“If an 18th-century watch turned up on my workbench, I would struggle to tell whether it had belonged to a man or woman. But in the century that followed, the differences became pronounced. As women were increasingly cast as frail and emotionally temperamental, their watches become correspondingly delicate,” Struthers writes. Meanwhile, pocket watches had been positioned as the choice for men, adventurers, and cowboys – when Levi Strauss introduced his 501 jeans in 1873, the small inner pocket at their front right was designed to hold a pocket watch, a quirk that persists to this day. One of the first entrepreneurs who saw the broader potential of wristwatches was Hans Wilsdorf, the founder of Rolex.
If there’s a criticism, it’s that much of the history is told from an Anglo-centric point of view, though you might expect this from a British watchmaker. Switzerland (and Japan and the United States) make appearances as supporting characters, but Struthers stays close to home, and she does it well.