Analog gets smart in Box Clever’s OLED-powered Span watch concept

By Andy Boxall April 10, 2014

It’s called the Span, it’s the work of design studio Box Clever, and it’s easily one of the best looking smartwatch concepts we’ve ever seen.

Many tech fans willing to strap a new gadget to their wrists are salivating over Motorola’s beautiful Moto 360 smartwatch. The Span might just trump Moto’s forthcoming watch when it comes to the cool factor.

It combines a super cool analog timepiece with a clever, unobtrusive OLED screen to show all the expected smartwatch features. The round face contains a jump hour mechanism, with the hour at the top and the minutes at the bottom. When the hands reach the end of their portion of the dial, they jump back to the beginning. The face is split in two by a black mesh band.

The band contains the watch’s OLED screen, which also shows the time digitally, while displaying reminders, alerts, call details, and a variety of notifications. Box Clever says the Span is designed to work alongside a smartphone, not replace it, so there’s no microphone or speaker to spoil its simplicity. It doesn’t have a touchscreen, and is controlled using a jog dial built into the bezel. In the video, this looks very simple and intuitive to use, and is accompanied by a push button to confirm actions. Recharging the digital display is performed using a micro USB port on the underneath of the watch.

Box Clever envisages the body made out of polished stainless steel and glossy black ceramic, with something more grippy for the bezel. While stainless steel and ceramic are common materials for luxury watches, we’ve yet to see a smartwatch take advantage of them. In the pictures, the Span looks fantastic, a true combination of modern, analog timepieces and high-tech smart watches.

Sadly, before you start reaching for your credit card, the Span smartwatch is only a concept at the moment, but the team does say it’s ready to be put into production — should someone be willing to take it on.

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Andy is a Senior Writer at Digital Trends, where he concentrates on mobile technology, a subject he has written about for…

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