He holds the watch movement in his left hand, placing it on a base, and using tweezers in his right hand, he assembles tiny parts into it. When he's really dedicated, this work can last for as long as 16 hours. When asked if he spends all his time doing it except when he's asleep, Asaoka calmly replies, "Yes. I drink coffee several times a day to keep myself awake." It's not just assembly. His method of designing, crafting parts, polishing, and finishing the exterior all by himself is the same traditional method as when the wristwatch was invented. Asaoka, who doesn't belong to a watch supplier that shares the work, is respectfully called an "independent watchmaker." However, there are only a few dozen of them in the world. The Academy of Independent Watchmakers, founded in Switzerland in 1985, has 35 members, of which only three, including Asaoka, are Japanese.
HAJIME ASAOKA Tokyo Japan's watches are all designed, made, assembled, polished, and handled by Asaoka himself. Only a few watches are made per year, and although they are extremely expensive, starting at 50,000 euros each, royalty and collectors from around the world count as customers. 
In his studio on the second floor of an old building, Asaoka stands in front of a large table crammed with watchmaking equipment and tools, clad in a shirt. "When I'm not working on an interview, I usually dress more casually," he says. 
Watch movements are assembled while looking through a microscope at tiny parts that are invisible to the naked eye. If a part is damaged by a tool, all the work done up to that point will be ruined, so a great deal of concentration is required. 
The watches that Asaoka makes are all relatively small, with a diameter of less than 40mm. "I believe that if we allow for large watches, we can do anything, so I force myself to keep them within a moderate size." 
Parts and tools are carved out of blocks of metal. "I think there are probably very few independent Swiss watchmakers who own this cutting-edge machine." Asaoka is particular about doing everything himself, from making the parts.
He has dexterous hands and has loved building plastic models since he was a child. "Dexterity is genetic. My mother's side is a family of craftsmen." The first watch he ever owned was a Citizen automatic chronograph, given to him as a gift when he entered junior high school. The reason he asked his parents for one was also related to his interest in building plastic models. "When I took pictures of the finished model, I would take a slow shutter speed in a corner of my room. In a dimly lit place with no special lighting, I needed a chronograph with a stopwatch to measure the shutter speed, even if it was just two or three seconds." The chronograph eventually broke and was left carelessly in a drawer. Then, when he was approaching his late 30s, he had the idea to take it apart and repair it. After learning the mechanics of a mechanical watch and polishing the exterior, it looked like new. "I never intended to make a living from it. It was just a way to kill time, driven by curiosity," he says. Yet, a few years later, he single-handedly built Japan's first tourbillon. The tourbillon is a complex mechanism synonymous with luxury watches, correcting time discrepancies caused by positional differences. "The design and concept of the tourbillon, created by the watchmaker Breguet over 200 years ago, is sophisticated and relatable."
At the time, Asaoka was working as a graphic designer, but he wanted to return to being a product designer who makes things. He is also interested in cameras, cars, and a variety of other designs. "Among them, watches are small and have many restrictions. They are fascinating, like checkmate shogi puzzles." He says that he continues to express this way of thinking through watches. "As an independent watchmaker, my artistic talent comes out first in the design. Figuring out what kind of mechanism to put that into requires a sense. And finally, it's concentration and patience." Asaoka continues to work meticulously for several months to complete the ultimate watch, and he can already see the finished watch at the design stage.
"When I'm completely focused on making watches, I can't do anything else," he said. He said it became difficult to even throw away the paper and cotton swabs he used to wipe the parts, and in the end, the floor was littered with rubbish. 
The back cover of the see-through case back is opened and closed with the utmost care, and the wrench used for this is a special one made by the craftsman himself using machine tools, taking into consideration the size of the watch and the work process. 
Asaoka has a wide range of tools at his disposal, from pre-made ones to ones he has made himself. He uses different tools depending on the type of parts he is assembling and where he is going to install them. 
"Maybe only members of the Academy of Independent Watchmakers will understand, but even the placement of a single screw is sophisticated." It is in these small details that a watchmaker's sense is revealed. 
Finishing work on a lathe requires careful work, as it requires shaving off even a hundredth of a millimeter. "While looking through a magnifying glass, I stop just short of the mark, then turn it gently, and the moment the sound changes, I turn it one notch." 
The second line, "Chrono," uses a katakana logo to appeal to foreign watch enthusiasts (photo right). The revived "TAKANO" brand focuses on precision and has released a chronometer (photo center and left).
First, a new theme comes to mind, and that sparks the idea. "How do I incorporate that into a watch? It's similar to how a chef looks at a fish and thinks about what kind of dish he wants to make it into." Asaoka aims to refine both the parts and the process, moving forward efficiently. That said, watchmaking is full of pains. If one step goes wrong, it takes a huge amount of time to recover from the work that was done up to that point. "When I come up with the idea for a new watch, or when I take a photo of the finished watch. I'm only happy during the first and last steps." He laughs, saying that because making the same thing over and over again isn't fun, he doesn't take orders, and that his ideal situation would be to release just one new watch each year. "Once in a while, I'd like to try making plastic models without the stress. I recently bought a 1/12 scale model of a Lotus Europa on Yahoo! Auctions." Asaoka hasn't found the time yet to return to his dexterous childhood and build his favorite plastic models.
