Ep. 194 - Interview with Patrick Bremer of Bremoir

Published on Thu, 14 Jul 2022 00:40:20 -0700

Synopsis

Patrick Bremer, the founder of Bremoir Watch Company, joined Andrew and Everett on their podcast "40 and 20: The Watch Clicker Podcast" to discuss his brand, inspiration, and upcoming watches. Bremoir is a watch brand dedicated to designing contemporary timepieces inspired by Art Deco architecture, with their debut watch, the Lexington, released about a year ago. Patrick shared the story of how he combined his passions for watches and Art Deco to create Bremoir, and the design process behind the Lexington, including its distinctive stepped bezel and sector dial inspired by the Chrysler Building. He also teased details about their next release, inspired by the Griffith Observatory in Los Angeles, which will feature a moon phase complication.

The conversation covered various topics, including Patrick's background in watches, the challenges of starting a watch brand, the importance of case design, and the decision to use the STP movement. They discussed the colorful names and stories behind the different Lexington dial variants and Patrick's experience building relationships with retailers. Overall, it was an insightful look into the mind of a passionate watch designer and the journey of launching an independent brand.

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 hosts, Andrew and my good friend Everett. Here, we talk about watches, food, drinks, life, and other things we like.
Everett Everett, how are you? Uh, you know, I'm fine. I'm, I'm good. It's, it's been warm here, which I like. It's been hot. It's been hot. Uh, I'm cool with that. I actually like that. Um, but, but the, my impulse is just to, play and because I'm a grown up with a mortgage and responsibilities and children, I'm not able to do that as much. So I'm, I'm, I'm feeling a little grumpy that I've had to like go to the office and be responsible.
Andrew I could turn my sprinklers on for you when you leave. If you want to just run through. Yeah. Frolick about on your way home.
Everett Uh, our, our, our children were playing in my front yard the other day and I turned the sprinklers on on them.
Unknown I did that too.
Andrew Not even all my, one of my kids and several other kids that are not mine.
Everett Yeah. One of them. So it was one of my kids, one of your kids, and then like four other neighborhood hoodlums. And I just lit them up. Got them. It was great.
Andrew Andrew, how are you? Uh, I'm good. I'm also, I, you know, I'm finding ways to cope with the heat. The AC is on and I'm not going outside. Uh, I don't know how I survived proper hot summers. Um, now with like a day in the mid nineties from like, I'm going to fucking die today.
Everett Right. This is not Fort Hood temperatures.
Andrew No, but it's just unpleasant. I'm starting to miss fall and it's not even really that close, but I'm not, you know, staying busy. I'm excited to see the World Athletic Championships over the next couple of weeks. Yeah, it's happening. It's starting. The opening events are on Friday morning and yeah, it's going to be crazy.
Everett And for those of you uninitiated, this is track and field. The World Championships are taking place. In, in our, in our hometown, in, in our, in our humble abode of Eugene, Oregon, it is for sure one of the biggest track and field events in the world at any, at any time. And it's pretty special.
Andrew Yeah. First time. In the Western hemisphere. And then that's being hosted in Eugene, Oregon, which is a, just a, just a real puzzler, but it's going to make for a really cool couple of weeks.
Everett Trackdown USA. I think the one thing we're lacking is proper hotel support. So things get a little, a little weird. Yeah. Yeah. People are able to like, um, Airbnb their houses for a month at a time and get really significant money.
Andrew Well, and you know, we have cities all up and down the Valley, you know, Portland seeing a big jump and the whole I-5 corridor. So should be an interesting couple of weeks.
Everett And you'll notice there was no tab at the beginning. We're drinking cocktails.
Unknown Yeah.
Everett a lovely grapefruit cocktail. Tequila and grapefruit. Which is Andrew has made for us. But so that was the, it wasn't a jingle bell. It was ice clinking in a glass. Cause that's what we're doing. And it's not Christmas.
Andrew It's not Christmas. I don't have any handy jingle bells, but we should move on.
Everett We are going to talk about watches. We're going to talk about watches today. And for that purpose, we've, we've invited a guest on our show, which is something we do from time to time. Real rarely though. And I'll say, you know, we've had some, we've had some handsome people on the show. We have. We've had some, uh, Brett Williams, obviously of tool watch co handsome, handsome fellow. I mean, he's a, he's an actor, a famous actor. Uh, I think, I think our guest today is maybe like, uh, he's, he's top three, I would say. Yeah. A hundred percent. Yeah. This is a good looking man. We've got, he knows too.
Andrew He's like, he's smiling. Like as if he's like, Oh, you're right.
Patrick Bremer I'm blushing, guys. I'm blushing over here.
Everett We've got with you today, with us today, Patrick Bremer of the Bremoir Watch Company. Patrick, how are you? Welcome to 40 in 20, the Watch Clicker podcast.
Patrick Bremer I'm great. Thanks so, so much for having me. That was quite the introduction. I don't know if I've ever had an introduction like that before.
Andrew And you probably never will again. I mean, we're just, that's the kind of people we are.
Everett Incredibly unprofessional and totally willing to embarrass someone.
Patrick Bremer But you know, as you, as you guys were intro in the show, you got me excited. I was like, man, are these guys, are these guys that big of pros where they have done the research to an extent that they knew that I ran track in college?
Andrew I didn't know that.
Everett I didn't know that.
Patrick Bremer I didn't know that either. Anyway, I did not know that the World Championships were in Eugene. That's cool.
Everett Well, have you been to so as a college track and field athlete? Have you been to Hayward?
Patrick Bremer I've not but I know about the Prefontaine Classic and how that's absolutely massive meet annually, of course. And it's kind of like an iconic stadium, right for track.
Everett Well, it was it was and then they've destroyed it. And they've built a new, probably the nicest track and field stadium in the entire world. So in Eugene, Oregon, of all places. Because why not? Yeah. Because you know, Phil Knight. Uncle Phil, man.
Andrew Uncle Phil hooking it up.
Everett Well, what was your event? I was actually a pole vaulter. Oh my gosh.
Patrick Bremer You can believe it.
Everett So one of my best friends name is Sam Roberts, not related to Andrew Roberts. However, Andrew Roberts' wife is also named Sam Roberts. My friend, from law school was a U-Dub, which I think you're also a U-Dub guy, but he's a university of Washington, Povalt. Yeah. Yeah. So, uh, well, great. We didn't bring you here to talk about Povalting.
Andrew We could though.
Everett Because you know.
Patrick Bremer It'll be in the next show. The next show. Let's save that one.
Everett Okay. Okay. That's perfect. We brought you here to talk about, to talk about the watch brand. You started a watch brand. Yeah. Pretty cool.
Patrick Bremer Right guys?
Andrew It is indeed.
Everett Who would even think of such a thing?
Patrick Bremer It's insane. It's insane. Who's doing it these days?
Everett No one. No one. No one. What a crazy thing. So you are the founder of Brimoire Watches, which is in some ways your namesake watch company, I would say. Marshall, it's a bit of a hybrid. It's a bit of a hybrid. So first, For those that are uninitiated, because I think some people will be listening to this and have maybe not heard of you or not be familiar with Bremoir. So why don't you just, for the uninitiated, give us the Reader's Digest version. What is Bremoir and what are you doing with this brand?
Patrick Bremer Yeah. So Bremoir is basically watch brand dedicated to designing contemporary timepieces inspired by the age of Art Deco. more specifically inspired by Art Deco architecture. So you certainly see a lot of brands that are inspired by motorsports. A lot of different sports, actually. I don't think there's that many brands that are inspired by architecture. But when you think about it, it kind of makes a lot of sense, right? It does. Yeah. There's a lot of interesting curves and angles and You got to look at proportions when you're designing a building or a house or anything else that's a vertical structure. So it lends itself actually really well to watch design.
Everett The Art Deco aesthetic.
Patrick Bremer Or the architecture in general. In general. I think Art Deco architecture is incredibly distinctive, right? It's very easy to spot Art Deco architecture in any big city. Yeah, absolutely. But it was also incredibly clean. It was almost like one of the early, you could say, minimalist movements, not completely minimalist, because there was a lot of flourish, decoration, yeah, decoration in Art Deco. But there was also a lot of symmetry. there was a lot of use of geometric shapes. And obviously that lends itself well to watches, right? Yeah. But I didn't choose to start a brand because of architecture being, you know, a good way to translate that into watches. It was just because I like watches. I love Art Deco architecture. And I wanted to combine two passions of mine and get back into kind of creating something fun, new, uh, going down a path that a lot of other brands haven't gone down before.
Everett Well, let's come back to Art Deco because, because I think we need to talk about that more as we, as we move through some of this show here. But, um, with that introduction, uh, I'll just say, Bremoire has released its debut watch in this last year, really late last summer, about a year ago now is when the Lexington, Bremoire's debut watch started making the rounds. I think you've, you had prototypes in circulation late last summer. Um, and then towards the end of the year, you were getting ready to launch and you've now launched successfully. So we, we have seen about a year of Bremoire in Lexington. Take us back, take us back further. Take us back five or six years ago. Or, you know, I'm guessing because I don't know exactly when this started, but take us back to the actual Genesis. You said you've combined two of your hobbies. I know the answer to the question, but you're interested in Art Deco. What's the other interest and how does that become what this is now?
Patrick Bremer Yeah. Of course the other interest is watches. Got into watches probably about 20 years ago at this point. I remember my first watch in high school. It was a relatively inexpensive Skagen. Oh yeah. Wore it all the time. Wore it through college. I'm going to tie in the track thing. Went up to the University of Wisconsin, we won big tens and what did we get gifted as big 10 champs was a championship watches. Oh, that's cool. That was number two. So that's a, that's a great one. That's sitting over there in a little case. What kind of watch was it? Yeah. You know, unfortunately it wasn't a super nice watch. It looks really cool. It's a quartz, which is fine. We're not going to bash on the quartz watches, but the brand was Selco. Oh yeah. Oh. I know. To the Google. Not Seiko. Not Seiko. Selco. Selco. Yeah. Yeah.
Everett That's, that's different. It's a notable difference. We, we've got a community, a credit union. Yeah. Called Selco. So maybe, maybe they made it.
Patrick Bremer Yeah. So anyway, so, so all of a sudden I've got another watch and yeah, all of a sudden I just got into watches and then, you know, kind of For a while I was into antiquing and I would come across all these old pocket watches. And I think that was honestly the first time I actually realized that there were some watches that weren't powered by batteries. Sure. I was like, Oh my God, these things have gears and springs. Wow. Look at this. So that's when a little bit of the nerdery started to, you know, be birthed.
Everett Yeah, because it's a nerdy, it's a nerdy hobby. It's okay if we admit that, right? Yeah, of course. Of course. It's a nerdy hobby.
Andrew Yeah. Inherently.
Patrick Bremer But the natural extension of that is getting into vintage watches because at the time they were more affordable. It was interesting. They were old. So that sort of tied into my interest in older things, older objects that had stories in them. Um, So I was into vintage for a while and now I've got just a mix of vintage and modern. Some nouveau vintage as I'm understanding they're calling watches from the nineties now.
Everett Oh, that, that is the nouveau vintage, huh?
Unknown Yeah.
Everett I will tell you there's an aesthetic. There's a nineties aesthetic that we have not fully come back to, but at some point I would say, let's just say 20 years from now. there is going to be a movement where people are like, look at this. I don't know. We talked about Breitling last week. Look at this super fucking ugly Breitling super ocean from it's so nineties. That's the most amazing thing. It's going to happen.
Andrew Yeah. Look at this titanium G shock.
Everett Oh, so you're into vintage watches.
Patrick Bremer Is there some, Make a long story short. I'm into watches.
Everett No, make it make the long story long. We've got to kill an hour here, Patrick.
Patrick Bremer Oh, that, that'll be easy, gentlemen. That'll be easy. I told you I came from happy hour, so don't get me talking. Um, so then, yeah, fast forward. I'm in my thirties, my mid thirties, I should say. Um, and I'm, I'm going through a divorce and all of a sudden I've got time on my hands, you know, when you're not in a relationship, No wife. I'm like, okay, I've got extra time. I want to get back into doing something a little bit, a little bit more creative.
Everett Um, it's either that or the dog track.
Patrick Bremer Yeah. Yeah. Or maybe the pub down the street. There's actually a lot of options, but doing something productive seemed to be the way to go. So, you know, again, this was just like, I'm going to have some fun. I'm going to start designing a watch. I'm going to make it like Art Deco feeling, not really with the intention of like, Oh, I'm going to start a watch brand.
Everett Sure. Because that's a crazy thing to decide.
Patrick Bremer That's too much work. That's a lot of work. Yeah. And, um, so I started down this process and a good buddy of mine, he's an industrial designer. So all of a sudden I was like, Hey man, you want to, you want to have some fun with me over here? design this watch. And he's like, yeah, maybe you've got to pay me, but maybe I'll give you a good deal. So it was one of those things where, you know, and he's super talented, you know, but he's not a watch guy at all. So we then spend the next couple of years there. I say a couple of years, just kind of getting together every other week. weekends, maybe some nights here and there go down this process. We start designing a dive watch. And then I kind of realized I'm like, God, that market is so saturated.
Andrew Everyone did a dive watch already. Yeah.
Patrick Bremer Yeah. I'm like, no. Okay. So we took five steps back. We saved a little bit of the design. So if you've really looked at the Lexington, you know, that The case is a little bit dive watching. If you take away that elegant bezel. And then we completely redesigned the dial and the hands and everything inside the case. So after that reset, you know, that put us back another, God, six months, let's call it. And then we're finally getting to the making some good progress. And we're both jazzed about the, uh, Pun intended, by the way, jazz.
Everett Right. Right.
Patrick Bremer I was going to say. We're both jazzed about the design and we're like, yeah, I think this, I think this could be something. I pulled in another friend of mine who was a former executive at Leo Burnett and their big brand name marketing agency out of Chicago. And he kind of just, he loved the watch and he's like, man, I think like Art Deco, nobody's really playing in this space. There's so much great content here to work with in terms of a new Roaring Twenties. Um, there's just a lot of interesting parallels between the 1920s and now, and that would be like a totally separate podcast in and of itself.
Everett Yeah. Well, and at that time, I assume at the time you're having this conversation, you didn't even know about the biggest parallel, which was that we were going to be, On the tail end of a, of a giant, massive international pandemic.
Patrick Bremer Yeah. So when I started designing the Lexington and this was pre pandemic. Yeah. So it's, it's totally weird and bizarre that history really does repeat itself in a lot of different ways. Um, so yeah, guys, I mean, it was just, it's been a total slow, diligent evolution of how we've come to be where we are today. Well, and so it's been a blast.
Andrew I got to say, are you a creator by trade or is that just something that is like, it's just an outlet for you?
Patrick Bremer Yeah, it was, it was always an outlet. I mean, as a kid, I loved drawing. I, you know, did pretty well in art classes, um, carried that into college again, all just for fun, never pursued it, um, professionally or anything. And maybe had I, Done it again. I might've gone into the arts and done something full time in the creatives.
Everett What do you do professionally?
Patrick Bremer I work in sales.
Everett So would it be fair to say that you are a creator of yeses? We're on the pun train tonight.
Patrick Bremer Yeah.
Everett That was a good setup. Thank you for that. Yeah. We, we high five live on the show. I don't know that we've ever done that. Um, So you are, you're creating this watch. You're, you know, you, you kind of downplayed, I think you say, well, I never thought it was going to be a brand. I'm just sort of creating a watch. Meanwhile, you've paid an industrial designer to help you with making this, I assume, two-dimensional to design three-dimensional. So, so you're obviously not completely disconnected from the idea at this point that this may go somewhere. So when, when did that crystallize? When, when did the, when did this go from, a project that you're doing with your friend that you're paying him for to, uh, I'm going to do this. I'm going to, I'm going to be a watch. I'm going to be a watch brand.
Patrick Bremer Yeah. I mean, I think you're, you're a hundred percent right in that once you start paying somebody, you kind of really want to do it. And the cash outlays give you more and more incentive to carry it through.
Andrew Yeah. Yeah. You got more and more skin in the game. Cause it's becoming much more expensive for just the one watch for you versus to make a whole production.
Patrick Bremer By the time you get to prototyping you're, you're 20, 30, 35 grand in. And now you're like pot committed is what they call that. I'm doing this a hundred percent. Um, but you know, the other thing that's swirling in the background is like, you get to a point in like maybe midlife where you're like, man, I, I now really want to do something that I'm passionate about and that I'm really interested in, you know? Yeah. So there was a little bit of that at play.
Everett You're maybe in an industry where it's easy to have passion about what you're doing, but it's, you know, always really metric driven and it can be a life sucker, right?
Patrick Bremer Yeah. Yeah. You're kind of on the hamster wheel, kind of not. I mean, It depends. I mean, but I got to say, you know, I've been in the industry for call it a year now. And like, it's a fun industry. You meet cool people all the time. It's a global industry. So, you know, you can go to, you know, I was in France a couple times this summer, I met these guys in Marseille at a watch shop, super cool guys, super helpful. You know, they were happy to meet with me and hear about Bremoire. I left a couple hours later, they're all, you know, posting pictures of my watches and like, you know, it's just a, it's like a great community, super supportive. Um, so it's been, it's been awesome.
Everett Yeah. I mean, this is why we're here, right? Because this community is so great. We, you know, we don't do this every week because we're getting paid cause we're not Rather, we do this every week because we've just been sucked in by the people, right? The group, the community, you know, whether those are our listeners that we talk to on Instagram or, you know, just people who don't even listen, but we've just met, you know, or owners at this point, you know, we've met with dozens of owners. And it's always amazing when you meet someone and you're like, you're my friend now, we're friends.
Andrew That's the supportiveness of this community. I don't know. We dig it. Yeah. It's, it's cool. And I'm glad you've seen that.
Patrick Bremer Speaking of friends, I gotta ask since we didn't have too much time before the show. Um, so I, I obviously connected with Mike out in DC. I guess write some articles for the site. How did you end up coming to know him? Who is another super cool dude that I got to spend time with at the district time show. So I don't know. Shout out to Mike.
Andrew We don't talk about him anymore.
Everett We don't, we don't, Mike is actually he's on the outs. Uh, no, he's not. Uh, of course he's not. But so we met Mike, we started this podcast, just the two of us. It was just the two of us and we had a podcast and then, you know, those, those folks at home will know this. Um, and then we met will, we actually had will the watch clicker on our show to, to just as a guest, just like you're here today, Patrick. And we just really liked him and thought this is a good fit. And we approached Will kind of simultaneously. He was planning to approach us, which is just a beautiful notebook style love story and merged our group. So we've now Watch Clicker and 40 and 20, the Watch Clicker podcast. And Mike was a writer for Watch Clicker. So we were introduced to your watch through Mike, who I think was probably introduced to you through Lauren at the Timebone. This is a very incestuous industry. It really is. Yeah. Mike has now taken over Tempest's Fudgett Watch. I think it's probably Fudgett, but I like saying Fudgett. I like Fudgett. Which is actually a really cool website. And he's doing just a different thing. So he's no longer writing for us. We've each written each other off for Uh, wasteful, uh, wasteful humans and removed him from the group chat. None of this is true. Uh, but yeah, that's how we know Mike. And, and that is how we came to know you, Patrick.
Patrick Bremer Yeah. Yeah. Awesome. Okay. Where were we now that we've talked about Mike and how he's dead to us.
Everett And how he's dead to us. Let's talk a little bit about your, watch because that is the goods. That is what we talk about. That's why we're here. Let's talk about the Lexington. We've talked about a little bit, kind of an ancillary, uh, uh, off kilter approach. Let's just talk about the watch, man. It's a 39 millimeter. I don't know that I'd call it a dress watch, but I think it sort of evokes what a modern person may call a dress watch. Give us, give us your version. What is this watch?
Patrick Bremer Yeah. You know, I, As I think about, and again, I, I, I hesitate to call myself a designer, but there's a little bit there. Um, in design, I always like things that kind of straddles the fence of things, right? It kind of can be a dress watch. Some people might see it a little bit more as a sport watch. Cause it's got that masculine dive watch chunkiness to it.
Unknown Yeah.
Patrick Bremer Yeah. But then again, it's got the elegant stepped bezel that's polished that contrasts nicely against the brushed finishing of the majority of the rest of the case. And then you've got that, you know, beautiful, like fluted thing that narrows at the crown and then it gets big again and it runs lug to lug.
Everett And it's just what I think Mike called a ribbon chamfer, which I think is a fantastic term.
Unknown Yeah.
Patrick Bremer Beautiful term. Beautiful term. I'm going to use that moving forward now.
Everett A ribbon chamfer. So, right. You don't box Patrick Bremmer in. This isn't a dress watch, but it is a dress watch.
Patrick Bremer No. Well, you know, the Royal Oak. What is the Royal Oak?
Everett Yeah. No, they had to just start, they had to invent a term that nobody understands. Sports watch for the Royal Oak. Right. What is it? We don't even know what that means.
Andrew Nobody knows what it means, but they charge enough money that they can make new definitions. People are like, Oh, okay.
Patrick Bremer But I think one of the reasons it's so appealing is that it's got unbelievable versatility, right?
Unknown Yeah.
Patrick Bremer That goes great with the white t-shirt or the suit or the tux.
Everett Yeah. I mean, you might be pushing it with the tux and a Royal Oak, but I mean, if you've got a Royal Oak, you're just going to wear it all day. Exactly.
Patrick Bremer Yeah. I could see Bond wearing the Royal Oak.
Everett Yeah, that's right.
Patrick Bremer I could see Bond wearing the Lexington too.
Everett I think you're right. I could see it. I could see it. I think the most obvious design feature of the Lexington, well, I think there's two of them. One, that beautiful stepped bezel, and we don't see that a lot. I know that another brand that we're a big fan of, Wellsboro, a newish face in the microphone. They're working with a Japanese case designer, and he's got some of this sort of stepped bezel action happening in some of his designs, which I think is going to carry through to some of Wellsboro's design. But other than that, I'm not thinking of too many other watches that have that design feature. It's not a modern design feature.
Andrew That's what it is. Yeah.
Everett I mean, if you had to point some for inspiration there, uh, where would you point?
Patrick Bremer You know, the old 1950s Movado Cronos had steps, but their steps were flatter. Whereas in a way, all I did was just curved it up. So the steps,
Everett take a different angle upward. They climb. Yeah. As steps do. That's it. Well, I'll tell you, it's, it's a charming design. I think it's different than what we're used to. And it's so obvious once you see it, which I think is what good design should be, right? You see it and you're like, that is just really incredibly obvious, even though basically no one else does it.
Patrick Bremer Well, I think I mentioned this on the last podcast I did. It kind of surprises me, and maybe you can comment on this, but you don't see that much focus on case design. No. You see a lot of just the same case, different dials, same case. And I think that's such an opportunity for micro brands, indie brands, whatever we're calling them these days. I know I personally want to have that be a focus for Bremoire is to have interesting case designs that are like, you know, familiar to people, but different and unique. And that's, again, the beauty of creating anything that the possibilities are limitless. I mean, it's like creating music. We're never going to run out of music. There will always be new music.
Andrew Right. And I think that's something that, that you're trying to do to separate yourself from the saturated boutique, small indie micro market. I don't remember what we've settled on the four part, small name.
Everett I've settled on not spending any time thinking about it. And I just say the first term.
Andrew Oh, well that's causes confusion. Cause what if it's different every time? It might be. Doesn't matter. We see a lot of brands come out with a lot of off-the-shelf parts. Because it's cheaper and that's reasonable. When you're pouring your money into a project to make something that you want to make, cost matters. But this ground-up design is a big separator from other brands that are landing in the market. And to speak on your design, looking at pictures of this watch and you've included the Chrysler building on your website, this this watch is the Chrysler building. It's so fucking cool. Like that's that's what I see now when I see it. And it all seems it's just this ascending tower, you know, like this this great, chunky tool watch of a case that's still really elegant with steps up to the dial and an elevator dial. It's fucking dope. Yeah. Yeah.
Patrick Bremer No, but honestly, if you show the watch to somebody that hasn't seen the website, they would have no idea that it's connected to the Chrysler.
Andrew No, but if you say Chrysler building and they look at it, it's just immediate like that. The inspiration is so clearly done. And we've all seen a lot of things like this is inspired by this. And I'm like, no, you did this thing. And then you found something that looked generally like it. And you're like, this inspired it. No, this is, this is a, beautiful homage to that style of architecture and really that building specifically.
Everett And it's evocative in a way that you've avoided any sort of tackiness, right? You're able to see the elements once you know it, but it's, you know, you could have made decisions that would have been... I think less... You don't want to be literal.
Patrick Bremer No, that's right. You don't want to be literal.
Andrew Yeah, because if you do just put the Chrysler building on the case back and said, this booze is inspired by a Chrysler building and Art Deco design, miss. Yeah.
Everett And you definitely don't want to be literal when you, what you really mean is figurative too. That's another thing you don't want to be. He said, sure. Patrick said, sure. He's done with us. He's like these guys, uh,
Patrick Bremer I'm going to start giving you guys the hand signals.
Everett Yeah, yeah, yeah. Cut it off. Cut it off. So we've talked about the stepped bezel. The other, I think, design feature here that just jumps right out at you is what I'll call the sector dial. Although I don't think that that's actually what draws the attention. Although that is what your eyes see. Really what I think it is. is these absolutely stunning markers with, you know, perhaps a, uh, Chrysler tower spire at the end and the interesting loom. So, so basically the entire dial, you've done something really great with talks to the dial design and, and what you're going for there. I think it's, it's obvious enough if you look at these pictures, but let's hear it from, from the designer who may or may not be a designer.
Patrick Bremer You know, I think, I think every designer is always going to be pulling in things they love personally. And I'm a sucker for the sector dial. I think they're so cool. Just, and again, like Art Deco, the majority, let me take that back. The majority of Art Deco architecture, there's a lot of symmetry. Of course, a sector dial is incredibly symmetric. Maybe they'll have a a date window at six o'clock. But generally I think like most sector dials are without a date window.
Everett Truly symmetric. I think that's right. Yeah.
Patrick Bremer Yeah. So I love sector dial. So, you know, I, I pulled that in, we made the hour markers nice and angled so that they really catch the light beautifully.
Everett Sure. And you can tell every picture you see the, the, the markers are a different color. Sometimes they're like, Like blue, almost like it's a blue colors that polish on him just captures whatever, whatever is reflected by him. It's an incredible look.
Patrick Bremer Yeah. And then, you know, the, the idea of the triangles at the, the outside ends of the hour marker, it was just one of those things that just were like, Oh, what if we did this? And it, it worked out. beautifully, put a little loom around it. And we're like, Oh, this is, this is a great, you know, as you said, an homage, I guess, to the Chrysler building as seen in the night skyline of New York.
Everett Yeah. You know, homage is a bad word in the, in the world of watches we've found, but I think we're both big advocates to, uh, of using homage in the way it was intended. Right.
Patrick Bremer Because, well, that's because they're, People are using it as an homage to another watch. I mean.
Everett Which is really a copy. Don't get me started. Yeah. We can use better. We can use better words for that because homage is such a great word when used appropriately. But in watches, it's a dirty word because people say it to mean copy.
Andrew I made this watch. It looks just like this other watch. It's an homage to this watch. So I had to pay less for the watch.
Everett So when we say this is an homage to the Chrysler building, we mean that in the true sense, in the sense that that you've actually homaged these beautiful elements in a way that's cohesive. I think that's maybe, I think that's maybe what, what Andrew was, was getting at. And I'll just follow on with saying cohesive. That's, that's what you've done here. You've created a cohesive watch.
Patrick Bremer Well, thank you.
Everett Well, well, you're welcome. You're welcome. So Andrew's going to say something.
Andrew I want to ask. So this started as a dive watch. Right. So the case remained the same. What was the, what took you to this direction? I mean, you've already talked about liking sectors, but what was, what brought this up as, as the next, next idea to kind of come to the top to, to get here? Cause this isn't an easy decision. This is, this is a pretty complex watch.
Patrick Bremer I think if you look at, um, watches from the forties, So I'll make an admission here that we're actually outside of the age of Art Deco when we get into the forties. Forties dial designs were spectacular. These concentric circles, these beautiful chapter rings on the inside of the dial. That's, that's very forties design, which I love. So again, I'm going to incorporate things that I love and think are beautiful.
Everett Well, yeah, because when we talk about 20s watches, when we talk about 20s watches, I mean, really, we're talking about mainly feminine watches, or at least from a design aspect, we're talking about very small watches. We're talking about primarily square watches, also pocket watches. Or gigantors, yeah. And so we really don't get into modern watch design. for another, as you've said, until really the forties is when modern watch design sort of takes off. So it's, it's almost unavoidable that you're not going to be able to, the source material is just not there.
Patrick Bremer Yeah. And again, and again, I never set out to make replicas of watches in the twenties, you know, that it's always inspired by the twenties and thirties. So, yeah. But, you know, as I look at the watch, Because I've got one in front of me as well. Another thing I love about design is mixing textures and creating contrast. And so there was a lot of deliberate design that went into creating contrasts of polished versus brushed. Sure. So on the dial, the majority of the dial is a matte finish. The chapter ring in the middle is a metallic brushed finish that gives a nice, again, nice contrast.
Unknown Yeah.
Everett Yeah. You know, the, so, so I think that the contrast is, is really the sort of glaring feature of this watch. And I don't say that in a bad way. Did you find yourself, did you find yourself having to pull anything back in any time, just in the design process? We don't talk a ton about design here on the show because it can be a little boring, but I'm curious about this with this particular watch. I know we've talked about the evolution from dive to what this is now, but within that, once you really knew what this watch was going to be, did you have to pull back from that at all on any aspects?
Patrick Bremer I think, yeah, I think you're, you're always, you're always pulling back because you're always over-designing because it's easy to over-design. And that's, I think that's a mistake that a lot of designers and brands make. There's, There's too much happening on the dial, right? Your eye doesn't know where to go. It's busy. And again, it's, it's okay. I know like if you've got a chronograph, you need a tachometer and you need all these, these markers, right? So a chronograph is naturally going to be a little bit busier, but on a three-hander, if you really want to strip it down. He could go the three hands and maybe 12, 3, 6, and 9.
Everett Right. You can go two hands. You can go Bauhaus. There's a, there's a lot of ways you could overdo that.
Patrick Bremer Yeah. Yeah. But at the same time, I will say that, you know, for a while in the aughts, the whole minimalist thing, this was when, you know, movement watches was coming up, Daniel Wellington. I mean, no offense to those guys, but. Those watches were boring as... You couldn't tell a Daniel Wellington from a movement from any other of the gazillion brands that were making watches with the two hands and then, you know, the dashes around the minute track and that's it.
Andrew And no one's doing anything especially unique in that space. No one's using cool movements. No one's using cool technology. It's all very, pedestrian, produced for the masses.
Patrick Bremer But moving aside though, it's like... The design isn't there. The dial is just zero personality. And zero creativity.
Everett The watch I think about, I mean, really, it's this concept to the nth degree, but the Movado Museum watch, which is a famous watch. And the idea of the Movado Museum is really beautiful that that museum dial. It's a really fun concept. And it was, you know, like Jackson Pollock, perhaps, or whatever, right? The the original is a is art. And then beyond and then beyond that original. It's boring, right?
Patrick Bremer Because I was gonna say it's amazing because they did it first. Yes, yes. They did it first.
Everett The idea is the beautiful thing as opposed to this execution that everybody knows is easy. That's what's great about it is it was easy, but until someone thought about it, it didn't exist.
Andrew And then now, you know, we have brands who are entirely built around that model. Right.
Patrick Bremer But, but guys, I'm going through this exercise right now because I'm, we're working on another model.
Everett Well, well, that's, that's great. That's a perfect segue. So let's talk about it because Art Deco, I think it is a huge, Art Deco is a huge idea and sort of like modernism, which I think Art Deco and modernism parallel each other in a lot of ways, you know, contemporaries of the two ideas are contemporaries of one another. They're sort of unique in that they are kind of a climax of certain principles, right? So modernism is what we call modernism, is followed closely by post-modernism, right? Which suggests some sort of climax. I think in some ways Art Deco is maybe less climactic, but similar in that we get to this, you know, precipice. And in terms of industry, in terms of art, in terms of philosophical concepts, the whole world is doing a thing and about to roll down a hill the other direction. So you've got ideas there. You've got concepts. You've got ideas. The subject material is great. How do you as a designer though, how do you as a designer maintain that brand language that you've in some ways married yourself to? Obviously brands can evolve and, but, but the way you've put your brand out, you've dedicated yourself to our tech. So how do you take those ideas and keep from being weird or played out? Um, and, and does that go on for forever? Do you think?
Patrick Bremer Yeah. I mean, you, You definitely have to kind of pick what is going to be my distinguishing brand feature, if you will. Um, I had an actually interesting conversation, you know, a few weeks back in France with these guys, I just had mentioned the Marseille boys, the Marseille boys, and these guys had actually designed their own Go figure. Dive watch. 50 watches, sold them out in like a week. But they were, they were trying to tell me and convince me that the way to go is just to don't change the case and just change the dials.
Andrew Which is a really common method.
Patrick Bremer Incredibly common because it makes business sense. Yeah. And I get it. And I was like, I was like, yeah, I kind of get it, but that's fucking boring.
Unknown Yeah.
Patrick Bremer Pure and simple. Like how am I going to, how am I going to use the case for the Lexington on another model that's inspired by another piece of architecture? They won't work at all.
Andrew Or another idea. Are you married to architecture? Is that kind of, is that the going to be the inspirational jam of the brand is iconic buildings. And that's that I think that can be really cool because that can translate across forever.
Patrick Bremer Well, and the beautiful thing, I think I mentioned this before, but what's fun about Art Deco is it was a it was global. You know, you go to any major city around the world. I don't care if you're in Paris, Sydney, Australia, Mumbai. You'll find Art Deco buildings.
Andrew Yeah, it's there, right?
Patrick Bremer Because during the twenties and early thirties, the whole world was building in this design style.
Everett And everybody was building.
Patrick Bremer Yeah.
Everett People were fucking building.
Patrick Bremer Those were boom years.
Everett Yeah. Well, so what are you going to give us in terms of teasers here? Because you're working on the next watch. You've admitted to it.
Patrick Bremer Yeah. I'll give you the same teasers that have already been out there. I'll give you the, the name of the building. It's we're bringing it back to LA, actually. And it's funny, because most people think we're based in New York, just because Chrysler building, I tagged a lot of the posts, New York, sure to go along with the Lexington and the New York thing. But I'm based here in LA, you know, some of the guys that support me are based here in LA. So we're bringing it back to LA. We're going to do a watch inspired by the Griffith Observatory.
Everett Oh yeah. What? Okay. And I actually saw that you posted a picture on Instagram of the Griffith Observatory.
Patrick Bremer I think that was on my personal feed.
Everett It may have been.
Patrick Bremer You creep, Andrew. Sorry.
Everett Yeah. Yeah. That's right. Andrew's also a creep. I linked it to him. I sent it to him.
Andrew He doesn't admit to it.
Patrick Bremer Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. No, but it's fabulous. Fabulous building. Beautiful. It's iconic. It's, If you've never been, it's like, it's maybe one of those second tier tourist destinations. That's totally worth it. Like you go up there and you go for a hike, you look at the Hollywood sign, you can do a picnic in front of the building. You have sweeping views of LA. I mean, on a clear day, it's like, it's a wow type of place.
Everett The location was chosen for its prominence, uh, above its surrounding, above its surroundings.
Patrick Bremer Yeah. Yeah.
Everett Yeah.
Patrick Bremer So, so naturally we're going to do a moon phase.
Everett Okay. I think that fits.
Patrick Bremer So was that a mic drop?
Everett I think it fits so well. I'm really looking forward to seeing what you've come up with. It's going to be good. That's super exciting.
Andrew Yeah.
Everett I like it. So you are selling watches right now. Currently watches for sale.
Patrick Bremer Watches for sale, watches for sale.
Andrew Are there any not available? Because you've got the Lexington and four colorways.
Everett Interestingly named colorways. Yeah. Do you like the names or no? I like the names. What I noted was that even though there was opportunity for some sort of thematic consistency to the names, you've really gone in different directions with all of So one is named after a restaurant. One is named after a city. One is named after a cigar, even though there was a very obvious city that you could have chosen in that collection. And one's named after an outfit. So that is, I like it. No criticism. Did you have conversations about these?
Andrew These are all roaring 20s ideas. And you think about like, Morocco and the Cohiba, but no, these all make sense for me.
Patrick Bremer Well, they all have, they all have a bit of a backstory. Um, and I think maybe some of that's on the website, maybe not, but we, we spent our, we spent our time deep diving.
Andrew We didn't look at the story of the colors. We apologize.
Patrick Bremer Yeah. Well, the blue and silver one, we call it the cloud club. Um, the cloud club was an infamous, I should say an infamous, a men's only lunch spot at the top of the Chrysler building. Cause that was the times and the places where it was men only power lunches, big time business moguls. It was a private club. So you have to have a membership to go and dine there.
Everett So that you could have booze probably.
Patrick Bremer Yeah. I'm sure. Cause it was two level. There was like, club level and then dining level. Um, although, although we should set the record straight, Chrysler building, I believe opened in 1930. So it opened post prohibition.
Everett Okay. Fair enough. Fair enough. Uh, and so, so Morocco, obvious enough, right? These colors, you've got the blue and gold.
Patrick Bremer Morocco was was chosen because the lobby of the building they use Moroccan marble.
Unknown Uh huh.
Patrick Bremer Okay, beautiful. Yeah, like a like a beautiful auburn reddish Moroccan stone in the lobby.
Everett Okay, we've got Cohiba. And it occurred to me, you may have gone with Havana for that colorway, but I like Cohiba. In fact, I think Cohiba is probably the coolest cigar brand in the world. Let's talk about that decision.
Patrick Bremer Cohiba only because, you know, it's a beautiful chocolatey dial, like a cigar. Sure. It has that deep, rich brown. And it is a stunning color, by the To your point, Havana in the 1920s was a place where Americans went regularly and freely and they gambled there and they partied there. And it was like, that's when Havana was popping off.
Everett Yeah. And I don't, the other one, I don't really get tuxedo. I just don't get it.
Unknown Yeah, that one.
Everett It doesn't make any sense.
Andrew Just It's classic. What do you want?
Everett Clack silver. No, I'm joking. Obviously it makes a ton of sense. Well, beautiful watches available now. I wanted to, they're available on your website, which is pretty common for folks that come on our show. Oftentimes their watches are available on their website. Oftentimes, I can think of a couple of exceptions, but oftentimes that's exclusive. You are different. from most of the brands that we talked to in that you've got a fairly well-developed retailer network. And so you've just given us a so-so hand motion suggesting you're maybe not happy with the development, but in any event, four separate retailers, retail partners, and in the age of direct internet sales, that's uncommon. How did you develop those relationships and how was that going?
Patrick Bremer Yeah, you know, this is another topic I feel like we could spend a very long time talking about it because it's an interesting one.
Everett You mean like the economic situation we find ourselves in globally?
Patrick Bremer That too. You know, a industry veteran who I went to for a bit of advice pre-launch, he highly recommended that I try to develop some retail channels. And his argument was, whether it's this watch or the next one, or as you grow, you're going to want to have those guys helping you sell watches so that you can stay focused on running your business, designing the next watches, dealing with your supply chain, dealing with your inventory, doing your marketing. I mean, there's a lot. that goes into it, you know? Um, so I was like, okay, yeah, maybe it's, maybe it's a smart idea. Um, there's of course, pros and cons to having the retailers. I mean, obviously they need to be compensated.
Unknown Right.
Everett So the margin goes, the margin goes somewhere, right? The myth of the middleman being cut out is, is just that it's a myth. So now you've created, you've created a middleman.
Patrick Bremer Yeah, no, if you're selling direct to consumer, you are cutting out the middleman, but you're also cutting out maybe a whole channel that could help you sell more. I'll give you an example. I've got one jeweler out in Palm Desert, which is about two hours outside of Los Angeles. It's right next to Palm Springs.
Everett Emerick Jewels, if you're in Palm Desert.
Andrew Great guy. Rick is the owner. It says Palm Desert and other desert cities. The exit off of the, uh, what's the free, the East West freeway that goes through there.
Patrick Bremer The 10.
Andrew Yeah. Off the 10. Palm Desert and other desert cities. It was a horrifying sign to see.
Everett So tell us about Amarok.
Patrick Bremer Um, so yeah, I, I, I was out in the area for God knows what, maybe visiting some friends or doing some business out there. This was when I had the just the prototypes, my four prototypes. And this is on the back end of the conversation with this industry veteran. And I literally walked, they have like a it's called Paseo. It's their main strip. It's and Palm Desert is a very affluent area. So on Paseo, it's basically the Rodeo Drive of the desert. You've got your Louis Vuitton, you've got all these big brand names that are there and a lot of jewelry stores. So I spent a couple hours literally going into every jewelry store, being like, hey, check these out. Any interest in possibly carrying these? And Rick at Emmerich Jewels was the last stop I made before I was just going to jump in my car and Get out of my way.
Andrew Was he the last stop because it was the last stop on the way back to your car? Was he the last stop? Cause you finally got it. And you're like, that's enough. I win today and I'm moving on.
Patrick Bremer No, he was kind of like the last shop that I had not been into. Yeah, that's good.
Andrew That's a win. And that's a, that's like a primo spot to have anything because just, just the impulse purchasing in that environment. Hey, this is new. I haven't seen this before. I got it.
Patrick Bremer And again, it's about being where, Sorry to be a little bit crude, but being where the money is.
Unknown Yeah.
Patrick Bremer It's a, it's a place where there's, it's all snowbirds. So people with second homes, third homes, fourth homes, um, and you're presenting them with something new that no one else has because there's not that many of these watches. Right. So a lot of them are like, Oh, this is cool. Oh, this is a thousand bucks. Yeah. Swipe my credit card. Right. Right. Too easy. Like no problem. Um, so he's been great. I mean, he's, he's moved like quite a few of them at this point.
Andrew Is that kind of luxury feel part of your decision-making to go Swiss in your movement?
Everett Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Let's talk about the movement real quick. And then we're going to have to, and then we're going to have to sort of move this forward. Um, STP, uh, STP movement. So you'd be 111, uh, no date, which is kind of the, the standard STP movement. It's not a movement we see a lot. And I don't know that there are any good reasons for that. It's just of, of the kind of player three hand, no date movements. It's, it's maybe the least common. How did you settle on STP and, and what have you guys done to that movement to sort of, you know, I know you've, you've done some, some stuff to that.
Patrick Bremer Yeah. Um, you know, it's, uh, at a 20, 24 clone, similar to the Salida SW 100, I believe something like that. 200 dash one or whatever. So architecturally it's sound, right? It's a, it's a design that's been around forever. The beauty of these clones or cloning a movement that's been around forever is that any watchmaker can service them.
Everett Right. Right. Often one-to-one part compatibility.
Patrick Bremer Totally. And I just, I read an article on, I think it was a blog to watch. Those guys went to the factory and said great things. And, you know, I got in touch with them and ordered the movements directly. That's a cool experience. That's nice. Yeah. We customized them and, and then, you know, the watches are assembled here in the US. So that's a really nice layer of quality control. So those guys, um, fine time solutions, uh, FTS, Arizona. Yeah. Yeah. They're on Arizona. Awesome dudes, by the way, shout out to those guys. Um, you know, yeah, they get the movements, they get to check them. They get to, you know, pull out any that are nonconforming, if you will. And, you know, What I have to remind people is anytime you're dealing with a mechanical movement, and you're dealing with 300 of them, there will be some movements that you're gonna have are not performing. Right? Yeah, perfectly. Like this is, this is normal. Yeah. And it's why, you know, a lot of companies, including grimoire, we offer, you know, a two year warranty. So that typically will get you past the the point of finding out if there's an issue with the movement.
Andrew Yeah. You'll find out in the first year if there's a problem with the movement.
Patrick Bremer Probably sooner than that, to be honest.
Everett Yeah. Well, so Greg, we've talked about, we've talked about your current watch, the Lexington. We've talked about your future watch, the Griffith Observatory watch. We've talked about... I'm imagining a bubble diver. That's what I want. That'd be cool.
Patrick Bremer It's going to be a bubble diver. What is a bubble diver?
Andrew A big ass bubble crystal diver. We're talking 2000 meters of water resistance here. Right.
Everett With a moon phase, obviously. With a moon phase. What have we not talked about? I guess that's my question for you, Patrick, because we've got you here. We probably don't have you here for very much longer. Are you going to join us like permanently on a semi-permanent basis here?
Patrick Bremer I could. Okay. I'm available.
Everett What, what, what else do, do you want to tell us about, about Bremoir or about Lexington or about what's coming up for you guys?
Patrick Bremer Oh man. Um, well I do have, uh, something coming up that is going to be in the much shorter term than the Griffith and I'm not a hundred percent settled on that name. We'll see.
Everett That's the working, that's the working name. It's in pencil still. Okay. Yeah. Fair enough.
Patrick Bremer Yeah. We might solidify it as the Griffith. I don't know. We'll see. We are going to be releasing a new dial variant. Oh yeah. We're going for number five. And what's funny is this is a dial that I wanted to release first and the Cohiba was its replacement. Yeah. So I'm going to give you a quick look at it. Very hard to see it through, you know, a computer screen.
Andrew Sure. It's going to blurt out. He knows exactly what's about to happen. He's got one of those zoom call blur screens. Every time he moves his hands away, it's just, it's, it's blurred out.
Everett All right. You've promised the goods. The folks at home won't be able to. Oh, it is blurred out. Yeah. Oh, fantastic. So are, is that, are we going to, is that it's safe to call that champagne?
Patrick Bremer It's close. That's another thing I'm,
Everett This is terrible light, but, uh. No, it's beautiful. So what we're looking at, we're looking at a gold ring. I assume it's the same gold ring as on the Morocco, copper, excuse me. And then, and then maybe an off-white or a crude dial.
Patrick Bremer It's like a sunset sand or.
Andrew Sounds like you haven't settled on the name yet.
Everett I have not. Call the Grand Seiko folks. They're really good at this sort of thing.
Patrick Bremer Yeah. But but my my first.
Andrew That's a beautiful colorway.
Patrick Bremer Yes. I wish you could see it in better light. I'll send you pictures after the show, but it's it's super nice. And like I said, it's one of the colors that I wanted to launch initially. But unfortunately, the factory just wasn't really getting it right. I wasn't happy with it.
Andrew And I was like, all right, we'll wait, you know, and looking at your colorway options that that that colorway. perfectly rounds out the family.
Everett Yeah. Maybe, maybe fair to say it was missing from the family.
Patrick Bremer Well, it's, it's nice because it's a, it's a lighter color. So it's going to be a great summer, fall watch. Um, and the other thing is the Morocco and the Cohiba are selling the best people just love that copper ring. So this is another one that, um, should sell pretty well.
Everett Fantastic. So if you want to look at these, you can do so at bremoire.com. We didn't talk about Bremoire. Is it okay if I tell this anecdote? So it's a combination of your name, Bremer, and memoir. Right. Which is beautiful. It works so well. And I think it's great. If you want to find a Bremoire watch, you can do that right from your iPhone, sitting in your lawn chair. It is B-R-E-M-O-I-R, bremoir.com. You can also, if you are so inclined, several brick and mortars. We've got Grand Central Watch in New York City. We've got Gibson in Los Angeles. We've got For the People in Phoenix, and as discussed, Amarik Jewelers in Palm Desert and other desert cities. And other desert cities, yes. And so check these guys out. Check this watch out because it's beautiful. I know that you guys have a website and you're updating with blogs. Your Instagram is very interesting. It's not the typical watch brand Instagram, I'd say. I think you do a fun thing with the art deco, the jazz. It's an interesting social media identity. I think it's fun. I think it's enjoyable. I'd say give them a follow. That's at Bremoire at Instagram, correct? That's it. And where else can people find you if they wanted to do so?
Patrick Bremer Well, I'm in L.A. pretty much full time. So anytime you're in L.A., hit me up. We can get a coffee, grab a beer, show you the watches. I'm probably going to be in New York at the The Warning Wound Show in October, I believe that will happen.
Everett Yeah, in the new location.
Patrick Bremer Yeah.
Andrew I think we'll both be there. Are you planning on being there?
Everett I think we'll both be there.
Andrew Correct.
Everett We'll both be there.
Everett Cool. We can have a tequila grapefruit cocktail, perhaps.
Patrick Bremer Let's do it.
Andrew It'll be October. It's whiskey time by October time. So fair enough.
Everett Yeah. Well, great. Andrew.
Andrew Other things. What do you got? I got something. We've been drinking all night. We have been. I was, you know, in, in like, Oh, you mean we've been drinking your other thing all night?
Everett Yeah. All night.
Andrew Cause we have been also just drinking all night. No, no. We've been drinking your other thing all night. The other thing. So my other thing is my go-to summer, like when it's hot summer cocktail, which is a cheap a hundred percent agave tequila. And that's the key a hundred percent agave. So my go-to is El Hemador. It's great, great classic tequila. Super clean. I usually get the Blanco. This is the Añejo. I decided to try the Añejo and I think it comes through the grapefruit a little bit better. And just cheap as you can find a grapefruit juice. Mix it as strong as you like. Put it on some ice. Super refreshing. Delicious. This is my go-to summer cocktail. So if you're looking for something to lighten up your summer drinking habits, 100% agave tequila and grapefruit.
Everett Delicious. Also sneaky.
Andrew It's yeah, I know it gets you there.
Everett It's sneaky. It's a sneaky cocktail.
Andrew Yeah. Cause of the sweetness of the grapefruit juice. Right.
Everett Fantastic. It's been really good. And I'm glad, I'm glad that that is your other thing. Um, Patrick, I know you've prepared another thing cause we, we talked about the preparation and you were a little mysterious when you said I've got something. So I'm curious to hear other things. What do you got?
Patrick Bremer Uh, I have spent quite a bit of time in France this summer. Um, my fiance is French, so relatively newly engaged. So we've been spending some time in France. Congratulations. There's just a lot happening there.
Everett And she's not one of the Marseille boys, I assume. No, she's not.
Patrick Bremer Hey, but you know, today, you don't know.
Andrew You don't know? Yeah. No, that's fair.
Patrick Bremer That that's right. You never know. But, uh, but yeah, no, I just, I've been traveling in France and I hadn't spent much time there ever before. I've been to Paris. You know, once, uh, I'd never been down to the French Riviera. I got down there last trip, spent a little time in Provence, which I had always heard was this amazing, magical region of Southern France and just the greatest food on earth.
Everett And
Patrick Bremer And highly, highly recommend gentlemen, highly recommend.
Everett And so any places in particular in Provence that you thought this is, this is it, this is it for me.
Patrick Bremer Um, well kind of the, the big city, it's not much of a city, but it's, it was cool and charming and fun is Aix, Aix-en-Provence. It's spelled A-I-X. Um, you know, it's just it's so great being back in Europe after not being there so long with COVID. And, you know, going out on a Friday night, you go into these beautiful plazas, and there's chairs and tables everywhere. And everyone's drinking outside. Like, man, it was so much fun. Just like I was thinking, man, there's there's so few places in the United States where you can get that where you can get Tons of tables outside, you know, because of course the open container laws, there are a little bit loosey doosey, if you will.
Everett Yeah. As if it's not open, it's a problem in Europe, right?
Patrick Bremer Yeah. Yeah, exactly. If it's not open, what are you doing?
Andrew Well, and what's your experience traveling in France? So it sounds like you hit all these places. And I think for most Americans, when we're like, Oh, well you went to five places in France. We look at an overlay of France versus the United States. It's like, just it's like Illinois, Wisconsin, and Ohio. Like, so is that, is that amount of travel pretty common across the country to be like going border to border over the course of, you know, several days?
Patrick Bremer Uh, I was definitely mostly in the South. Um, and it was great because we, we were hosted up and we would do day trips to places and come back and have home base. And that's the beauty of, you know, Europe, everything is so much smaller and closer and you can, you can do that. You can leave your home base and go see a totally different area and drive back at night and, and it's all good.
Everett And so I imagine if I was in South of France eating and drinking at cafes, I'd probably like just jump right in and like be smoking cigarettes and just doing, you just do the full meal deal, right?
Patrick Bremer Oh yeah. They're, they're still cranking on those six.
Andrew The heaters. Sucking heat rods. And we drink Silver Bullets here, but I imagine they're drinking delicious cocktails or wine. Or wine. Yeah.
Patrick Bremer Yeah. Well, that's. But you're right. The food is like next level.
Everett Yeah. So great. I don't know that we've ever had a whole country is another thing. So that's, that's new for us. I liked it.
Andrew It'll be hard to link to. Yeah.
Everett Yeah. It's just a Wikipedia page. I'm just going to put up the flag. France. Um, uh, very cool. This one thing that I haven't done as much as I'd like to is travel. So, uh, I, I actually am inspired by your other thing.
Patrick Bremer Yeah. You gotta get out there, man. Gotta get out there.
Everett So I've got another thing for this week. It's, it's, Also based on traveling.
Unknown Okay.
Everett But it's maybe less sexy. Is that okay?
Andrew Because you're saying it. It's because I'm saying it. Text him the other thing and have him say it.
Everett I've got another thing. It is a, it's a stove. It's a camping stove. It's a camping stove by like the least sexy company on the face of the earth called Coleman.
Andrew Uh, this is. The second time you're doing this.
Everett Have I done this one before? So I went camping this weekend and we brought, is this really the second time I've done this stove?
Andrew 100%. The, the dual fuel.
Everett Yeah. Well, look guys, it's worth a second go around because every time I pull this thing out when we're camping, so what it is, is a Coleman powerhouse. I think it's a 414 or something. It's a dual fuel stove. It runs on white gas. It actually runs on gasoline and a number of different gases, but you know, I feel like this is the stove that all of our dads had. and that none of us have. We go camping. We went camping with 10 families this weekend. So 10 families and nobody had a proper cooking stove. There were several sort of half assed cooking stoves. Um, some people cooking on fires, which is cool. That's respectable. And I had this, I had my Coleman stove and it was like, it was like a hit because it's so good. It's so good. Uh, that basically everybody who was in the camp when we were cooking is like, man, I got to get one of these. They're not cheap. It's like 200 bucks for these things, which is how long have you had it? I've had mine since 2006. I know exactly when I bought it. I've had it since 2006 and it looks like it's, it's getting older now, right? This is now like actually literally, as we said, dad's camp. So, so my kids will grow up understanding that this was dad's cook stove, but it's just, I think it's one of my favorite things that I own because it's so perfect at doing the job that it sets out to do. Better technology than all of the new stoves that you can buy. It's fantastic.
Andrew And it's because of the simplicity. That's it. It's, there are no frills. There are no bells and whistles. You put fuel in the fucker, you fire it up and you have fire.
Everett And the construction is right. The construction is sort of like that 1960s Uh, there's some things that are a little bit suspect with the construction, but it's, it's, they, they overbuilt it everywhere where, you know, like they've got folded spot welded steel, but they've overbuilt it all. So it's just going to last forever. Enamel paint. It's it's great. I'm sorry.
Patrick Bremer It's made in America. Cause it's cold. Actually, it's probably not.
Everett It's probably not. Yeah. I don't know that, but it's certainly has that feel to it, which is all that really matters. I dig it. That's a, it's a worthwhile. I'm sorry. It's the second time. Andrew, the look of disappointment on your face.
Andrew No, it's actually, it's sheer amusement.
Patrick Bremer This is the, I'm telling you, Andrew, would you make up for Everett's misstep here?
Andrew I intend to also link to the previous show and timestamp when you did this other thing. Cause I swear to God that's verbatim what you said the first round, which is indicative of just how true it's true. It is separation of at least one, but probably two years. You're the only one with a fire going and everyone else is cooking with bullshit and backpacking stoves. Yeah. At a camping site. Yeah. Yeah. That's right. Like Jetboil. No Jetboil is for backpacking. Jetboil is not for camping. That's right. Camping, stove, big old cast iron skillet.
Everett We've got room in the minivan. Yeah. We've got room in the minivan. You don't have to carry it.
Andrew Yeah. You don't have to carry it. It doesn't matter if it weighs 12 pounds.
Everett Patrick Bremmer of Bremoire Watches. Parting thoughts. What do you got, man?
Patrick Bremer Parting thoughts? Um, I don't know. I mean, I'm just, uh, we didn't really talk about the whole micro brand scene, but it's pretty cool these days. I mean, there's a lot of awesome, interesting indie brands, micro brands. Again, I know that's a debatable term, but, uh, Yeah, I would just encourage people to support the little guys because they're doing some cool things. And one day they might not be so small anymore.
Everett If you said that to a room full of our listeners, I think you'd hear protests of preaching to the choir because I think that's the people that listen to this show and certainly that's what we're into. So you're in great company. It's been a total pleasure to have you. Again, brumwar.com, at brumwar on Instagram, you know, and also Emmerich Jewelers in Palm Desert. Andrew, Andrew, anything you want to add?
Andrew I'm out of things, man.
Everett Hey, look, you guys, seriously, thank you. Thank you for joining us for this episode of 40 and 20, The Watch Clicker Podcast.
Patrick Bremer Absolute blast. Signing off, gentlemen. Thank you so much.
Everett Check us out on Instagram at 40 and 20 or at watch clicker. You can also check us out, uh, check Patrick out at, at Bremoir. Uh, you can check us out on our website, watch clicker.com and at Bremoir.com for Patrick. If you want to support our show, you can do that at patreon.com slash 40 and 20. We really appreciate your support. You guys, all of those who are patrons. We love you. Thank you so much. And don't forget to tune back in next Thursday for another hour of watches, food, drinks, life, and other things for like a while.