Interest in this was great as mokume is a uniquely Japanese technique
imitation Tag Heuer watches
Interest in this was great as mokume is a uniquely Japanese technique and art form, and it therefore rarely happens that Europeans apply these techniques to typical everyday European products such as watches. Mishima was the first to order a watch from Kees, which on its arrival created quite a stir, and the concept of the present series was born.
The technique of mokume gane (“wood eye” or “wood eye metal”) traces its conceptual birth in the methods used for traditional Japanese swordmaking. The hot steel used to create the blade is folded over itself dozens of times and then beaten out into the proper shape by hand. On close examination, these layers of metal can almost be mistaken for wood grain or some similar organic form, hence the descriptive name referring to wood.
There are however, several real differences between this concept of folding used in swordmaking and the actual technique used in mokume. For one, mokume gane is composed only of nonferrous materials, and instead of folding, the layering is consciously built up in regards to color and thickness, which can contain more than twenty-five of these metal layers. These metal plates are then very tightly clamped together and placed in an oven. The heating must be closely controlled so as not to melt the layers, only fusing them together. This creates a new crystalline structure between each layer and the result is a new, coherent total mass, which can be worked as if it were one piece. This block of layered metal is then worked over with U-shaped chisels in a pattern of choice over its surface. The artisan can also choose just how deep to go, much in the fashion of chiseling grooves in wood. The block is then put through a high-pressure roller several times, making it longer and thinner, and the whole process is then repeated. The final thickness is achieved through several of these steps, with the possibility to fold the metal or remove material with chisels at each stage of the process, consequently generating new resulting patterns.
Through the combination of the openings in the layers and the differences in ductility or taffy-like ‘stretchability’ of the metals in the original piece of metal, all kinds of beautiful patterns emerge. In the hands of experts, these swirls and patterns can be planned quite precisely in shape, size placement and regularity. In combination with a large number of metals—gold, white gold, red gold, green gold, platinum, palladium, copper, nickel and many others—the effects are breathtaking. But that is not all.
It is also possible to naturally color the metals through the application of salts, ammonia, acids and other solutions, which can color just one metal in the multilayered matrix. Then, to make it all even more complex, one must also consider the three dimensions that the piece fills, and the layers through which the final shape will traverse. Working with mokume gane requires not only deep technical and metallur-gical knowledge, but also three-dimensional insight into the hidden forms invisible from the outer surface. Kees’ choice was not only to use these complicated techniques but also to apply them for the first time to the world confined within the boundaries of a wristwatch.
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