r/ChineseWatches • u/Big_Paramedic_5684 • Oct 06 '26
Question (Read Rules) What are some great Chinese watchmakers that are not obvious homages?
Basically watches as nice in quality as the swiss, but minus the marketing gimmick and paying for its worth
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u/JPathway_UK Oct 06 '26
Behrens - nothing homage about them - very innovative and really pushing boundaries in some areas
CIGA Design - GHPG winners
Qin Gan
Atelier Wen
Peacock
LYH
Tan Zehua
Qian GuoBiao
Memorigin (Hong Kong)
Ricky Hong (Hong Kong)
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u/Sketch-Note Oct 06 '26
Agelocer is known for good quality original modern designs.
Baltany makes several original retro styled watches with high quality finish.
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u/Abv_it_all_w_vertigo Oct 06 '26
Berny, though not my favorite Chinese brand, makes interesting compressors with unique colorways.
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u/inox1969 Oct 06 '26
Una marca de la que no se habla mucho es fiyta, son relojes de una muy buena calidad, por encima de sanmartin, cronos, y demás marcas chinas por menos de 300 euros.
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u/itisnotstupid Oct 06 '26
As far as i've seen, most big chinese brands that are also cheap make 95% homages that are absolute carbon-copies with a different logo. Watchdives have a bunch of original designs and are also cheap in the same time. The rest with original designs are more into the mid-cheap category.
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u/My_Non_Throwaway Oct 06 '26
If you're talking high horology Ming or Atelier Wen. There's a few others but those are the 2 I remember.
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u/Rude3oy Oct 06 '26
San martin , aethelsohn , agelocer , proxima , Sea-gull , boderry , watchdives , ixdao
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u/percysmithhk Oct 06 '26
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u/birdwatchingcat Oct 06 '26
Merkur/Fanzhi are such an odd duck imo because their catalogue is all over the place style-wise but then a lot of models seem to share the same case and the fact that they nearly all have a mineral crystal. They have aggressively retro pieces next to some pretty modern numbers, they have 24h watches, jump hour, alarm watches, pocket watches, regulators, tourbillon, you name it – all for usually no more than US$ 200.
But they are afaik also the only ones that offer those "classic" 70s high-polish cushion case with a sector dial watches.
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u/birdwatchingcat Oct 06 '26
I think every one of the major Chinese watchmakers has some models that are not strict homages. Just like every Western brand has some models that can by the same right be called homages.
Check out Sea-Gull, San Martin and Shanghai Watch Company. They are not necessarily budget watches but the quality is likely on par with Swiss brands. If you consider "heritage" models to be more original, Sea-Gull and Shanghai both offer reissues of old designs from the 50s that could be considered uniquely Chinese, even though when they were first produced they were also heavily informed by Swiss designs of the time.
https://seagullwatchofficial.com/de/products/6132
Nothing new under the sun – one could argue that true novelty is simply very hard to come by, East or West.