Due to a Royal Mail cyber incident, we are temporarily unable to dispatch items outside of the UK. Shipping of international orders will be resumed once the Royal Mail have sorted out this issue.
For more information, please visit Royal Mail’s website.
We’ve recently partnered with One Tribe Global to help reduce our carbon footprint, save trees and fight the climate crisis. With every uchi purchase we will donate a portion of the sale to help preserve 100 square metres of endangered tropical rain forest and the communities that live in them.
Find out more here.
Due to Covid restrictions, processing of orders may be delayed. We are aiming to get all orders out as quickly as possible. Please be aware that any items out of stock may also take longer to produce. The screen printers, print studios and garment suppliers we rely on are either on lock-down or have limited capability. Postal services around the world may also have longer delivery times.
We truly value your support, so please bear with us during this busy and trying time.
Wishing you the best and hope you remain healthy and safe.
best
Michael
Anger over the murders of George Floyd, Breonna Taylor, Ahmaud Arbery and others, and the system that supports police brutality has hit many hard. Although saddening and horrific, they were not surprising events.
I am still angry but I am also hopeful that the seeds of real change for equality may have been sown.
Based on an archived uchi T shirt design, this art print addresses the polarising protests and marches for racial justice and constitutional rights.
An art print addressing the saddening and horrific police brutality and murder of George Floyd and what was heard from the video of Darnella Frazier.
70% of the sale from these prints will go to the Bristol based charity Babbasa.
Babbasa is a Bristol-based social enterprise, dedicated to bringing equal opportunities to Bristol by supporting young people from underrepresented backgrounds discover their strengths and talents and pursue their ambitions. They are currently holding an appeal to support vulnerable young people affected by the Coronavirus pandemic.
Read more Babbasa and how they are helping black lives matter.
DC Vintage watches along with uchi and Southpaw Leather Goods is giving away a Seiko dive watch package, which includes:
1) 1993 Seiko 7S26 automatic dive watch
2) Two Southpaw Leather Goods leather straps
3) The uchi SKX “The Wave” print and a SKX Day Date Wheel T shirt!
There are many vintage Seiko divers popular with collectors, and the legendary 7S26 is one of these. With good reason, Seiko was able to build a cult following around this movement and its various iterations. Of significant note – Seiko oddly discontinued these legendary divers in 2018.
The design of this 7S26 is classic and simple, with immediate evidence of those that came before it, namely the instantly recognizable Seiko 7002 automatic, 7548 quartz, and even the famous 6309 diver. Its automatic movement is tough and reliable – during its heyday, it was also popular with various armed forces for this same reason, despite the widely held (false) assumption that military personnel only wear military watches issued to them.
Seiko’s 7S26 is a logical step in its mechanical movement line, which debuted in 1996 to replace the 7002 in Seiko’s popular dive watch line. This 7S26 incorporates quickset day and date displays, and automatic bi-directional winding via Seiko’s patented Magic Lever system. The 7S26 automatic movement is a very reliable workhorse – with a power reserve of approximately 40 hours – and it runs at 21,600 beats per hour.
DC Vintage Watches has great respect for classic mechanical movement timepieces – usually originating from the vintage and retro eras, spanning from the 1950’s to 1990’s – for the care taken during this period by Swiss, American, and Japanese watchmakers to ensure the owner had a keepsake worthy of lasting decades (and longer), all at an affordable price. We strive to bring these beautiful and interesting watches, the type people will undoubtedly notice on your wrist, to our discerning customers.
Each one of the vintage watches we curate has its own unique story, which we do our best to track down for our customers – doing the research to find these stories is half the thrill of the vintage watch hunt, and we do it well.
You can find DCVW on Instagram @dcvintagewatches or via email at dcvintagewatches@gmail.com.
If you are an Seiko SKX009 owner (the ‘Pepsi’ bezel version) you will know the relevance of featuring the Hokusai Wave in this design. The engraving on the back of the SKX dive watch is a homage to Hokusai’s Great Wave woodblock print. This is an unframed, high quality, signed and titled art print, printed onto a lovely 300 gram matt paper.
The Seiko SKX Day Date Wheel Watch shirt based on the Seiko SKX diver’s watch. As with many watch day date wheels, the SKX has various versions – choose between the International Day Date Wheel with days in English and French, the Japanese Domestic Market (JDM) Day Date Wheel which has the days of the week in English and Japanese typically for watches intended for the Japanese domestic market (JDM) or the Arabic Day Date Wheel version with Arabic and English days of the week.
Two high-quality hand made leather straps, one navy blue with red accent stitching, the other black with white. Both straps comes with high-grade stainless steel brushed hardware – nothing but quality here!
Southpaw Leather Goods is a maker of fine leather watch straps and wallets based out of central Iowa. Using only the highest quality leathers, Andrew creates each unique piece entirely by hand using traditional leather working techniques. SLG specializes in custom straps, using a few measurements from you and your watch to create a finished strap completely custom to you and your watch.
You can find Andrew on Instagram @southpawleathergoods or via email at andrew@southpawleathergoods.com.
That’s it!
I was surprised, honoured and humbled when asked to collaborate with Gloucestershire-based watch and watchstrap company Geckota Ltd, and be one of their first brand ambassadors.
Now, a year later, I feel less overawed and can see how our shared commitment to authenticity, original designs, ethical business and engaging stories means we complement each other remarkably well…
One of the things I like best is the match between our ethical and creative approaches. Like my Uchi brand, Geckota Ltd, and its WatchGecko e-commerce presence, grew from one man’s (Jonathan Quinn, Geckota Ltd’s founder) passion to source and supply quality watchstraps and watches. Jon saw an opportunity to create products that weren’t available at a certain quality and price point. Similarly, Uchi grew from my desire to express certain ideas and inspirational feelings in urban wear, artworks and homewares.
Both brands are grounded in authenticity – never parody. We’re committed to original designs, artistic integrity, good value and quality. And respect for what inspires us – always with an interesting backstory.
I grew up immersed in Hip Hop, but always believed that the culture is more than just ‘rap, dance and graffiti’. So, alongside a career dominated by design, printing, photography and typography, I was driven to create a brand that celebrated intelligent, deeper understanding of the Hip Hop culture. That was how the Uchi Clothing brand began in the 1990s. Since then, it’s evolved into a speciality bricks and mortar, and online, retail business in Bristol. And become a creator of original limited edition screen prints and luxury homewares inspired by lifestyles, science, mathematics and art. And now, measuring time…
I’ve always appreciated watches that were meaningful to me and own a couple with the simple, clear, analogue dials that I like. For whatever reason, I’d never got into the passion and intense enthusiasm of watch lovers – whether for affordable micro brands or ultra-luxury watches costing the price of a nice house in Bristol. Now I’m starting to explore this world – and ‘getting’ the passion that drives watch fans.
To be honest, it took a few days actually living with some Geckota watches (their first-generation Miyota-powered K1 and K1 V28) to bring me around. Suddenly, I realised that I’d forgotten how much I enjoyed wearing nice watches. Especially watches with stories behind them, which Geckota’s certainly have.
There’s something about the nostalgia of old watches and their respectful contemporary homages. Maybe it’s the way they need winding – that regular daily attention like feeding a Japanese Tamagotchi. Or the tactility and constant reminder of geometric precision and micro-engineering that’s with you when they’re on your wrist.
Meeting the Geckota team and being given a couple of their pilot watches didn’t just rekindle my appreciation of watches. It reawakened something hard-to-define and nostalgic in me. Since then, I regularly catch myself being seduced by the tactility and micro-engineering of timepieces. Above all, I’m discovering this world and its design possibilities with fresh eyes. And growing more fascinated and inspired to create by the day.
I’d long harboured, and put off for years, a desire to experiment with more geometric, mathematical, mechanical and technical illustrations. Doing so seemed a logical way to extend my existing designs. They say every idea has its time. Being introduced to Geckota fits perfectly with my aspirations – and theirs.
With the gradual blossoming – like sakura across springtime Japan – of our relationship, I know the time has arrived. This renewed exposure to horology excites me with its opportunities to experiment with illustration inspired by watches’ geometric, mathematical and technical form. It’ll be an interesting, and well-overdue, extension of the creative work I’ve done before – including projects based on the Fibonacci sequence, the Golden Section, the mathematical constant Pi and designs featured in Spain’s Alhambra Palace.
There’s something particularly inspiring when a serendipitous opportunity (in this case, being introduced to Geckota) corresponds with timely reawakening of aspirations. It’s given me the excuse to experiment with ideas that I’d put off for years. Perhaps in future, I’ll fulfil another long-held ambition and design a Uchi watch, maybe with Geckota. Why not?
Then there are the more immediate and realisable possibilities of teeshirts, watchstraps and high-quality prints inspired by classic watch formats. And of course, as with everything I’ve done already, they’ll be designed and printed in Bristol, and given my unique Uchi twist. As well as stretching my creativity, what a great opportunity to extend the exposure of the Uchi brand to new audiences.
Now to embrace this new world (to me) of horology. I’m confident. It’s a long way from the disciplines of printing, photo-typesetting, desktop publishing, technical writing, typography, design and urbanwear that have occupied me for over three decades. But what an opportunity to harness everything I’ve learned and apply it to the world of watches and watch design…
As ever, I’ll listen to my inner voice. Then I’ll do what I always do – what I was put here to do – and draw on all those years of experience, and the influences shaping my approach to design: influences as diverse as Japanese language and culture; Hip Hop artists like KRS-One; typeface designers including Ed Benguiat and Jonathan Barnbrook; comic book illustrators such as Frank Miller; Animé masters Hayao Miyazaki; and even Harry Beck, the designer of the iconic London Underground map.
Take these, then mix with everything I’ve learned and the myriad ideas in my head. Trust the self-belief that’s served me so well before; be guided by my proven commitment to authenticity, artistic and production integrity, originality, and really caring for what I do. Basically, what served me so well for years.
And see where the world of watches and the new association with Geckota takes me…
