SJX Watches
Visiting American Independent Keaton Myrick
The Oregon High Desert might seem like a strange place to find a watchmaker, but if you happen to stop in Bend, the region’s largest city with about 100,000 residents, you’ll have a chance of running into Keaton Myrick. Inspired by the likes of George Daniels and Philippe Dufour, Mr Myrick produces largely handmade watches in small numbers for connoisseurs of independent watchmaking. Setting up shop this far from the robust supplier networks of Switzerland has proven challenging, but Mr Myrick’s story of overcoming these headwinds reveals a degree of resilience and independence that embodies the spirit of the American West. We’ve been following Mr Myrick’s career for more than a decade, profiling him in 2013 after he debuted his first watch at Baselworld 2012. Now delivering the final pieces of his 1 of 30 series, Mr Myrick has moved into a new, larger workshop and evolved many of his manufacturing processes, so we thought it was worth a visit to see what’s in store for the future of watchmaking in the Pacific Northwest. A later example from the ‘1 in 30’ series. Origins As you might have guessed, Bend, Oregon is not a hotbed for watchmaking. In Mr Myrick’s case, pursuing a career in watchmaking meant relocating across the country to study at the Lititz Watch Technicum (LWT) in Pennsylvania, where he became WOSTEP-certified and began his stint at Rolex, working in after-sales service and restoration. The founder at his bench. But it was not long before ...
