Laois Watch Works was born out of a simple curiosity that turned into a full-blown passion.

I’ve always admired the aesthetic of a well-designed watch, how it looks, how it sits on the wrist, and the personality that it adds. But for the longest time, that’s where it stopped—that was until 2022.

In 2022, I found myself living in Ireland, with two watches that had been purchased from the South African Mint a few years earlier. These watches were still pristine in their display boxes, but had just suddenly stopped working. Rather than toss them aside or send them out for repair, I thought to myself, why not open them up and fix them yourself?

I had absolutely no background in watchmaking—in fact, at the time I didn’t even know the difference between a quartz and a mechanical watch movement. In my mind, a watch was a watch, and the better it looked, the more I liked it.

But me being me, I dove headfirst into the fascinating world of horology—researching everything I could, watching countless tutorials on the Internet, and slowly investing in some starter tools. Eventually, when I opened those first two watches and investigated, I discovered they were just quartz movements, and that the batteries had died. So I just simply replaced the batteries and held thumbs ..… and they started ticking again!  That tiny victory lit a fire in me.