We welcome submissions of creative ideas to be considered for our unique and evolving range of wrist-worn sculptures which tell the time. You will be paid part of the sale price of any watches created by you (which would usually be made available for sale as small numbered releases).
Note that UnconstrainedTime watches fit the definition of art, so we recommend that you approach this as art and sculpture rather than design. For details of the differences, see our blog post on the definitions of art. We have only used the phrase “watch design competition” on this web-page because that is a phrase potential creators might be searching for.
UnconstrainedTime is based on art and conceptual-art-jewellery. This is fundamentally different from all other watches which are based on engineering and/or fine jewellery. Before you consider creating a watch idea for UnconstrainedTime, make sure you fully understand these vital differences (we don’t accept watch ideas based on engineering or fine jewellery). You can start with the summary of these differences on our infographic about Art and Conceptual-art-jewellery Influence on Watches, then read in more detail on the links from that page, and our home page etc.
Not all creative watch ideas will fit within the range of aesthetics which make sense as part of the UnconstrainedTime brand, but we are definitely open to some ideas with aesthetics which extend beyond those of our current range of watches, provided they fit the UnconstrainedTime brand concept, as described in the above paragraph. After looking at our current range of watches, if you want some inspirational images of work by other creators which does fit within our chosen aesthetic range, look at our Pinterest Boards, which show many examples which we love.
While submitting a 3D render is likely to show your creative ideas most effectively, we will accept submissions of sketches or drawings.
Watch construction starting-points
When working on watch creations, make sure your creation will use our unique time-display (which consists of a ring of 12 LEDs and one button at the 3 o’clock position, no hands, no dial) as an intrinsic element of the whole creation (not an unrelated addition). Ensure that the whole watch will make sense as a holistic artwork. We are not interested in artwork as an addition to a watch which the artwork doesn’t relate to.
Make sure you think about what materials and finishes your creation will use, and how they will be made. We certainly welcome ideas which use materials that are not used by current watches, since our creative focus is from conceptual-art-jewellery (which accepts use of any material) rather than fine jewellery and engineering. If we love your creative ideas, we can work with you to optimize those aspects.
Keep in mind that the time-pieces you create with UnconstrainedTime must be able to be worn in practice as watches. They need to be practical to make, and wearable without damaging people or clothing, without breaking or becoming imperfect from reasonable use, and the time-display needs to be visible when worn on the wrist in the usual manner.
In order for the internal parts of the watch to fit, so that the time-display functions, your watch creation needs to be based on one of our templates. It can be extended outwards from one of those starting-points, but is unlikely to be able to be reduced inwards. The templates are available in 40mm or 30mm diameter, and we want most of our watches to be available as a small numbered release with a choice of either size.
Our templates have either a rounded cross-section or a rectangular cross-section. As you can see from our current watches, the two options are either a partially filled central section, or a hole in the middle with protrusions (not shown below) added between the lugs which hold the strap (to accommodate batteries):
If we accept your watch creation, we will put the 3D renders on our website and social media for potential customers to see, but we cannot guarantee that a watch accepted by us and shown on our website will be made available for sale since the response from potential buyers will be a significant factor, which cannot be predicted. We also cannot guarantee that a watch made available for sale will actually sell.
You will be listed as the creator of the watch. So on the back-plate will be the UnconstrainedTime logo and name, watch name (which you choose, subject to our approval), by: your signature and name, then the serial number and edition number. On our website, the watch will be listed as being by: your name “with UnconstrainedTime.”
Make sure you keep any initial sketches of ideas, or notes you make, as well as documenting your creative process and inspirations, because people love to see the development which goes into this kind of work. Showing the whole sequence of how you get from initial inspirations and ideas to a finished sculpture which tells the time, can be of great benefit when promoting you as a creator.
You are responsible for making sure that your work does not violate anyone else’s copyright. This also means that you cannot use AI to create finished watches, because the legal ownership of the results of AI work is currently not clear (since they can be seen as being derived from the works which the AI was trained on, and thus owned by the original creator of those works). You can use AI to generate ideas provided the AI you use has good ethical practices (like Adobe Firefly does), and you then refine and develop the best of those ideas yourself. so that they are genuinely personal to you (if it’s not personal, it’s not art) Ultimately, it is you that is responsible for making sure that your work does not violate anyone else’s copyright, however the ideas were generated.
We are not looking for creations based on easily available 3D models, because we can do those ourselves. We are also unlikely to be interested in creations based on aesthetics which have already been explored in watchmaking, such as steam-punk or conventional engineering-based or fine-jewellery-based concepts.
You may submit a maximum of three creations per creator, per month. If you want to submit creative ideas, first contact us and tell us you’re going to submit ideas, then, after we’ve replied by email, you can attach your creative ideas to an email (or give us a link). This is because if you send attachments or links in an initial email (or on our web-form), that email will be less likely to get through to us.
Please include your email address and an alternative way of contacting you (such as a social-media profile or a mobile phone number) since emails don’t always get through.
When will your watch be available for sale?
We plan to launch the first UnconstrainedTime watch in summer 2025 (you can check our launch schedule here). After that watch is launched we will begin to add 3D renders of selected new watch creations on our website. The earliest that your watch might be made available for sale would be approximately 8 months after our initial launch (due to the time it takes to develop and make each watch plus the time needed by the press to talk about a launch).
If one of your watch creations sells well, we will invite you to submit further creative ideas. If we love your sketches, we will suggest suitable outsource experts you can work with to generate photographic-quality renders or we might choose to work with you to make renders or a physical version of your idea(s) which we will display on our website to attract buyers. We will tell you how to promote your UnconstrainedTime watch creations on your own website and/or social-media to increase the likelihood of sales, in addition to us promoting them on our website and social media etc.
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