Apple’s design team, including design heads Molly Anderson and Alan Dye, recently sat down with British GQ to talk the Apple Watch Series 10 and the new black Apple Watch Ultra 2. Here are the key design tidbits they had to share.
Benefits of larger displays
Robert Leedham interviewed several members of Apple’s design team at Apple Park in a conversation focused on the Apple Watch.
Now that we’re 10 years into the Watch’s public life, the new Series 10 design offers a fresh iteration without losing the strengths of the device’s origins.
One difference enabled by the Series 10, which started on the Ultra, is the ability to shift priorities thanks to the larger displays. Dye remarks, “We got so great at designing for a very small display and that required real efficiency with every pixel.” Hopefully we’ll see more evidence of these changes in the year ahead.
Durability of the new black titanium Ultra 2
Concerned at all about the new black Apple Watch Ultra 2’s finish getting dinged up? Here’s Anderson to alleviate those fears:
The diamond-like carbon coating is even harder than the surface of natural titanium. If you scratch it on anything apart from maybe diamond, you’re going end up with that object on your watch rather than scratching the coating off.
What goes into designing a new watch face
Dye explained how the new Reflections face was conceived, and the tech that powers it:
[Apple’s] new Reflections face is modelled on hand-carved guilloche dials, such as those found on many a Breguet and Audemars Piguet’s iconic Royal Oak, and uses the Watch’s inbuilt gyroscope, sensors and updated display to shimmer along with the sunlight on your wrist…“We got obsessed with understanding where the object was in any place or time and how we could actually cast reflections on it that feel like they come from the world around you,” says Dye.
All the rest
Some other interesting tidbits worth noting:
- nearly the entire design team owns traditional analog watches too
- Dye especially enjoys seeing the Apple Watch pop up on the red carpet for film debuts
- Apple “is not a dive company,” so the designers had to push hard for diving features in the Ultra and Series 10
- Dye said the design team is always exploring, challenging themselves, and is “not afraid of the new at all”
You can check out the full interview here at British GQ.
What are your thoughts on the Apple Watch’s updated design? Let us know in the comments.
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