Watches, Stories, and Gear: The King of King Seikos, Your New Favorite Coffee Maker, and More

“Watches, Stories, and Gear” is a weekly roundup of some our favorite watch content from Worn & Wound, great stories from around the web, and cool gear that we’ve got our eye on.

This week’s installment is brought to you by The Windup Watch Shop.

Watches

Affordable Vintage: Why the King Seiko 44-9990 (44KS) Rules Them All

“In 1959, Daini Seikosha hired a young designer by the name of Taro Tanaka, the man who would in 1962 create a set of design principles that he called the Grammar of Design. These rules would go on to fundamentally change Seiko’s design language.

First, all surfaces and angles of the case, dial, indices and hands had to be flat and geometrically perfect to best reflect light. Second, the bezels were to be simple, two-dimensional faceted curves. And third, no visual distortion from any angle was allowed, and all cases and dials had to be mirror-finished.

The second King Seiko, the 44-9990, would benefit from the Grammar of Design rules to become, in my opinion, one of the best looking watches Seiko (or any brand, for that matter!) has ever made.”

Click here to read more.

The Worn & Wound Podcast Ep. 74: Collecting with Author Aaron Sigmond

This week on The Worn & Wound Podcast we spoke to Aaron Sigmond. Aaron is a prolific author, editor, and publisher, and among watch-heads he is perhaps best known for his books Drive Time: Watches Inspired by Automobiles, Motorcycles, and Racing, and Bulova: A History of Firsts. His latest project is Sea Time: Watches Inspired by Sailing, Yachting, and Diving. Available this coming spring, Sea Time is currently open for pre-order here.

Stories

The Ringer; “Who Is the Most Impressive EGOTer?”

“A good barometer for extremely proficient success in the entertainment industry, then, is winning all of the prestigious awards. EGOTing—that is, nabbing at least one Emmy, Grammy, Oscar, and Tony—is such a rare feat that only 15 people in awards ceremony history have done it. (Six more people have EGOTed by receiving certain non-competitive awards; they are lesser EGOTs and we are not including them here.) That number used to be even smaller, but this past weekend, three more people completed the fourth leg of their EGOTs by winning at the Creative Arts Emmys: Andrew Lloyd Webber, Tim Rice, and John Legend, the latter of whom became the first African American man to ever EGOT and the youngest EGOTer at 39. John is most certainly a … legend, as is everyone who’s EGOTed.”

Click here to read more.

Forbes; “Bezos Unbound: Exclusive Interview With The Amazon Founder On What He Plans To Conquer Next”

“Unlike America’s other tech giants, Amazon doesn’t have a traditional campus. The 45,000 or so employees and executives in Seattle, out of 575,000 worldwide, fan across numerous high-rises downtown and in the South Lake Union neighborhood. Amazon’s “headquarters” defaults to where Jeff Bezos, the company’s founder and CEO, happens to be, currently Day 1 Tower. Its name comes from a perpetual Bezos maxim: that, relatively, we’re still at “day one” of the internet—and, by extension, that Amazon is just getting started.”

Click here to read more.

Gear

JUVO Desk Diver Limited Edition Watch Box

JUVO is a young company out of Austin producing high-quality winders and boxes for storing your watches. They recently collaborated with Dutch artist, Teun van Heerebeek (Watches & Pencils), who is famous for his quirky watch illustrations. The product born of the collaboration is the Desk Diver Limited Edition Watch Box, which features, yes, a diver sitting at a desk. Watch-heads will get the joke.

The Desk Diver Watch Box holds 10 watches and is finished in piano-white with multiple coats of lacquer for a high gloss look.

$300—Shop here

FrankOne Extraction Coffee Brewer

Coffee is the fuel that keeps the Worn & Wound crew going, and we’re always down for trying something new. Enter the FrankOne, a brewing system that uses vacuum extraction to achieve a more flavorful cup o’ joe. Put your coffee grounds in the machine, pour in some hot water, and with a push of a button the FrankOne uses negative pressure to force water to extract a rich brew all the while reducing bitterness.

Check out this cold brew demo for a better idea of how it all works.

$70—Back it on Kickstarter here