MAALS is a family owned start-up watch designer and producer from the minds of two brothers
based in Warwickshire, UK. Having both collected watches for over 20 years and encouraged by the
crowdfunding success of recent design led watches, they decided to take a chance and start their
own company designing eye catching, high quality affordable watches that they would be happy to
have in their collections.
Having only a small family, they wanted the brand’s name to be personal, thus MAALS – which stands
for Mark Anthony Andrew Lee Sealey – was born through taking the initials of their names and tailing
it with their family name. Simple and personal.
Designed in the UK and influenced by a love of design, cars and 70’s classic watches, the first
timepiece from MAALS is a retro modern, moonphase titled Jump Over The Moon. Named after the
stacked arrangement of its movement, Jump Over The Moon (JOTM) will be available in either a
brushed stainless steel finish or a black steel finish.
Early on the brothers decided to shy away from creating a design heavy dial face, instead preferring
to tread a simpler path, adding subtle detail touches to its look and feel. Sunburst silver or black
finishes were chosen to add vibrancy to the dial background, with a rounded triangular opening
located at the six o’clock position, creating a natural focal point for the watch face.
Through the triangular opening neatly step stacked top to bottom, are two rotating discs showing off
the movement with its moonphase element, completing its lunar cycle every 29½ days, giving the
watch its name. Pinning the stack is a centrally located metallic sweeping second hand. The inner
radius of the sunburst dial shows a 30 second count, while the outer radius counts at 5 second
intervals.
Housed in a 42mm case in brushed stainless steel or PVD black steel, the watch is water resistant to
5ATM, an anti-reflective coating is applied to the inside of the domed screen to improve readability.
Determined not to skimp on quality or reliability, a Miyota 6P24 multi-function movement was
chosen to power their moonphase jump hour creation.
Turning their attention to the back of the watch, MAALS worked with Leamington Spa, UK based artist OKSE aka Chris Oxenbury, to design artwork for the caseback. Using the watch name as inspiration, OKSE created an outer space star studded scene, with an astronaut reaching out and jumping over the moon,while in the background an alien abduction over Earth is detailed.
Every caseback for JOTM, both black and silver, will be laser etched with OKSE’s artwork. Completing each watch will be a vintage style leather strap in either dark brown or black depending on which version is chosen.
As watch collectors, the brothers are used to taking a few watches with them if they go away somewhere. So to protect them on the go, they teamed up with Warwickshire based boutique handmade leather goods company Fizzarrow, to create an exclusive hand cut and stitched tan leather watch pouch.
Each pouch is made using vegetable tanned leather with red thread detail. To encourage people to collect watches – whether they be from MAALS or any other brand – each pouch features zips to the side to connect to additional MAALS pouches so you can protect your collection as it grows.
A curved tuck flap closure secures the pouch, behind a debossed MAALS logo to the front.
The watch pouches will be available as part of a combination pack alongside a Jump Over The Moon watch, as well as sold separately via the MAALS website.
Both versions of Jump Over The Moon, will retail at £275 which will include the handmade leather watch pouch or £249.99 without it. The pouch is available for £45 separately.
Celebrating the launch of their site, and the start of their crowdfunding efforts, for the month of June MAALS will be offering pre-orders of each watch and the combo pack, which includes a handmade leather watch pouch, at a40% discount. After the store launch pre-orders, the brothers plan to follow-on with a crowdfunding campaign on Indiegogo, where Jump Over The Moon will be offered with an early-bird saving of 35%, followed by a 30% discount for the rest of the campaign.
MAALS Jump Over The Moon, is just the first part of an intended three watch series, with plans for new designs and complications already in the works.
MAALS is a Limited company, utilising Swiss /Japanese movements alongside reputable Hong Kong based ODM manufacturing and production. Their aim is to serve niche markets within the watch industry, designing affordable, eyecatching, high-quality and unique timepieces. MAALS goal is to create modern classics producing design-led watches for those who desire high-quality, stylish goods, but do not think they can afford them.
