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About TimePiece Ltd.
Timepiece is a privately owned company, dedicated to the restoration
of vintage
dials and hand
refinishing for the horological industry, dealers, collectors
and watch enthusiasts. Our 70 m² workshop is located in the
center of Israel, one hour drive north of Tel-Aviv in a well organized
facility including all the relevant machinery and equipment.
In the world today there are a handful businesses that still practice
the dial
refinish service using the traditional methods. There are quite
a few that offer the service, but very few that actually
do it. We are the sole business
performing such service in a professional level in Israel and serve
customers both within Israel and worldwide.
We take great pride in our work and master manual skills and original
know-how of the refinishing process; Our selection of prints cover
most periods and styles from the early 20s to the late 70s, as well
as some particular and newer models with a large variety of brand
names; Some of our equipment dates back to the early 30s!
History of Dial Refinishing
It was for several decades till the early 20th century that most
watch dials were made of enamel. The application of enamel requires
a lot of expertise and repairing enamel dials is not a simple task.
The story of the dial refinishing business is related to the appearance
of the metal dial in mass production and dates back to the early
20s of the 20th century. The metal made dial, mostly made of brass
(top brands such as Hamilton, IWC and some Longines model, were
made of silver) is easier to restore - First by treating the surface
with chemistry and natural coatings and then restoring the original
print with special ink or cold enamel.
In the mid 20th century, dial
refinish shops were already a common business in most large
cities in the US and quite popular in Europe as well. As with the
history of the American watch indusry, such businesses reached a
crisis in the late 60s, caused by the introduction of the quartz
movement and cheaper watches from the far east. These watches were
cheap enough to allow their owners to buy a new watch once the watch
required maintenance or restoration, rather than invest in restoring
the old one. For this reason, many watch making companies, as well
as dial refinish companies, closed down or minimized their activity
to a garage family business. Today there are less than 20 different
dial refinish businesses who practice the traditional method of
dial refinishing worldwide.
Nevertheless, as mechanical watches are rather rare and sought after today more than ever and collecting old watches is considered an exotic hobby, dial refinishing has become a fascinating niche of the horological industry in recent years.
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