Maison Alcée Persée Fantôme Limited Edition for Hodinkee puts you in-charge of building your own desk clock

Maison Alcée, founded by French engineers Alcée and Benoît Montfort, and NYC-based watch website, Hodinkee, have joined forces for the first time to release a limited-edition desk clock. This is targeted at collectors who don’t want a finished model, but desire one they can actually have some hands-on fun with before it’s realized as a complete work of haute horologiere.

The Maison Alcée Persée Fantôme Limited Edition for Hodinkee is more than any special edition or limited release desk clock you can think of. The difference is at the construction level itself; essentially owing to the Maison Alcée’s approach to watchmaking. The French Maison focuses on “teaching people about watchmaking” by letting them be a part of the finishing of the timepiece, which resonated with Hodinkee enough to become part of this 25-piece limited edition.

Designer: Maison Alcée x Hodinkee

Limited edition timepieces in modern watchmaking are often rare collectibles. Alcée Persée Fantôme – based on the company’s existing desk clock concept – is not quite there. It invites collectors to physically become part of the watch-making process and build the exclusive clock you can own. That to me per se, seems like an experience anyone would dream about before owning a watch, but speaking for most of us, we rarely get the chance to live it.

The Alcée Persée Fantôme thus doesn’t start as a finished product. It is offered as an experience via a kit. It comes with 233 meticulously crafted components, which purchasers are required to assemble themselves and hand-paint the lume to steadily piece together a limited-edition mechanical clock. The company says it takes 6-10 hours of build time to create for yourself the most personal limited editions you can ever own.

So, you don’t just own this desk clock; you, in fact, build it, adjust it, and live with it. And you just don’t do that Maison Alcée style, but in Hodinkee’s vision. The clock has some notable details like its dark aesthetics achieved by ruthenium coating on a stainless steel base, which ties it closely to Hodinkee’s signature color theme.

For the features, the Maison Alcée Persée Fantôme Limited Edition for Hodinkee is powered by an in-house manual-wound movement that beats at 18,000 VPH frequency and has a substantial 14-day power reserve. Of course, building an exclusive watch is no child’s play. Each build kit is provided with a 150-page instruction manual and video tutorials for each stage of watchmaking. To ensure what you build remains elusive, the collaboration is limited to 25 units. 20 of which will be available globally online, and the remaining five are reserved for the Watches of Switzerland showroom in Soho, New York. Alcée Persée Fantôme will cost $9,900 apiece and will be sold in a rosewood presentation box.