When he was young, Nicholas Bowman-Scargill wanted to be an investment banker “and get to dress in a nice suit and spend my bonuses on beautiful watches”.
The tale of how Bowman-Scargill brought back his family watch brand is one of derring-do and scraping together resources. He studied economics but, having graduated in the financial crisis of 2008, was unable to land a job in investment banking, so instead started a career in PR. Unsatisfied, he followed his interest in watches and, in 2011, landed aapprenticeship. “I don’t think you could find a better place to start and learn, an incredible place,” he says.
His mother dug out an old photo album with advertisements from the 1940s of Fears watch manufacture, England’s largest at the time, employing some 100 watchmakers. He began to learn more about Fears’ history, including how his forebears had trained in Glashutte, Switzerland, “the best place back in the day”.