Gilt, a popular fashion company along with computer giant Hewlett Packard unveiled HP’s new smartwatch, the Chronowing last Friday, making the new watch available to consumers prior to the upcoming shopping season for the holidays.
The Chronowing brings an all new circular design to the category of smartwatches emerging in the market, something which has largely remained unseen. This comes courtesy of professional fashion designer, Michael Bastian.
The professional designer has helped HP create a watch that is much sleeker and more stylish in appearance. In a recent statement on his website, Bastian has said that he had been intrigued by the recent advancements in the wearable technology segment, the smart watch category in particular. He was however disappointed by the earlier designs of the smart watches released by other companies. Being a designer himself, he immediately saw the need for a stylish watch, which looked to be more of a traditional watch rather than a new unrecognized device on the wrist.
By and large, existing smart watches in the market feature a rectangular shape. The new Chronowing does not have any touchscreen on it, but rather features a monochrome LCD display. This greatly helps preserve the traditional watch look and makes it a wearable device second to being a watch. The device also doesn’t feature any camera or microphone but rather connects to smartphones via Bluetooth.
While displaying only the time primarily, the watch is also capable of displaying messages, updates and other alerts subscribed to. It also has the added abilities of syncing with the user’s calendar and can also send out mails. The Chronowing is also water resistant. Another handy feature is that the watch allows users to control music playing on their Bluetooth connected smartphone.
However, the Chronowing does not offer some of the features already available in other watches. For instance, the Chronowing does not have the ability to track the wearer’s heart rate.
The device will be made exclusively available on the Gilt store on November 7 onwards. The watch is set at a price of $349. HP has also released a limited edition of the Chronowing featuring an alligator style strap and sapphire glass crystal material. This limited edition model is available for $649.
The standard version of the Chronowing features straps made out of nylon, rubber or leather. Both versions of the watches will feature a capacity of 300 megabytes. The smart watch can be controlled by an application which is available for iOS and Android devices.
After HP’s new and stylish release, next year will see Apple unveiling it’s much hyped about smart watch. Only time will tell what Apple has in store for this wearable technology segment. With both Samsung and Apple having their own smart watches featuring touchscreens, HP has decided to move in the opposite direction to make the watches look more like classic watches rather than miniature phones worn on the wrist. This may help raise the acceptance towards wearable technology for those who are more fashion conscious.