Decaminute watch turns your day decimal.

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Design submitted by Logan from the USA.

Logan says: I interpreted Tokyoflash’s slogan, “change the way you think about time,” as a design challenge: create a watch that will convince a traditionalist that there are advantages to thinking differently about time.

Decaminute is an analog watch based on this idea: we’re used to counting with the decimal system, so it’s more natural to read the time is hours-tens of minutes-single minutes than as hours-minutes.  The watch has a single hand that rotates once every 10 minutes, with highly legible markers for single minutes.  At the left (between the 7 and 8-minute markers, the traditional 9 o’clock position), there is a window showing jumping hours and jumping tens of minutes.  The overall effect is faster, more natural time reading, and a bonus is that having only 10 major divisions on the dial instead of 12 means that there is more space for subdivisions — 0.1 minute subdivisions.  The extra space and lengthened 0.5 minute markers makes these subdivisions very easy to read.

Decaminute can be appreciated by people who love traditional watch designs, but want to explore new methods of reading the time, or by people who love Tokyoflash-style time reading, but want to explore classical designs.  I hope this design will attract people who would not normally consider wearing a Tokyoflash watch and also Tokyoflash fans who are bored with traditional watches.

Innovating in the analog time world is difficult without adding complexity.  Decaminute represents a new way to think about time, but is no more complex — and possibly simpler — than traditional analog designs.

11 thoughts on “Decaminute watch turns your day decimal.”

  3. Very nice and simple way to make a traditional looking time piece new and interesting.
    For me it looks a little too traditional (in the context of this blog anyway) if I saw it in a shop and compared it to regular watches it would certainly stand out! Very cool idea and definately support worthy 5/Y Best of luck Logan! 😀

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  5. I’m not 100% sure I understand the concept, but if I got it right six o’clock standard time (half way between 0 and twelve) would be five o’clock decaminute time? Six thirty standard time would be 5.50 (half of twelve + half of one hour)

    If this is the idea behind the concept then the time gets very complicated very quickly.

    For example;
    Three o’clock standard time would be 2.50 (one quarter of 10.00).
    Three fifteen = 2.75 or 2.50 (one quarter of 10.00) + .25 (one quarter of an hour).

    I don’t think this is a ‘simple’ way of converting twelve hour clock to the decimal system, but it is a fascinating idea for math geeks and people who are good at doing quick arithmetic in thier heads.

    Even though its just a concept you have certainly gotten my attention already.

    I wonder if I can convince my colleagues to start talking about time using your new decaminute standard.

    Our ten o’clock meeting would be renamed (8.3333333 recurring) meeting.

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  6. I just studied the clock face more closely and saw that the hours counter goes all the way up to twelve.
    so it’s just the minutes that become decimals. Still interesting, but also as you said simple and easy to understand.

    Although I am still fascinated by the idea of using a decimal base ten system for telling the time.

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  7. Ok I totally missed the point of this one.

    The watch doesn’t actually change the hours and minutes to a base ten decimal system, it just changes the way we read the digits in the time.

    far more simple and elegant concept and completely different to the assumption I first jumped to.

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  8. Thanks for the feedback, everyone.

    Guy, I like the idea of a fully decimal watch, too, but it just wouldn’t be practical. This, I think, is practical — even useful — while still being partly decimal. For me, it would be easier to think about 0.2 minutes than 12 seconds. I did earlier submit a decimalized hours concept (also not full decimal), which you might like: http://www.tokyoflash.com/blog/2011/05/decimal-hours-analog-watch-design

    Incidentally, various base-10 forms of time-telling have a long history (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Decimal_time).

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  10. I like almost everything about this concept, except that the straps should be closer to the case. I love one-hand watches. I wouldn’t hesitate a second to buy one, either the black & orange or black & gray. ( I don’t like the cream-colored dial & white or gray dial with black marker would also be nice ) 5*

    ( I’m not sure that TokyoFlash is the good place for a concept like this, but I’m happy they post it )

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