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Watch & Clock Design winners feature wet look

Designs inspired by sailing and water have won top honours at the latest Hong Kong Watch and Clock Design Competition. The winners were announced yesterday by the Hong Kong Trade Development Council (HKTDC), organiser of the HKTDC Hong Kong Watch & Clock Fair. The world’s largest watch and clock show opens 5 September and continues through 9 September at the Hong Kong Convention and Exhibition Centre.

The design competition’s 29th edition attracted more than 220 entries, with "Initial Dream" and "Love Vision" the themes of the Open Group and Student Group respectively. The Open Group champion was Team 1 Design Limited’s "Navigator I". The piece features separate dials for hour and minute display, as well as a crown that can be turned to change time zones. The Student Group’s top prize went to Hong Kong Design Institute’s Ngan Pik Ki, for her "Ripple" creation. The dial and strap of the watch feature grooves representing ripples, while blue crystal bearings symbolising water drops beneath the hour, minute and second hands roll in the grooves on the watch face.

The 28 winners and finalists of this year’s design competition will be on display, in the Hall 1 Concourse, throughout this year’s Watch and Clock fair. Other highlights will include the Brand Name Gallery, presenting more than 120 brands from 14 countries and regions, among them: Swiss watch company Alexis Farin; Hush Puppies, which will roll out its 10th anniversary watch; Hong Kong’s Memorigin, which will introduce its tourbillon watches; and local brand Zerone, which will unveil its "Zerone and 5+1" collection at a ceremony featuring six designers from Hong Kong and Japan.

Brand Name Gallery will open to the public on the last day of the fair, offering watch parades, tourbillon demonstrations and such sessions as "Fashion Watches, Mix & Match" by fashion designer Cecilia Yau, and "Finest Watches to Watch" by Ashley Lung, watch critic and chief editor of The Watch Magazine. The fair’s World Brand Piazza, sponsored by Prince Jewellery & Watch Company, will feature rare timepieces from 12 internationally renowned brands: A Lange & Sohne, Audemars Piguet, Blancpain, Breguet, Chopard, Franck Muller, IWC, Jaeger-LeCoultre, Panerai, Piaget, Roger Dubuis and Ulysse Nardin. A Blancpain Léman tourbillon watch, selling for more than HKD16 million (USD2.06m), will be among the exceptional watches on display. In addition, the Pageant of Eternity will offer outstanding timepieces from more than 260 exhibitors.

The fair will present a variety of special activities, including cocktail receptions, conferences, product launch events, watch parades, lucky draws and seminars. They will include "The True Value of Prestigious Watchmaking", a Prince Jewelry-sponsored seminar featuring Philip Ng, founder of Watch Report magazine. Representatives from global watch associations will discuss the state of the industry, 5 September, at the Hong Kong International Watch Forum. And the Asian Watch Conference, 6 September, will offer the insights of Shang Jiangguang, Vice President and General Manager, Zhuhai Rossini Watch Industry Ltd.

Hong Kong is the world’s second-largest watch and clock exporter by value, exporting USD4.45 billion (HKD34.72 billion) worth of timepieces, parts and components in the first half of this year, up 13 percent over the same period in 2011.