balmuda's pocket watch clock shows users what time could feel like

Balmuda’s pocket watch-inspired The Clock

Telling what time it is isn’t what Balmuda has in mind, but allowing users to experience what it could feel like using lights, relax time, and sounds. Named The Clock, the pocket watch-shaped device features no hands, but a system called the Light Hour. It’s a dial that uses illumination rather than physical markers to show the time. The light moves across the face in a slow, pendulum-like arc, a reference the design team made explicit by visiting the Foucault pendulum at the National Museum of Nature and Science in Tokyo during development.

A Foucault pendulum moves so slowly that its motion is almost imperceptible in real time, but over hours it traces a full rotation. The Clock borrows that quality: time shown not as a countdown but as a passage. The Clock’s body is machined from a solid block of aluminum, resulting in an overall weight of 200 grams. The object charges via USB-C and comes in a cloth carrying bag, in case the users want to bring it with them wherever they go. When they do, the pocket watch-inspired clock can fit their palms, accompanying their travels.

all images courtesy of Balmuda

Device that plays seven sound recordings

Three functions sit inside that Balmuda’s pocket watch-inspired The Clock. The device comes with a Relax Time mode that plays seven original sound recordings, including rain, river, fireplace, produced in-house and with outside musicians. They play three minutes before the alarm goes off, with the volume rising slowly. By the time the alarm sounds, the room is already filled with the sound, gently waking up the user compared to traditional clocks that start off with loud rings. Then, there’s the focus timer, which runs from one minute to sixty and has white noise beneath the countdown. All three functions are controlled through the Balmuda Connect app over Bluetooth or Wi-Fi.

Gen Terao, the founder of Balmuda, has said that the starting point for The Clock was a personal habit. He played rain sounds on a tablet at night to fall asleep, but the screen lit up the room and interrupted his sleep. The Clock offers to relieve that by producing sound without emitting light. About half of a person’s day is personal time, including sleep, and Balmuda built The Clock around that half. The phone stays in the other room, while the Clock stays on the nightstand, slowly making users experience the passage of time.

telling what time it is isn’t what Balmuda has in mind, but allowing users to experience what it could feel like