An Interview With Giles English

Swiss Watch Gallery discusses role models, the next big thing, being British and the modern age in an exclusive interview with Giles English, co-founder of Bremont Watch Company.

1. Who would you say is your most influential role model? Any life decisions made because you were inspired by him/her?

G: My father, who was an amazing man and a wonderful PHD aeronautical engineer from Cambridge, is most definitely my biggest role model. He was a very practical engineer and had a workshop where he built planes and even a boat which we went to live on as kids. One of his passions was also watches and clocks. Life changed for us in 1995 when my father was in a plane crash with my brother. My father died and my brother, Nick, broke 30 bones and was in intensive care for many months. When he recovered, Nick and I agreed life is very short and wanted to do something we both loved doing, so that’s exactly what we did. I had trained as an engineer and we were working in the family aviation business at the time and we felt the timing was right to leave and start Bremont.

2. What is the next plan for Bremont’s future?

G: The next big thing for us is the upcoming launch of our new store in New York on 501 Madison, which is our fourth store in total. Our other boutiques are all in quite offbeat locations, so the Madison one is the first in a high footfall location. The US is already an important market for Bremont and we wanted a real home that was our space, to showcase the Bremont range as well as having a location where we can give back to our customers.

3. What do you see as the biggest challenge for Bremont, and how do you plan to counter it?

G: Bringing the manufacturing process over to the UK is most definitely our biggest challenge to date and also a big investment mainly because of the machinery required.  We could just let someone else do the manufacturing and focus solely on being a ‘brand’ rather than a watchmaker, but that is of no interest to us. We are continuing to invest heavily in people and machinery with many parts now being made on British soil at our new parts manufacturing facility in Silverstone, which is key for us being able to manufacture movements in their entirety on these shores.