From Junk Shop to Japanese Haute Horlogerie: The Story of Masa’s Pastime and Masa & Co
The first time you see a Masa & Co watch in the metal—a deep blue‑black Sohkoku dialed in shakudō, or the tranquil Nagi with its quiet glow—it doesn’t look like the product of a junk shop. It looks like something that stepped out of both a museum and a craftsman’s notebook: classical Swiss‑style horology filtered through Japanese metalwork, built in microscopic numbers inside a small workshop in Kichijoji, Tokyo.
Behind those watches is Masa’s Pastime, an independent Japanese watchmaker that took more than three decades to move from dealing antiques to making its own fully in‑house MP1 movement and the Masa & Co MP series. To understand why collectors obsess over this brand, you have to start far away from Kichijoji—on a dive boat off California.
How Masa’s Pastime began: from diver to Tokyo watchmaker
Long before anyone spoke of Masa & Co watches, Masaharu “Masa” Nakajima was working underwater, not at a watchmaker’s bench. In his twenties he lived in Los Angeles, working as a commercial scuba diver and enjoying a life that had nothing to do with escapements or finissage.
A chance encounter changed everything. Masa met a dealer who traveled the United States buying antique pocket watches and sending them back to collectors in Japan. Helping handle, pack, and move these watches gave him his first real glimpse into mechanical horology: engraved cases, enamel dials, and intricate movements that were already old when his parents were young.
He didn’t know it yet, but those early experiences with pocket watches laid the foundation for the movement architecture and aesthetic language he would one day make his own in Tokyo.
Masa’s Junkyard: the origins of an independent Japanese watchmaker
When Masa returned to Japan, he decided to give that fascination a physical home. In 1990 he opened a small shop with a self‑deprecating name—Masa’s Junkyard—on the outskirts of Tokyo. It was an antique store in the broadest sense: all sorts of vintage goods passed through its doors, but watches quickly became a central focus.
As customers brought in more and more old timepieces, a problem surfaced: skilled watch repairers were disappearing. Many of the traditional watchmakers who could handle 19th‑ and early‑20th‑century movements were either retiring or unwilling to work on fragile, unruly pocket watches. Clients would arrive with heirloom pieces and leave with the same frustrating answer—“too old to repair,” “no parts available,” “not worth the effort.”
For a shop built on the magic of old watches, that answer was unacceptable. If he wanted Masa’s Junkyard to survive, Masa realized, he would have to become the watchmaker himself.
Teaching himself horology: how Masa Nakajima became a watchmaker
Masa’s education in watchmaking began the hard way: with problem watches that had already come back from repairers in worse shape than they went out. He started by opening cases cautiously, using basic tools and lighter fluid for cleaning, trying to understand how these intricate mechanisms worked and why they failed.
Curiosity quickly turned into obsession. He bought books—often in English—and began systematically teaching himself mechanical watch repair, working through everything from simple cleaning to regulating and eventually fabricating parts for long‑obsolete movements. Every antique pocket watch that landed on his bench became a teacher, revealing different approaches to gear trains, bridge shapes, and finishing styles.
This was more than a technical apprenticeship. Over years of restoring pocket watches, Masa absorbed a design language: large, low‑beat movements, visible gold trains, generous space for hand finishing, and architecture built for longevity. Those lessons would later resurface, almost unconsciously, in the design of his own MP1 in‑house movement.
From antique pocket watches to custom wristwatches
As Masa’s skills grew, so did the ambitions of Masa’s Pastime—the evolved identity of his once‑humble junk shop. The business moved closer to Tokyo, eventually settling in Kichijojiin Musashino, and shifted its center of gravity from general antiques to antique and pocket watch restoration and sales. With that evolution came a new idea: what if these pocket watches could be reborn on the wrist?
The team began designing custom wristwatches built around antique pocket‑watch movements, creating new cases, dials, and hands to give 100‑year‑old calibres a second life on modern wrists. They experimented with sterling‑silver and precious‑metal cases, played with dial typography, and learned how to preserve the soul of an old movement while making it wearable every day.
Collaborations with The Armoury, a menswear retailer famed for craft and tailoring, brought these creations to a wider audience. Trunk shows in Hong Kong showcased Masa’s Pastime’s pocket‑to‑wrist conversions, including a remarkable minute repeater wristwatch built from a ladies’ pocket‑watch movement—an example of just how far the workshop had come from its junk‑shop roots.
These conversions did more than delight collectors. They forced the team to master dialmaking, hand‑making, and case construction—skills that would be indispensable once they decided to build a complete watch from scratch.
Inside the Kichijoji workshop of Masa’s Pastime
By the time Masa’s Pastime was firmly established in Kichijoji, it had become far more than a watch dealer. The workshop was a compact ecosystem: benches lined with tools, lathes and milling machines for cutting components, and engravers and finishers applying classical techniques to modern projects.
From the outside, the shop still looked modest—part antique store, part neighborhood curiosity—but inside it was evolving into a small Tokyo watch manufacture. Decades of restoration had given the team a deep understanding of pocket‑watch mechanics; years of custom conversions had taught them how to design and build dials, cases, and hands. There was now only one element left to truly control: the heart of the watch itself.
The long road to the MP1 in‑house movement
Around 2012–2013, Masa and his team quietly began work on a project that, at first glance, bordered on unreasonable: a fully in‑house mechanical movement, later named MP1.
The brief was simple to state and hard to achieve. Almost every component of the movement—plates, bridges, wheels, screws—had to be made in the Kichijoji workshop, with only the mainspring, hairspring material, and rubies sourced from Switzerland and Germany. In an industry where even many independents rely on base calibres, this was a radical commitment to independence.
Progress was slow and irregular. When money was tight, development paused while the team focused on paid restoration and custom work to keep the lights on. By Masa’s own admission, it was stubbornness as much as strategy that kept the project alive—but after roughly a decade, the MP1 finally became a reality, debuting in spring 2024.
The moment MP1 existed, the story of Masa’s Pastime shifted. What had started as a junk shop now had its own calibre—a watchmaker’s coming‑of‑age.
Inside the MP1: a movement shaped by old pocket watches
Look at the specs of the MP1 and you can see the fingerprints of all those antique pocket watches that once lay disassembled on Masa’s bench. It is a manual‑wind movement, roughly 30 mm in diameter and 5 mm thick, beating at a classical 18,000 vibrations per hour, with a barrel stop‑work that keeps the effective power reserve around 30–32 hours for stable torque.
The architecture consciously follows the classic form of vintage Swiss calibres: broad bridges, a clearly expressed gear train, and ample space for hand finishing. All back plates are hand‑bevelled (anglage), steel parts (including screw heads) are mirror polished, and the 2nd, 3rd, and 4th wheels form a “gold train” cut from 10‑carat gold, also bevelled by hand.
Technically, the balance is made of beryllium copper with six timing screws and three solid 18k mass lots, paired with a free‑sprung overcoiled hairspring in palladium alloy. All visible components are produced in‑house; only the mainspring, hairspring wire, and rubies are imported, because making those internally would make no financial sense for such a small workshop.
It’s a movement designed not just to impress today, but to be repairable a century from nowby any competent watchmaker with tools and patience—exactly the kind of longevity lesson Masa learned from struggling with antique calibres.
And once the MP1 existed, it needed characters—watches—that could express it.
Masa & Co watches: Nagi, Shike, and Sohkoku
To give the MP1 a proper stage, Masa’s Pastime launched a dedicated brand: Masa & Co, created in 2023 as the public face of their original watches. Within Masa & Co, the MP serieswas introduced as a trio—Nagi, Shike, and Sohkoku—each powered by the MP1 but finished and styled differently.
Masa describes the MP1 as the movement that will serve as the core of these watches “over the long term,” with finishing variations used to differentiate the models. Nagi and Shikefeature classic Côtes de Genève striping on their bridges, while Sohkoku stands apart with a frosted, matte finish on the plates and bridges that emphasizes its artisanal character.
Alongside the MP series, earlier Nayuta models continue to represent an important step in the brand’s evolution—original watches with in‑house‑made components that predate the final MP1 architecture. But it’s Nagi, Shike, and especially Sohkoku that have captured the imagination of the independent‑watch community.
Shakudō dials and Japanese artisanal watchmaking
Among Masa & Co’s creations, Sohkoku best illustrates how deeply the brand weaves Japanese craft into classical watchmaking. Its name refers to the deep blue‑black color of a crow, and the watch earns that title through its dial material: shakudō, a historical Japanese copper‑gold alloy.
The dial is finished using the ancient niiro patination process, which gives shakudō a rich, bluish‑black tone and a texture that cannot be replicated by modern plating or paint. Over this surface, master engraver Kei Tsujimoto carves the Asanoha (hemp leaf) motif, a traditional Japanese geometric pattern with spiritual and decorative significance. The same Asanoha motif is engraved on the MP1’s balance cock in the Sohkoku version, creating a visual echo between dial and movement.
Other elements reinforce the handcrafted theme: solid 18k pink‑gold hands of original design, individually shaped and polished; a seven‑piece case measuring about 38 mm in diameter and 10 mm thick with a 20 mm lug width; and options in full 18k pink gold or a combination of shakudō mid‑case with pink‑gold bezel, back, crown, and lugs. Sapphire crystals and a crocodile strap with a matching gold buckle complete what is, in every sense, a high‑end Japanese dress watch made on truly artisanal terms.
Given how much labour and specialized craft go into each piece, it’s inevitable that production volumes remain extremely small—which brings us to how these watches actually reach collectors.
Lottery‑only production and why collectors care
In an era when even many “independent” brands quietly produce thousands of watches a year, Masa & Co’s numbers are startlingly small. According to a detailed report on the Nagi and Sohkoku models, the 2024–2025 production cycle comprised just 10 pieces of each, all entirely handmade in Tokyo and powered by the MP1.
To distribute them fairly, Masa’s Pastime ran an order lottery in May 2024; all pieces were quickly reserved by the winners. For the 2025–2026 cycle, they announced another run of 10 Nagi and 10 Sohkoku, again allocated via a lottery held from May 17 to May 31, 2025, as confirmed by both a detailed newsletter and their own Instagram announcements.
The prices, converted into USD and excluding taxes, underline just how high‑end these independent Japanese watches are: around 60,000 USD for Nagi in stainless steel, 73,000 USD for Nagi in white gold, 80,000 USD for a shakudō‑and‑gold Sohkoku, and 84,000 USD for a full pink‑gold Sohkoku. For collectors used to industrial Swiss pricing, this might seem steep—but when you factor in the near‑total in‑house production, minute volumes, and level of handwork, it starts to look almost inevitable.
To make room for this work, Masa’s Pastime has stopped taking new custom pocket‑to‑wrist conversion orders, choosing instead to devote its limited bench hours to building and refining the MP1 series. That trade‑off is central to their identity today: fewer bespoke conversions, more original movements and watches that carry the workshop’s name on every component.
Social media and the growing fame of Masa’s Pastime
For a company that still looks like a neighborhood shop from the street, social media—especially Instagram—has become a crucial way to reveal what’s happening inside. The account @pastime_masa_ describes itself simply: “Completely in-house made watches Masa & Co. MP series, Nayuta model,” and as of early 2026 it shows about 7.9K followers, 470 following, and roughly 1,360 posts.
The feed acts like an open sketchbook for the Kichijoji workshop. Recent posts show everything from “work in progress” plates and balance cocks under engraver Kei’s tools to close‑ups of MP1 components on the bench, documenting the day‑to‑day reality of building a movement in‑house. An Instagram post in May 2025 formally announced the order lottery for the MP1 series, specifying the May 17–31 window for entries and linking out to the official site’s MP series page.
Other creators amplify the story. Isochrono’s Instagram and YouTube content invites viewers to “visit @pastime_masa_ and have a tour of the antique junk shop/watch manufactory in Tokyo,” driving home the contrast between the modest storefront and the level of watchmaking happening behind it. Combined with earlier video features from The Armoury, this social presence has helped transform Masa’s Pastime from a hidden local name into a globally recognized independent Japanese watchmaker.
How the watch world sees Masa’s Pastime
Within the crowded universe of Japanese independent watch brands, Masa’s Pastime now occupies a rarefied place. Specialist outlets such as Monochrome Watches, Isochrono, and independent newsletters consistently highlight three things: the depth of the workshop’s restoration experience, the rarity of a truly in‑house movement at this scale, and the distinctive fusion of Japanese craft with pocket‑watch‑inspired mechanics.
Monochrome’s portrait of Masa & Co emphasizes how unusual it is for such a small Tokyo watchmaker to design, manufacture, finish, and assemble a movement like the MP1 largely under one roof, and to then offer it in watches made in runs of ten pieces. SFWatchLover calls the release of the MP1 in May 2024 “a significant milestone in the history of Japanese independent watchmaking,” noting both the technical achievement and the disciplined lottery‑based allocation.
The Grand Prix d’Horlogerie de Genève (GPHG) description of the Sohkoku explicitly frames Masa & Co as the result of “over 30 years” of antique restoration and a desire to communicate a unique vision of horology by founding a new brand in 2023. In that telling, Sohkoku becomes the proof‑of‑concept: a watch where shakudō metalwork, Asanoha engraving, and a fully in‑house movement coexist without slipping into gimmickry.
Seen through that lens, Masa’s Pastime isn’t just another microbrand; it’s a case study in how a tiny workshop can, step by step, climb into the realm of haute horlogerie on its own terms.
Why Masa’s Pastime matters in independent watchmaking
Pull the threads of this story together and a coherent picture emerges.
You have a founder who starts not in a Swiss factory or a design school, but as a diverhandling antique pocket watches on the side, then returns to Japan to open a shop literally called Masa’s Junkyard. You have a business forced by circumstance to learn watchmaking because no one else would repair the watches its customers loved, leading to years of self‑taught restoration and part‑making on old calibres.
That hard‑won expertise turns into custom pocket‑to‑wrist conversions, collaborations with discerning retailers, and eventually a workshop in Kichijoji that can build dials, cases, and hands entirely in‑house. Out of that workshop comes a movement project—the MP1—that takes a decade of on‑again, off‑again work and a fair amount of stubbornness to complete, but ultimately becomes the beating heart of the Masa & Co MP series.
On top of all this, the watches themselves are not generic exercises in minimalism or spec‑sheet one‑upmanship; they are explicitly Japanese in their craft references and decidedly pocket‑watch‑inspired in their mechanics. Shakudō dials, niiro patination, Asanoha engraving, frosted plates, Geneva stripes, gold gear trains, free‑sprung overcoils: all of it converges on a handful of watches made in batches of ten, allocated by lottery, under the name of a workshop that once just hoped to keep old watches ticking.
So when you look again at that Sohkoku on someone’s wrist, or at a Nagi turning slowly under a loupe, it’s hard not to see the whole journey compressed into the ticking of the MP1. What started as a junk shop has become one of the most compelling stories in independent Japanese watchmaking—and the fact that it still operates out of a modest space in Kichijoji, documenting its progress on an Instagram feed, only makes that story more human.
In the end, that’s the real power of Masa’s Pastime: not just that it makes extraordinary watches, but that each one feels like a chapter in a long, unlikely, and very human tale of a Tokyo watchmaker who refused to stop at “that can’t be done.”
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