Not the last word in designer watches.
... because BOTTA Design also offers the most common type of watch with a dial (twelve hours with three central hands) - for this, look for models TRES, CLAVIUS and MONDO. These are therefore hardly less design watches than the aforementioned oddities with one hand or 24-hour display. Although... actually the MONDO GMT is a hermaphrodite, because as a world time watch it can have two times tracked on the dial and bezel, interestingly in 12-hour format with three hands AND in 24-hour format with one hand.
BOTTA Design - the pioneer of the one hand
In Königstein near Frankfurt sits the company of Klaus Botta, who from the very beginning as a product designer has pursued unusual ways of dressing time measurement in a new guise. He succeeded right from the start with the UNO, the first single-hand watch of modern times, which has been imitated by many since 1986. Even today, with its extensive watch collection, it is not difficult to attest to BOTTA Design's great importance as a wristwatch brand among genuine designer watches. One need only look at the special features of the company's men's watches, some of which have turned their glazed backs on the widespread standard of a twelve-hour dial. The principle of displaying the hour and minute (and second) with two (three) hands is not set in stone at BOTTA Design, even after 35 years. Swiss movements are used in the watches. The designer remains versatile: in Königstein, product design for audio, video, measurement technology and other areas is also carried out.
Why you must be here: 1 hand clocks by Botta
If one can venture a generalisation, it is that design clocks by Botta have few prominent numbers on dials and these dials are mostly kept dark; namely grey, dark blue to black. The rim scales, on the other hand, are usually very detailed and finely divided, even including bezels, those rising rim rings that are adjustable on diving watches. The displays are consistently round and large, with a very flat design. For individualistic solutions like the UNO single-hand watch, reading the time may have to be relearned, as the old familiar standards for scale division do not apply. For example, each fine line on the UNO indicates not one but five minutes, while longer lines alternate between quarter hours and half hours. Finally, the main dashes with numbers mark hours, found in familiar places on the twelve-hour model. The NOVA model follows this concept, but is more minimalist and does without the minute division. Even more exotic is the UNO 24, which has 24 hours on a dial with only one hand. It is available from BOTTA Design as a quartz movement or as a self-winding automatic, with ETA or Ronda calibres.
You want to try 24-hour display?
What you find most often in the world of analogue watches is twelve hours on a dial. BOTTA Design has dedicated part of its collection to designer watches that combine 24 hours on them, dividing the dial into lighter and darker halves to make the day-night cycle a little clearer. Every ninety degrees, where conventional 12-hour dials indicate 12, 3, 6 and 9, a Botta 24-hour watch uses colour-highlighted markers for 12, 18, 0 and 6 o'clock and numerals in the same colour. Both single-hand and three-hand models are available among the men's watches with 24-hour divisions on the dial, on models UNO 24 and TRES 24 respectively, but you don't have to give up the familiar twelve hours with seconds, minutes and hours if you want to wear a BOTTA on your arm...