Located just a few blocks from the bright lights of Times Square, Citizen’s Flagship Store & Museum in NYC was the perfect setting to mark 50 years of Eco-Drive Innovation, the brand’s proprietary light-powered technology. To mark the occasion, members of the Hodinkee community joined Neall Brick, Director of Merchandising at Citizen Watch America, Shoichiro Morita, Eco-Drive movement engineer at Citizen Watch Japan, Yu Sekiguchi, Editor-in-Chief of Hodinkee Japan, and Tim Jeffreys, Deputy Editor at Hodinkee, for curated cocktails and sushi experience, an exploration of legacy pieces, and a panel discussion covering the brand’s relentless pursuit of light-powered creations.
Guests were treated to an informative discussion about the history, development, and evolution of Eco-Drive as panelists reflected on the breadth of Eco-Drive models that exist today and the engineering aspirations to produce even more styles of watches powered by Eco-Drive. Citizen’s 100+ year philosophy to create a watch for every Citizen of the World continues as Eco-Drive’s success has forged a future of exploring even longer power reserves, lower power consumption, longer and heavier hands and smaller case sizes. Beyond the conversation, the brand’s US Museum, located on the third floor of the Citizen Flagship Store New York, was updated into an immersive story of Eco-Drive’s past with a special viewing of Citizen’s new global campaign, “Powered by Any Light.” Historic designs and vintage advertisements captivated attendees as they mingled around the space.
The story of Eco-Drive’s development is as much a philosophical conversation as a technical one. In the 1970s, when a global energy crisis was drawing attention to the promise of solar panels, Citizen’s engineers recognized that quartz was the timekeeping technology of the future. But even single-use batteries, no matter how long-lasting, eventually need replacing. Independent of the environmental realities of the time, Eco-Drive began as a quest to eliminate waste through the product’s entire lifespan. In 1976, just seven years after the launch of the world’s first quartz wristwatch, Citizen introduced the Crystron Solar Cell, the world’s first analog light-powered watch, establishing the brand as a pioneer in sustainable watchmaking. Thanks to Eco-Drive’s ability to run on any kind of light, it has since become a mainstay of the brand.
Solar-powered watches have become increasingly popular across the watch industry in recent years, but Citizen’s proprietary Eco-Drive technology remains in a class of its own. Citizen has spent fifty years lowering the energy threshold of timekeeping, perfecting a system that captures any light source, from dim office fluorescents to the ambient glow of a showroom, and converts it into a reliable power reserve. Eco-Drive provides a comprehensive solution to the biggest problem with quartz watches, namely their finite battery life. Not content with solving this problem, Citizen has spent the last 50 years pushing the boundaries of light-powered performance, a pursuit that has resulted in the 1mm thick Eco‑Drive One (the world’s thinnest light-powered watch), and the E365, which can run for a full year on a single charge.
The advent of solar cells that can be hidden beneath a watch dial likewise allowed Citizen to explore an unprecedented range of new aesthetic possibilities. From structural ink and artisanal Washi paper dials to Mickey Mouse and C-3P0, Citizen has continued to redefine the look of light-powered watches over the last five decades. Combined with the brand’s other proprietary technologies, including Satellite Wave GPS, Atomic Timekeeping, and Super Titanium™, Citizen continues to push light-powered timekeeping further still. Shoichiro acknowledged that every “finished” product they make is viewed as the beginning of the next cycle of innovation.
As with all good things, the night came to an end with the enthusiastic community heading into the dark evening. We would be hard pressed not to recognize the attendee who stood up in the concluding Q&A session, simply to share how accurate his Eco-Drive has remained after 10 years of ownership. No question, just pure enthusiasm for the brand. Given how much Citizen has achieved in the last 50 years and the enthusiasm of the community in the store, there’s a bright future ahead for Eco-Drive, powered by any light.
This event was produced in partnership with Citizen.
