The Parivas Exo.1 and the Rise of Additive Manufacturing in Watchmaking

Last year at the Windup Watch Fair in New York City I was approached by Jared Woods and Mickey Brown, the co-founders of Parivas, a brand that I had not heard of until he walked up to me with his business card in hand.

At the time, Parivas hadn’t really launched officially. They handed me a rough prototype of a 3D printed watch and loosely explained the concept behind the brand, which approaches watch design through the perspective of engineering, making use of the most cutting edge additive manufacturing technologies. It seemed like a cool, ambitious project. There are lots of cool, ambitious projects, many of them led by talented watch industry outsiders, and I’ve found that sometimes there’s an inverse relationship between the coolness and level of ambition and the ultimate success rate.

Now Parivas is here in a much more official capacity, with the launch of the Exo.1, a $7,500 3D printed design object with an intricate lattice frame and a trademarked finishing technique of the brand’s own invention. It comes at a time when 3D printed watches are having a bit of a moment. Holthinrichs and Apiar have released notable watches with 3D printed cases, and Ming manufactures an incredible bracelet that might be the single most impressive 3D printed watch object I’ve handled. The technology is clearly improving and it seems like enthusiasts are more receptive to these ideas than they ever have been.

The one thing all of these brands have in common is that they claim their designs could only be accomplished using additive manufacturing, and that they’re taking advantage of the unique properties of this tech to create better products that couldn’t exist otherwise. To a certain extent, these watches have certain common visual hallmarks in their geometry with shapes that defy convention. Parivas is no different. As you’ll see in CEO Mickey Brown’s written responses to a series of questions I posed to him recently, he believes Parivas is breaking new ground in the world of 3D printed watches through the use of processes that have only become available in the last few years.

The other common trait that Parivas shares with other brands making 3D printed watches is the perspective of an outsider. Michiel Holthinrichs has a background in architecture, Apiar was founded by engineers, and even Ming Thien comes to watches through the world of photography. Additive manufacturing, for a variety of reasons, is being embraced by entrepreneurs who have a non-traditional view of the watch industry, and will likely approach working within it very differently. That has the potential to radically change the industry if these manufacturing techniques are widely adopted, but in a discipline that has hundreds of years of history and largely trades on an adherence to tradition, that will be a steep hill to climb.

I have yet to see the final version of the Exo.1 in person, but we hope to have a sample for hands-on review soon.

Can you discuss the origins of the brand? Was it always conceived as a project that would take advantage of 3D printing technology, or was there a time when traditional manufacturing was on the table?

Parivas began as an epiphany, and once it took root in my mind, I didn’t know how or to what end, but I knew it would become my life path. Parivas is the convergence of the technical skills and design intuition I developed in aerospace combined with a passion for watches that runs deeply within my family. And our team brings it all to life.

Watches hold a special place in my heart. They represent a meaningful bond I share with my father and brother. In my family, like many, watches have always carried meaning. When a son reaches his first major milestone, his father memorializes that moment with a watch. This tradition shaped the presence and significance of watches in my life.

My early career in aerospace coincided with the exact moment additive manufacturing transitioned from an emerging technology to a serious engineering tool. Leading additive development programs and attending conferences across the country gave me unique access and insight to the technology. Not only did I understand its capabilities, its limits, and its trajectory, but I also created personal relationships with the people defining what it would become. That proximity gave me and Parivas an advantage before the first watch concept was ever developed.

In 2020 my expertise in additive manufacturing, creativity as a designer, and passion for watches converged. In that instant, my life shifted; Parivas was born. An exclusively additive brand that would build its identity on designs and structures that could not be produced through traditional processes. Not only is additive my personal technical niche, but this distinction is our greatest lever to differentiate ourselves and provoke curiosity within the industry. Beyond that, it affords us a truly rare and significant opportunity – to offer something genuinely new to the watch community.

The Exo.1 is our first expression as we enter the era of additive watch making.

Several brands have experimented with 3D printed cases and other components over the last few years. What makes the Exo.1 different? Is it the case complexity? The technology used during the manufacturing process? Or something else?

For the brands already exploring 3D printing, while a variety of watches have been produced with 3D printing, some could also have been manufactured using traditional subtractive methods. The Exo.1 showcases what a watch looks like when the only method capable of constructing it and its features is additive manufacturing. Beyond that, it is designed and produced with an inherently and fundamentally different process and mindset than any other watch.Most watches are designed from the inside out – watchmakers refine the movement first and then build the surrounding case to house the movement. At Parivas, the process is inverted. We begin with a single 3D structure unit cell and propagate that into a lattice, that we form into the watch’s exterior structure. From there we design inward. Our process is anchored in exploration and instinct, believing that through our development process the final design will reveal itself. Constructing one block at a time, by hand, from the outside, in.

Furthermore, instead of designing toward a particular type or category – dress, pilot, dive – we engineer geometries that are rooted in the aerospace world. The Exo.1 is not designed for an environment or function; it’s an extension of the fighter jet structures that we designed first. The same performance, the same precision, the same standard, but a completely new implementation and variant of the structure in an application that emphasizes its beauty while preserving its engineering integrity.

Since its inception over 6 years ago, we have refined the design and manufacturing process to reflect the highest levels of engineering rigor, common between the aerospace and horological worlds.

You describe the Exo.1 as a ‘monolithic structure’ where the bezel, lugs, and case architecture are unified into a single form. From an engineering perspective, does that solve a problem inherent in traditional case architecture, or is this an aesthetic choice? “Inconsistencies, misalignments, and stress concentrations” are mentioned as pitfalls of traditional manufacturing in the press materials – are these problems the Parivas team has encountered with traditionally manufactured watches?

The monolithic structure is both a deliberate engineering decision and a core aesthetic ethos, and for us, those two things are inseparable. Without the engineering strategy and rigor, the aesthetic construction would not be achievable.

On the aesthetic side, it is central to how we’re introducing ourselves to the industry. The Exo.1 showcases what additive manufacturing is genuinely capable of, establishes a structure that has no precedent in contemporary horology, and sets the formal design language the brand will carry forward.

The engineering rationale is equally intentional. At a fundamental level, reducing part count reduces risk. The stackup of a traditional watch case is an exceedingly complex layering of components, tolerances, and interfaces. While brands don’t advertise their attrition or acceptance rates, we have a firsthand view behind that curtain through our own production pipelines. The reality is simple: more components mean more variability and more opportunity for something to go wrong.

This is neither a critique nor a response to any specific problems we’ve observed in existing watches. It is our default and baseline as non-traditional watchmakers to identify risk mitigation opportunities and apply fundamental engineering principles from the outset. When you approach a watch purely as a design and engineering challenge, without inherited assumptions about its parts or construction, the approach is simple: fewer parts mean fewer interfaces, fewer tolerances, fewer alignments, and fewer variables altogether. The monolithic case isn’t a statement on traditional manufacturing. It’s the result when a new manufacturing process enables you to maximize execution of first principles.

There’s a strong sense throughout the press materials that Parivas sees itself less as a traditional watch brand and more as an engineering-led project. Do you think that outsider perspective is essential to making something genuinely new in the watch industry right now?

As much as we wish we were born with a Swiss watchmaking lineage and formally trained in its techniques and practice, we were not. Even if we wanted to position ourselves as a traditional watch brand, we have neither the formal upbringing nor traditional training. Instead, we began, like many, by embedding ourselves in the world of watches as admirers and avid enthusiasts.

We know that in order to make something worthy of being worn by collectors in this community, we first and foremost have to bring genuine value and distinction to the table. Our perspective invites the reimagination of watch construction and our background enables us to leverage the most advanced technologies capable of realizing it. When we began our endeavor in 2020, our goal was to build the most interesting watch we could conceive. As we continued to refine our design language, it became clear to us that what we were making could be compelling enough for others to want to be part of. Six years later, and we’ve made it to our debut milestone.

We don’t think that our perspective alone is essential to making something genuinely new in the watch industry, there are already many creative and brilliant minds at work. The fundamental advantage of our perspective is that we have no bias, no rules, and no blueprint. Everything is on the table because we have no reason to believe otherwise. We hope that what we created and the approach, process, and standards through which we built it, are things that people resonate with. When someone holds an Exo.1, they should feel the passion and soul that we’ve poured into making it.

You mention that the Exo.1 was conceived years before the manufacturing technology was ready to realize it. What are the specific advancements that have been made that allow the Exo.1 to exist?

There are two distinct additive manufacturing worlds that needed bridging in order for the Exo.1 to be possible – macro printing and micro printing. In 2020 when the Exo.1 began development, these two worlds had not yet converged. Macro printing machines can reach nearly a cubic meter in build volume, prioritizing speed and size over finish and accuracy. This is most common in the aerospace and automotive industries for engine parts. At the opposite end of the spectrum, micro printing can produce exceptionally intricate and detailed structures but has a maximum build volume of roughly 1 cubic centimeter. These machines have incredible feature resolution but a severely limited build volume, optimal for the microelectronics and medical implants.

The Exo.1 case is 42 mm in diameter and constructed entirely of 1 mm diameter individual beams. Essentially the Exo.1 is a macro structure composed of micro elements. In 2020, a process capable of scaling the resolution and fidelity of micro printing to the volume of macro construction had not yet been developed, let alone able to meet our standards of precision and quality.

However, our deep roots in the additive industry gave us a clear view of its direction and the confidence to design ahead of it. We knew the trajectory of additive manufacturing and beyond that, began working closely with the companies at the forefront of the industry, building the next generation of printers that would bridge the two worlds of macro and micro into one.

In late 2024 the convergence we had explicitly designed for occurred and we were able to realize the vision that we had been nurturing for the prior 4 years. These companies at the helm of the manufacturing industries used the Exo.1 to prove and showcase their next-generation technologies. From 2024-2026 we refined our processes and results together.

Can you discuss the development of the Solar Dusted finishing process?

When we received our first metal prototypes of the Exo.1, one of the more remarkable features was the metal finish, specifically on the dial from which the hour indices extrude. This is the largest continuous and slanted surface found anywhere on the Exo.1 and because of those two specific attributes, we inadvertently created a texture that captured and reflected light like nothing else we’d ever witnessed.

What we discovered was that due to the slant of the dial, when the 30-micron layers of powdered metal are sintered together, they merge and resolve naturally into a vast array of microscopic reflectors, distributed across the surface with wave-like pattern elements. As a result, when you tilt your wrist in direct sunlight, the dial comes to life. What we also realized was that this natural metal finish had never been reproduced before because it was a consequence of bridging macro and micro printing with the specific metal recipe and sintering process we had custom developed for our watches.

Identifying this brand new surface finish was just the beginning. Over the following years we focused heavily on the mixture and process that yielded the cleanest and clearest version of the dial. The final version showcased on every Exo.1 has been refined and tuned to its maximum brilliance. And due to the individualized nature of how each watch sinters, every Solar Dusted surface is a one-of-a-kind fingerprint-like signature, meaning each Exo.1 is truly a unique 1 of 1.

Can you elaborate on the brand’s strategy that will shape the next few years? Is the $7,500 price point roughly where we can expect Parivas watches to exist, or will the brand experiment with watches at significantly higher or lower price points?

From 2020 to 2026, we built Parivas from the ground up, refining the design and production of the Exo.1 while simultaneously laying the foundation of the business and developing a roadmap for the expansion of the Genesis and future collections.

At Parivas, each collection is defined by a dedicated case geometry. Every collection that follows will be established through its own distinct case design and construction. While our geometries and features will evolve, the Genesis Collection establishes the formal language that defines Parivas; and whose core elements have become cornerstones of the brand: tritium integrated floating hour indices, Solar Dusted surfaces and bespoke lattice architectures.

Within the Genesis Collection, three additional models are in development, each introducing new complication configurations, materials, and model-specific design details. They share the same movement family as the Exo.1 and will range from the current price point into the mid five-figure range, reflecting the added complexity and materials each brings.

The concepts for the next two collections are well underway, each defined by a completely unique base lattice structure. These will require continued advancement in 3D printing before they are fully producible at our standard. Their releases are correlated with elevation of the movement, as we diversify and pursue integration of our design language into the caliber itself. Price points for those collections are still being determined.

We will continue to create forms that challenge the limits of manufacturing, because that is how we reinforce our identity and positioning in the industry.

What is the future of 3D printing in the watch industry? Do you see it as a niche interest, or are there opportunities for this technology to be adopted by mainstream watch brands?

We hope to be a central conduit between additive manufacturing and the watch industry. While we may not be watchmakers in the traditional sense, we are the culmination of engineering expertise in the additive space with the devotion to become watchmakers, as the industry enters the era of additive watch design. For us, it’s integral and fundamental to our brand that our designs cannot be made any other way. This conviction forces us to think differently than traditional watchmakers as we continue pushing the boundaries of additive watch design.

What we’ve come to learn is that the technology in and of itself is relatively inconsequential, it’s what brands choose to do with it that matters. To paraphrase one of our first buyers -“I appreciate that this watch is 3D printed, but I’m buying it because I love the design.”

Similarly, we’ve seen brands take one of their existing designs and identically reproduce it with additive, and it’s received no differently than the fully machined versions. Additive manufacturing alone is a tool and an opportunity. This tool unlocks a valuable new dimension in the creative space and opens the door to the reimagination of watch design.

There is plenty of room in the additive space for everyone. There are brands whose processes and pillars are deeply rooted and beloved, but many who are bold and ambitious and are well suited to explore additive. Ultimately, whether or not the technology is more broadly adopted by mainstream or independent brands rests on the shoulders of the watch collectors and the balance between their demand for iconic and traditional watch designs and innovative and novel concepts.

As the newest watch brand to enter the space, our design language, specifically and exclusively enabled by additive manufacturing, is what makes us different, not simply the use of the technology. We hope this technology offers collectors the ability to explore a new visual and horological expression, one they find refreshing and exciting. And if enough people resonate with what we, and others like us, have built and what we represent, waves of additive watches and watch brands will almost certainly emerge.