reduce coral reef bleaching. And that obviously helps to benefit all of our marine life. So it's all connected.
Andrew Same with not wearing sunblock. Don't wear sunblock when you're on the beach near a coral reef. But do. Just let it soak in.
Everett So the Photic Driver... Diver, excuse me. It could be a driver. It could be a driver. The Photic Diver launching September 2021. You heard it here first, folks. Great British pound 429 of them apply your at the moment contemporaneous exchange rate And it's happening with Kickstarter. It's broken some discounts happening in September.
Andrew Where do we look at it right now and what colors can I get it in?
Tom Clements So we have made the photodiver in atoll blue, which is blue, abyss black, which has got a nice matte black dial. I should mention that the blue has got a sunburst finish to it. And then there's the kind of the showcase one, which is the photic. dial. Um, and that's a fume or gradient dial, depending upon what terminology you prefer. And that goes, that's a sunburst and that goes from blue to black and it's got a black bezel. Um, you can find us on Instagram. That's probably where we post most frequently. So at Clements watches, um, I should mention Clements is spelled C L E M E N C E got a lifetime of, of spelling that for people. Most people spell it with T S cause that's an uncommon spelling.
Andrew I wouldn't even have thought of it with a T S. Ah, it's interesting. Whenever he texted me that we were talking to you, it autocorrected to Clemency. Clemency watches. And I was like, that's not a thing, man. But yeah, Clements. I mean, there's a lot of famous Clements with a T and those didn't even come to mind. Yeah.
Tom Clements Oh, good stuff. You're welcome. That's good. Yeah. So yeah, on Instagram, Clements watches or at our website, clementswatches.com or just, you know, just give us a Google.
Everett Google Clemens watches.
Andrew C. With a C. With a C, yeah. Clemency, but with an E instead of a Y. Are you done?
Everett No. Andrew, other things, for fuck's sake, other things, what do you got?
Andrew I watched half of a movie today.
Everett This is auspicious, auspicious beginning.
Andrew The half of the movie that I watched, I am comfortable telling you that you need to watch it. I don't know how it ends, but the first 55 minutes of it were good enough that they are worth whatever may or may not happen in the end. Tell me more. It's called Gunpowder Milkshake. So just from title alone. We're good. Like you got you got some interest here. It's a two hour movie. It's recently released. It's a Netflix original. It's got some people that you recognize, but you don't realize why you recognize them. You're IMDb-ing these actors.
Everett What do I know this person from?
Andrew Yeah. So main character is Karen Gillian? No, Gillian maybe? Yes. She's Aurora in Guardians of the Galaxy. You've got Lena Scottish. Scottish, by the way. You've got Carla Gugino, Paul Giamatti, like just people who are like, I know this person, but what do I know them from? So a good lineup. And a writer, director who you don't know and has directed, he has six credits to his name, but he killed it. His name is Navat Papashato. Papashato. He's an Israeli fella who made a movie that combines all these elements that you're really familiar with. that we all love. It feels kind of like Drive, right? The Ryan Gosling Drive with these bright colors, really conservative dialogue, but it's also Kill Bill in this very revenge oriented, super strong female leads. It's, it also is kind of John Wick-y with a flavor of The Matrix. You got this really good gung, gung fu action. with some, some timing work in the fighting.
Everett It is, this feels a little bit like a beer advocate review.
Andrew It is fascinating. I loved watching it, uh, just the first half of the movie. And I'm saying you need to watch it for just the first half of the movie because it's, it's killer. The whole, the whole premise is this, this, uh, little girl is in the family business of being an assassin. And then fast forward 15 years and she's in kind of the twilight of her career as an assassin through some mistakes that she's made as an assassin. And I'm at the point now where she's about to pay the piper on the mistakes that she's made in her career field. So now it's like getting heavy. Now is where the action really starts. 55 minutes in.
Everett It's got Angela Bassett in it.
Andrew It's got like people you know And you're trying to play some because you just don't. There are people who've been out of the out of the spotlight for a while.
Everett It's got Cersei Lannister. Yes. All right.
Andrew I'm in. Watch it. It's on Netflix. It's I don't know how it ends. So it could be.
Everett So it might be a terrible ending. The first hour could be awesome in the last hour.
Andrew I don't expect it's going to be just based on the way he time like the tempo, the the this movie to to the halfway point. has been terrific. Even if storyline ending is poor storyline and even where John Wick is poor and everyone loves that series and it's fucking awesome. That's it. That's my other thing. Milk or gunpowder milkshake. What a ridiculous title. Watch it. It's on Netflix.
Everett I've got another thing. Do me. I had another thing earlier and while we've been recording my other thing has changed in my mind. Look at you. So I There is some chance, this has been another thing previously, but this week, so today's Sunday, I think on Wednesday, I couldn't find, I couldn't find a pencil. I was looking for a pencil. I mean, we have pencils all over the house, but I wanted a pencil, a specific pencil.
Andrew You wanted a daddy pencil, and there's a very real difference between kid and mommy pens and pencils and what daddy uses.
Everett And I was like, Kim, I can't find my mechanical pencil. And she was like, well, which one? And I'm like, my mechanical pencil. I use all the time. I have like five of them and I can't find a single one. Okay. So, so we've moved. So there's maybe a stash of them somewhere. Yeah. There's still some boxes. So there may be a stash of them. With that said, I've had one at the new house. So it's like, I can't find my mechanical pencil. And she was like, well, there's one right here. And she picked up one that's very similar, but it's not it, but it's not. So it's a nine millimeter. And I wanted the five millimeters.
Andrew So we have nine mill. When it,
Everett I do, I do art, man. I need to have different line weights, bruh. Anyway, I needed a five millimeter pencil. I couldn't find one. I ordered them on Amazon. I got two new ones today. I cracked them open and now I'm using them for our notes, our recording notes.
Andrew They smell nice.
Everett I got a Pentel P205, which if you're into pens or pencils at all, you've certainly used, uh, This is not an exceptional pencil. It's not a special pencil. With that said, this is the SKX of mechanical pencils. It's cheaply, quickly made, mass produced, inexpensive materials. However, feels right. The design on this thing is borderline perfect. It's completely and utterly functional and totally replaceable and totally replaceable. Uh, the printing is good. It's Japanese, which it's kind of their thing, right? Pens, pencils, precision, precision instruments. This is a precision instrument for every man. And I just love it. As I've been using it on the show, I was like, man, this is it. This is the mechanical pencil for me.
Andrew I'm happy they delivered my Amazon package on a Sunday.
Everett No, they delivered it on Thursday. It came the next day. I ordered these Wednesday morning and they were in the mail the next day. Oh, that's good.
Andrew I have some scrub daddies in the mail today.
Everett Oh, you scrub daddy? Scrub Daddy. I've seen a couple watch accounts post Scrub Daddies in their posts this week, and I don't know that it has anything to do with us, but it made me happy.
Andrew Maybe or maybe didn't send a picture of the group. I'll send it now while everyone's sleeping.
Everett Scrub Daddy. That's the champ. Tom, other things. What do you got?
Tom Clements Yeah. So, firstly, I think I've got that pencil. So, yeah. Shout out to that. Good choice.
Andrew Got good tastes.
Tom Clements Yeah. Definitely. Yeah. Definitely the SPX of the mechanical pencil world. Yeah. Nice. Um, yeah, my other thing is, uh, an inflatable kayak. Um, so fuck. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I, I love my inflatable kayak. So when lockdown struck, uh, you know, we couldn't go on holiday. We couldn't do a lot of things. And so me and my, me and my, uh, um, partner, Alison, we, we invested in a, in an inflatable kayak, but in the UK, a lot of the inflatable kayaks are kind of these big bulbous bladdery kind of things. And, I think you guys have got them in the States, they're drop stitch. So it's the same stuff as paddle boards. And they are amazing. They are rigid, they are fast, they track well, they are just brilliant bits of kit. And it's about four and a half meters long. So it's a it's a big thing. It's a two manor. And we take it everywhere and take it out as frequently as we can. We've paddled across coast to coast Scotland in it. We've
Andrew Wait, how long does that take?
Tom Clements That took five days and we were wild camping on the shores of various lochs. So we went through Loch Ness, which is probably the most famous loch in Scotland.
Andrew Did you encounter her?
Tom Clements We didn't see Nessie. No, she was chilling.
Everett So wait, this has been a controversy on the show for a while. Are there whales in Loch Ness?
Tom Clements not as far as I know.
Everett Okay, just wondering. Okay, that's a controversy. I can't.
Andrew Why would it carry on?
Tom Clements It depends on who's on the beach. Yeah, no, we didn't see any whales. But yeah, you know, we've done that. We've a few weeks ago, we were going down a river with some little rapids on it, which was loads of fun. We saw Golden Eagle, which I've never seen before. That was awesome. We've taken it through along kind of coastal routes, rivers, lakes, locks, you know, you name it. And it's just fantastic because it makes adventure so accessible. You know, it's it's it's a bit of an investment up front. But if you've got some space in the boot of your car, just go for it, you know. And I just can't advocate them enough to to people.
Andrew What brand did you get? What was the what's the the brand of kayak that you guys went with? Because there's a bunch of the inflatables that are out there.
Tom Clements Yeah. Yeah. So when we bought ours, it was We were a bit late to the game in lockdown in the UK, and basically everyone had had the same idea as us. And so there was a national out of stock basically for inflatable kites. So we just bought some random, no brand, no name one. And I'm pretty sure it's probably something that had been imported from China at some point. Well, like most of them were, I'm sure.
Andrew Like an AliExpress.
Tom Clements Yeah, probably. But there's an analog to it now that's available in the UK. I know for sure it's called Blue Wave. And I think In the States, I did a bit of research before we bought this bad boy. And I think Razorlight do one that's that's kind of akin to it. And yeah, as I say, it's drop stitch on all three sides. So you've got the base and two sides. And yeah, it's just a beast. Just if you're thinking about it, do it and just have fun because they are awesome bits of kit. Wonderful.
Andrew I love inflatable, like durable, inflatable boat options. Yeah. As a person who stores a kayak always, I would very much like it to be folded up and on the shelf.
Everett You know, I, I also think just like, like Zodiacs, when you see people just flying on a Zodiac and, uh, you know, you still got to store the motor.
Andrew The motor takes some storage space.
Everett But your, but your, your point is that inflatable, uh, like durable, sick, inflatable watercraft are awesome.
Andrew Yeah. I'm into it. I'm looking at buying a big ass boat that I have to store.
Everett You're going to buy a boat. And I told you I would help you clean it. And I appreciate that. So Clemens watches dot com. Also, Clemens watches on Instagram. You're looking in September. Forty and twenty exclusive be looking in September for the announcement of the Kickstarter, where you'll be able to pick your own Clemens watch up for a discount from four hundred and twenty nine Great British pounds.
Andrew Andrew, anything else you want to add? So I always, in order to write the show notes, do a quick Google on whatever we talk about so I can have the tabs open. Yeah. The FutureForce company, they're like when you open their page on your phone, it says un-f asterisk-k-ing the future, which I assume to mean un-fucking the future.
Everett Yeah. Let's un-fuck that future.
Andrew I love that. That's a great company to partner with.
Tom Clements Yeah, it's a strong statement.
Andrew Yeah. So that's that's the last thing that I have.
Everett Tom, thank you so much for joining us. Really looking forward to seeing what you're going to do. And thank you at home for joining us for this episode of 40 and 20. The Watch Clicker podcast. Check us out on Instagram at 40 and 20 or at the Watch Clicker. You can also check us out on our website Watch Clicker. That's where we post every single episode of this podcast, as well as reviews, articles, all the good stuff, man. All of it. All the good stuff. If you want to support what we're doing here and look, right, look, we really need it, OK? Got to pay for hosting. Andrew's like picked up a mani pedi habit. I have. Shit's expensive. Also a sugar scrub habit. You can do so at Patreon.com slash 40 and 20. Look guys, it really does help. I know it doesn't feel like much, but even if you could give a buck, two bucks, three bucks per month, that just, that just makes the, that makes the engine keep turning over. Let's put the gas in the tank. And don't forget to tune back in next Thursday for another hour of watches, food, drinks, life, and other things we like. Bye-bye.