Collector interview : Pawel

1. You in few words

Could you describe you in few words ?

I was born and live in Lodz, Poland. I studied at Academy of Fine arts in my city with a master of arts degree. I’m a designer, painter, founder of CarBone, founder of Smilodone, entrepreneur, Porsche cars and Heuer stopwatches collector.

2. Your passions and hobbies

Aside from watchmaking, have your other interests/hobbies?

I have just a few hobbies in my life but they are really deep and I’d say they are addictions or obsessions. So aside HEUER stopwatches I enjoy spending time with my familly, cooking for them ,sport activities, and Porsche cars.

You are a Porsche specialist. How did it start ?

I have an older brother. When we were children, he used to say, Porsche is the best car in the world. All my life, from my childhood, I wanted to have the best car in the world, a 80’s Porsche. My dream came true in 2014 when I bought the first one, 911 SC Targa. I wanted to rebuild the car by myself. I took it to my garage, started dismantling it and prepared a list of parts I needed to buy. And one position was impossible to buy. A set of five technical stickers. I recreated the design, found a right material to print it on and visited the printing house. They told me they could not print just 5 stickers and instead of that I need to order at least 500 of them. I placed the order. I wanted my set to be perfect. I wrote a post on the Pelican Parts Porsche forum. I informed members I got those technical stickers, saying me maybe somebody could have the same need. It turned out everybody needed my stickers. I was excited I can do something I really love and that’s how it started. From only me onboard to around 40 people team. We do custom builds, custom parts, services like upholstery for these beautiful cars. This community is amazing. Porsche people are people who drive their cars and love to share their passion. I stick with Porsche.

You have a designer degree but, looking at your work at Car Bone, you have super mecanical skills. Did you follow a formation for that or are you a self made man sport car tuner/mechanical/engineer ?

I do not have mechanical skills. We hire the best specialists in the country. However as a designer I need to understand how systems, mechanisms work. I need to know how tall the person sitting in the car is, how long the hands are. I need to understand what people behaviours in the cars are. Considering a car as a thing to redesign we face something more complicated than a sculpture. We can see the car outside and inside at the same time. It’s important to have a distance, to calm the emotions and see a blank canvas with functions we want to add and the styling as the next step. Car needs to be an extension of a person who owns it. Some people love long trips so their cars should be more comfortable, ready to eat kilometres. Other ones want to have a beautiful thing in a garage. There are many, many types of people with other personal needs. I believe being polymath is the way to design not only the shapes that are perfect but things that are perfect functionally too.

3. Pawel and watches

For how long have you been interested in watches/watchmaking in general ?

I was always into classic watches and stopwatches but couldn’t afford beloved ones for a long time. Classic, mechanical stuff is my thing. Meanwhile, everytime I found something interesting it turned out we speak about something impossible to buy. It made me think rarity is something desirable for me.

1. The beginning of a passion

For how long have you been interested in HEUER watches/chronograph and stopwatches ?

I always admired classic Heuer stuff. I started collecting Heuer stopwatches around 9 years ago starting with inexpensive ones. Now I’m focusing on extremely rare ones. My passion for the Heuer stopwatches rose along with my other passion for Porsche cars. Deeper in the Porsche world I was, the more Heuer love I had. These two fields complement each selves.

2. Relation with HEUER (Tag HEUER)

Saying HEUER or Tag HEUER which words/ideas/value come to your mind ?

Saying Heuer I always think about Porsche 356 rally with a HEUER super-autavia on the dash. This is the most iconic thing I can imagine. I love the fact HEUER covered all time measuring needs starting with scientists, going through sport to aviation and rally cars.

3. Pawel stopwatch collection

How many HEUER stopwatches have you got in your collection ?

I can’t tell the number but around a houndred (see visual 5 below).

Do you remember the first HEUER stopwatch you bought ?

That was probably a ref.595.

What is your favorite one ? Why ?

Super-autavia (see visual 6 below). I love the functions and how precise it is. For me it’s an icon.

What do you look at when you buy a vintage HEUER stopwatch ?

Being made for rally or aviation purposes and meanwhile rare is the perfect combo for me (see visual 8 below).

1. Reedition

What is the HEUER or Tag HEUER vintage device you would like to be re-edit ?

Ok, so in my opinion these masterpieces shouldn’t be re-edited. The limited access to the new finds makes that game amazing. Buying a new one is not the same

2. Tag HEUER device of your dreams

If Tag HEUER had to developp a new measurement intrument from scratch, what would you except for ? 

Ok, so my dream is to design a Tag HEUER stopwatch that is a sum of my thougts about the classic one. Retrofuturistic, winded manually, with some new features that are the answer for the new needs from the current times.