In 1881, an entrepreneurial 21-year-old, Kintaro Hattori, opened a shop selling and repairing watches and clocks in Ginza, Tokyo. Eleven years later, he established the Seikosha factory (“Seiko” meaning “exquisite” in Japanese, and “sha” meaning house) that enabled him to produce his own designs, setting the course for the country’s watchmaking. Over the following 140 years, Seiko has not only proved itself on the world stage but set itself apart from its Swiss counterparts with a unique and innovative spirit, informed by both its deep heritage and that of its native Japan.

And when it comes to the latter, there’s multiple millennia of cultural riches from the country to draw inspiration from. Its influence threads through Seiko’s collections, but, in particular, is seen in its Presage range that captures the beauty of traditional craftsmanship and carries its legacy on into the next generation.

New additions to the family see the watchmaker heading to the artistic heartlands of Japan and forging collaborations with local artisans to create one-of-a-kind dials for its timepieces. The first stop was Arita, located on the southern island of Kyushu, where Japan’s first porcelain was fired in the early 17th century.

To this day, the porcelain industry is at the core of the community of this mountain town. Walk the back alleys and you’ll find the distinctive tonbai walls, made from old firebricks previously used as kiln parts. You may even stumble upon the workshops of master craftsmen such as Hiroyuki Hashiguchi of Shingama Kiln, one of the master craftspeople keeping the art of porcelain alive. Like Seiko’s timepieces, his work strikes a balance between function and art, deeply rooted in the past but with a continual eye on improvement and looking forward. ‘I believe that we must challenge ourselves to innovate precisely because that is what will allow us to pass our traditions on to posterity,’ he explains. ‘I feel a kinship with Seiko in this sense.’

He was a natural choice to entrust with a new line-up of Presage Arita Porcelain Dial watches, equipped with Seiko’s precise automatic timekeeping. The elegant nature of the collection is enhanced further by the captivating dials, with the use of porcelain bringing an understated and intriguing lustre.

Gently curved, they are produced at a thickness of just 1mm, a feat that takes incredible skill and a delicate touch. To achieve the flawless finish, the dial undergoes a multi-stage process involving several phases of firing. ‘It isn’t easy to see, but this dial – with varying thickness and thinness in a single shape – is incredibly hard to achieve with traditional methods,’ says Hashiguchi. ‘We took the thinness to its physical extreme.’

The same level of detail has been applied to the new Presage Craftsmanship Series Urushi Dial Limited Edition, albeit with a distinct aesthetic of its own. Like many of Seiko’s creations, it draws from nature, with its deep green dial echoing the lush greenery of Kanazawa, the historical home of the Japanese lacquerware known as urushi. The age-old craft is particularly renowned for its delicate maki-e paintings, in which intricate designs are created on the lacquer using gold powder.

‘To me, urushi is a means by which we can pass down that which is truly important to us for posterity,’ says Isshu Tamura, the artist that Seiko has collaborated with for this piece. ‘It is important that this tradition is not cut off, but rather serves to connect past, present, and future generations.’

In this spirit, the dial of this limited-edition timepiece celebrates this decorative technique through a contemporary lens. Its clean look expresses the capabilities of the Caliber 6R24 in a poetic and balanced design, with the hands of the date, day and power reserve recalling the elegant lines of a Japanese fan.

The production of each dial requires a painstaking process that needs a perfect finish to both achieve the beautiful depth of colour, as well as a precise thickness and smoothness so as not to interfere with the movement of the hands. Throughout its creation, Tamura identifies imperfections imperceptible to the eye through sound and touch; often slight blemishes don’t present themselves until the end of the crafting process, requiring him to start anew.

The result is a fusion of the traditional and modern, an expression of both skill and craftsmanship handed down from generation to generation. Seiko’s founder always had the vision to be ‘one step ahead of the rest’. This is a sentiment that today is still demonstrated not only by his brand, but also by those it chooses to partner with. As urushi artist Tamura puts it, ‘I start not by considering what is accepted as possible, but what we want to achieve – and how to achieve that.’

Price starts from £1,100; seikoboutique.co.uk