Seiko Clocks (Seikosha)
Before Seiko was a watch brand, it was a Tokyo clock factory turning out wall clocks and alarm clocks by the hundreds of thousands.
Kintaro Hattori and the Seikosha factory
Seiko's story starts in 1881, when 21-year-old Kintaro Hattori founded K. Hattori, a business selling and repairing watches and clocks in Tokyo, according to the Seiko Museum Ginza and Seiko's own chronology. From 1885 he also traded with foreign merchants in the Yokohama settlement, selling imported Western timepieces wholesale and retail.
In 1892 he set up the Seikosha factory in Tokyo's Honjo ward and began making wall clocks, with about a dozen workers and a chief engineer named Yoshikawa. The museum says nickel-plated alarm clocks followed in 1899, the same year Hattori toured Western watch factories to study their machine tools.
The Seiko Museum Ginza's clock collection begins with Seiko's first eight-day wall clock of 1892 and what it calls Japan's first alarm clock of 1899. The museum says that by making all its parts in-house, Seikosha became one of Japan's largest wall clock makers in a little over six years. Later pieces in the collection include a Blue Crystal table clock from 1913, a twin bell alarm clock from 1915, a musical wall clock from 1929 and a marine chronometer from 1942.
Alarm clocks for the world
Seikosha's clocks soon reached beyond Japan. The museum notes sales agents opened in Shanghai and Hong Kong in 1905, and Seiko's own chronology records orders in 1915 for 900,000 alarm clocks from the United Kingdom and France.
The 1923 Great Kanto Earthquake hit the business hard; Seiko's chronology notes that it replaced the watches customers had left for repair that were lost in the disaster. In 1932 the company completed the clock tower that still stands on the Ginza 4-chome corner in Tokyo, now known as Seiko House. In 1952, the museum notes, a Seiko Comet flower clock appeared in what it describes as Japan's first television commercial.
Quartz, radio and talking clocks
Seiko was early to quartz. Its chronology says it supplied a quartz clock to Chubu-Nippon Broadcasting for time announcements in 1959, launched the portable Crystal Chronometer quartz clock in 1964, and in 1968 introduced what it calls the world's first quartz wall clock for home use.
The company also lists what it calls the world's first radio-controlled clock, installed at the 1970 Osaka Expo, the Pyramid Talk talking clock in 1983, a large marionette clock called the Mullion Clock in 1984, and ultra-thin wall clocks in 1989. These firsts are the company's own claims.
The museum's collection fills in the gaps with a transistor wall clock from 1961, a radio-controlled transistor pendulum clock from 1966 and what it calls the world's first quartz alarm clock, from 1976.
Later highlights include Yukyu, a 2005 clock that recreates what Seiko describes as the world's oldest escapement mechanism, and the 2013 Seiko Space Link, a battery-powered analog wall clock that sets itself from GPS satellite signals and that Seiko calls the first of its kind for the home.
See also: what to know about quartz wall clocks that run on batteries on OnlineClock.app.
Who makes Seiko clocks now, and how to spot one
Clockmaking has been split off and renamed several times. In 1970 the Seikosha clock factory became Seikosha Co., Ltd. SEIKO Clock Inc. took over its clock business in 1996, and in 2021 it merged with Seiko Time Systems to form Seiko Time Creation Inc., the company behind Seiko clocks today.
For newer clocks, the model code is the main identifier. US retailer The Clock Depot lists Seiko's Melodies in Motion musical clocks under codes such as QXM297BRH and QXM380BRH. These battery clocks play 12 or 18 melodies with moving dials, and some models, according to the retailer, have a light sensor that silences the music in the dark.
Seiko's corporate history pages do not include a guide to dating older Seikosha clocks, so for a vintage piece, start with any marks on the dial and movement and ask a specialist clock repairer or collectors' group.
See also: the ultra-precise clocks that radio-set clocks follow on OnlineClock.app.
Questions people ask
Is Seiko still making clocks?
Yes. Since 2021 Seiko clocks have been made by Seiko Time Creation Inc., formed by merging SEIKO Clock Inc. and Seiko Time Systems.
What is Seikosha?
Seikosha was the clock factory Kintaro Hattori opened in Tokyo in 1892. It made wall clocks first and alarm clocks from 1899, and later became a separate company, Seikosha Co., Ltd., in 1970.
When did Seiko make its first quartz clock?
Seiko says it supplied a quartz clock to a Japanese broadcaster in 1959 and sold a portable quartz clock, the Crystal Chronometer, in 1964.