SPOTLIGHT: Grand designs in the Land of the Rising Sun

Founded in 1960 as Seiko’s pursuit of the ‘ideal’ wristwatch, Grand Seiko operated for half a century as Japan’s best-kept horological secret, being available for sale only in its home country. That all changed in 2010 when it was given its worldwide wings, and it hasn’t stopped soaring ever since. Renowned for its hyper-precise engineering, extraordinary hand-finishing, and nature-inspired dial design, Grand Seiko is loved and respected by true connoisseurs of horology. Watch and jewelry journalist Rachael Taylor flew to the Land of the Rising Sun to see the operation for herself.

It is 11.30 am on a Monday in late July, and I am walking the floors of Wako, Tokyo’s luxury department store within Seiko House. The doors have been open for only half an hour, and already shoppers are deep in conversation with sales staff across curving glass cabinets that hold watches from both Seiko brands and Swiss makers.

I walk by one customer on the precipice of a purchase and hear an American accent; tourism is big here, and a major driver of watch sales at Seiko-owned Wako. Last year, 42.68 million international visitors flew into Japan, up 15.8% year on year, and splashed out ¥9.46 trillion ($59.4 billion) during their trips. If the figures for 2025 (which are not yet available) remain on a par with 2024, about a third of that spend happens in Tokyo.

Watch retail specifically is strong in Japan. According to the Federation of the Swiss Watch Industry, the country imported $3.6 billion of watches in 2025, making it the fifth-largest watch-importing market globally. But that’s not why I’m in Tokyo; I’m here to take a closer look at a homegrown brand. One that, after half a century as Japan’s best-kept horological secret, is now being exported all over the globe. It is, of course, Grand Seiko.

Our tour starts in Tokyo, where we spend time at Seiko House in the heart of Ginza, the city’s most prestigious shopping district. The corner building with its Seiko-branded clock tower has been a local landmark here since 1894. At that time, Seiko founder Kintaro Hattori was operating a store within it that sold and repaired timepieces. The original building was destroyed in an earthquake in 1927 and rebuilt in 1932. It is one of the few buildings in Tokyo that was still standing at the end of World War II.

Today, Seiko House has multiple functions. The Wako store operates across four stores, selling watches, jewelry, fashion, and interiors, as well as operating an extraordinary food hall. The top four floors are dedicated to spaces to entertain and educate Seiko clients, including the invitation-only Atelier Ginza, in which we get our first glimpse of Seiko watchmakers at work, including Takuma Kawauchiya, the architect behind the 9ST1 movement within Grand Seiko’s Kodo watch.

The caliber was revolutionary when it launched in 2022 for combining a tourbillon and constant-force mechanism on a single axis. Kawauchiya — who was a professional guitarist before becoming a watchmaker — explains that he wasn’t just chasing precision, but musicality. He specifically engineered the 9ST1’s constant-force mechanism so that its once-per-second impulse coincided precisely with every eighth beat of the balance, creating the deliberate semiquaver rhythm behind Kodo’s heartbeat-like sound. To demonstrate his point, Kawauchiya picks up his guitar and starts playing along to the ticking sound of 9ST1, using it as a metronome.

Technical innovation has long been the cornerstone of Grand Seiko. The brand launched in 1960 with a dress watch powered by Caliber 3180, which was certified to a standard equivalent to the highest chronometer grade of the period, and continued to chase precision throughout that decade. By 1969, its V.F.A. watches had an accuracy of ±1 minute per month, which was exceptional at that time. It would later smash this out of the park. The Caliber 9F quartz introduced in 1993 achieved ±10 seconds per year. Then last year’s major launch, the Spring Drive U.F.A., powered by Caliber 9RB2, is claimed by the brand to be the world’s most accurate wristwatch movement powered by a mainspring at ±20 seconds per year.

A train ride 170 km north-west of Tokyo into the Hotaka mountain range — known as ‘the Alps’ of Japan — takes us to the Shinshu Watch Studio, within the Seiko Epson factory in Shiojiri, where watchmakers produce Grand Seiko Spring Drive and 9F quartz watches. Seiko has been producing watches in this region since 1942.

Shizukuishi is an impressive workhorse with a prestigious history, and is home to the brand’s mechanical watch manufacturing. It is highly vertically integrated, capable of developing movements and manufacturing components including cases, dials, and even screws. The only element outsourced is bracelets, which are sourced from a Japanese manufacturer.

The facility is also home to the Micro Artist Studio, which opened in 2000 as an elite haute-horlogerie workshop to preserve and advance traditional Japanese watchmaking skills. During our visit, a “trainee” watchmaker works quietly at a bench coved by shelves packed with watch books, manuals, and back issues of Chronos magazine. Further investigation reveals this trainee to be a watchmaker who in fact has 20 years’ of experience. However, to be able to work on a Grand Seiko minute repeater, his studies must start again, with three years dedicated to mastering the knowledge required.

Our next stop is Grand Seiko’s Studio Shizukuishi, 700 km to the north in the Iwate district, where the landscape is pierced by the mountain of the same name. This picture-perfect facility is dedicated to Grand Seiko mechanical watchmaking, and is built out of fragrant local wood to the specifications of architect Kengo Kuma (who designed the Japan National Stadium in Tokyo for the 2020 Summer Olympics). Every aspect of the design has been carefully considered to achieve the balance of light and shadow that flows through all of Grand Seiko’s designs, evident in the high-polish contrasts and cleverly textured dials. Mount Iwate, still an active volcano, is visible from the watchmaking studios at Shizukuishi, which are lined with windows that give a vista of the outside world, including the site’s 1,000 trees and biotope garden designed to encourage local flora and fauna. On the day we arrive, the peak of Mount Iwate is cloaked in clouds and set against a brilliant-blue sky.

The view is even more breathtaking from the full-length windows of a salon on the first floor of the building where timepieces are displayed, including some exclusive models that can only be bought in-person at Studio Shizukuishi. The public can book tours here, starting with a walk around a small museum space, then travelling the length of the watchmaking studio, viewing the activity of the sealed room through windows, and then ending up on the upper level with its spectacular views.

Just as the local environment is important to Grand Seiko, so too are the people. Of its watchmakers, 90% are local, and there are examples of three generations of the same family working at Studio Shizukuishi. Preservation of skills is a major focus, with each ‘meister’ — or master watchmaker — taking on one to two apprentices at all times.  

This idea of respecting and being inspired by Japan, its nature, and its traditions, is a sentiment that Seiko president Akio Naito reiterates when we return to Tokyo and Seiko House. “Nature has two meanings,” he says. “One is the essence, or the origin; that equates to the craftsmanship we’ve always been proud of. And the other nature is the beautiful nature in Japan, from which our watchmakers are inspired in creating new products.”

Naito says that an increased interest in Japan and its culture from the outside world, and the resulting boom in tourism, was partly behind Seiko’s decision to push Grand Seiko internationally. The brand was sold exclusively within Japan for the first 50 years of its history, before it initiated export in 2010. At that time, Grand Seiko was positioned as a prestige version of a Seiko, with dual branding on the dials. This changed in 2017, when it became an independent brand in its own right.

16 years in, Grand Seiko is gaining ground. It has stockists and stores across the globe, including flagships on London’s Bond Street, New York’s Madison Avenue, and Place Vendôme in Paris. While Seiko doesn’t release figures specifically related to Grand Seiko, the overall business is in rude health: in the year to March 2026, Seiko’s watch division increased sales by 15.4% to ¥203.1 billion. In the past three years, the division has achieved growth of approximately 41%.

“Moving forward, we would like to expand our customer base,” says Naito, who notes that the current hype around its ambassador, the Japanese superstar baseball player Shohei Ohtani, who plays for Los Angeles Dodgers, has been helpful in its mission to do so. “Although we are not disclosing our total sales value as a brand, we would like to be one of the top luxury watch brands in the world in a foreseeable future. Right now, I think we are between 20 to 30, or that sort of range, but we’d like to become one of the top 10 brands in the world in terms of sales. For that to happen, we would like to increase meaningful touch points with the consumers by opening more boutiques directly owned by us in major cities in the world.” With Japan’s cultural stock riding so high, if there was ever a time for a luxury Japanese watch brand to make the push, it is certainly now.

This article was first published in the August 2026 edition of Watch Insider.