LOCAL

Saving Stanley Market

Southside residents launch campaign to bring crowds back to the seaside town

Everyone defines life in Hong Kong a little differently. To some, it’s long days at the office capped off by weekends brunching or hiking. To others, it’s hours of manning the shop you’ve owned for decades, situated in one of the city’s most famously loved tourist spots.

Considering the tumultuous toll the pandemic has taken on people the worldover, life has been quiet for those that fall into the latter category. It comes as no surprise that walking through Stanley Market does not feel like it once did. The buzz of culture and excitement that used to flood that network of lanes has fallen quiet these days, as foot traffic and business has grinded to a near halt. Hong Kong’s number of arrivals have drastically dropped by over 90 percent in the last year, as has the number of people flocking to Stanley on weekends to shop, dine and stroll.

Yet, if you were to mosey on down to Stanley Market now, you’ll find that, despite over a year of bad business for the area, shops remain open with business owners standing in the doorway of their stores, greeting passersby, welcoming them and chatting to them with perfect enthusiasm. They stay open for about nine hours each day, seven days a week, even if only a handful of people visit.

In a spirited effort to rally behind these hard workers, members of the Stanley community have launched the Summer in Stanley ‘21 campaign. On top of trying to gain traction on Instagram through the account @stanleyvillagehk, Stanley residents have created shirts and posters to promote the campaign.

With summer barrelling in at full speed, there are also beach cleanups and a huge array of watersport events planned to bring crowds back to the seaside town. While this is the hook, residents are hoping it will get people to continue returning to Stanley to support local businesses there.

Where some may see a dead end, Hongkongers see a wall to bust through. While the buzz that hums through those lanes has quieted, remnants remain, carried through by the people that continue to occupy Stanley Market and Stanley neighbourhoods.

In a city that often fails to recognise and reward hard work, we should show up for our fellow Hongkongers and do just that. If you’re wondering where to spend your dollars this summer, head to Stanley. Have lunch under the sun, go shopping, join one of the many water sport events that will be available this summer and support our local business owners.

Thierry Dubois is not who you’d expect him to be. As the APAC Managing Director of the Federation of the Swiss Watch Industry, you might assume that he revels in the lavish particulars of that world – but Dubois’s fascination with watches has always been a humble one. He doesn’t concern himself with price tags on a timepiece or stylistic trends, but rather the nitty gritty details of a watch’s history, its mechanisms and, essentially, what makes them tick – otherwise known as horology. “I was just reading a book about the first watchmaker in Geneva. It’s truly fascinating. A bit geeky, but fascinating,” he says.

As a self-proclaimed nerd, Dubois has always been around the art of watchmaking. “My grandfather and grandmother worked for watch manufacturers in Switzerland. In the evenings and weekends, we would have people ringing our doorbell asking for their watch to be repaired, which my grandfather did to earn some extra money as they were not paid much in those days. Both my grandparents as well as my father, have proper watchmaking training. They know how to disassemble and reassemble watches. I do not have that training.”

So, when the time came for Dubois to pick his own path, he chose to study law. He became a lawyer but without noticing it was happening, became drawn back to the watch industry. “Frankly speaking, I found law a bit boring. Reading and reading,” he says. So how does one go from law to founding a private members’ club for watch enthusiasts? “At the time, when I decided to start the group in 2008, I was dealing with watches at the business to business level in my job – so retailers to distributors, distributors to brands. But I’ve always been fascinated by and interested in the consumer, in the watch enthusiast. Why are they so interested? That’s when I started the Art of Time.”

This was the original name for his group of watch enthusiasts but Dubois had initially wanted to call it something that arguably conveys his interest more accurately: ‘Toyz for Boys’. However, his colleagues advised against it, so he went with the name Art of Time.

The Art of Time would often meet for dinners or drinks to discuss their shared passion but they never had a physical space to call their own. “When we tried to organise events, we would meet at restaurants.” Many years later, he found a location in Aberdeen. From there, he decided to use his network to turn his interest group into a private members’ club that hosts events, workshops and meetings for people who love watches.

LUOXO, founded at the start of this year, is located in Wong Chuk Hang and is staffed with watch experts. Dubois has a team of people who have extraordinary skill sets when it comes to horology. Loraine is a young woman who single handedly disassembled and reassembled a watch that’s over a hundred years old – twice. It belonged to one of LUOXO’s members, who had bought it at a flea market in Europe. She took every cog and spring apart, cleaned it and put it back together. Marc, another person on Dubois’ team, holds a Bachelor of Engineering, Degree in Microtechnology, Specialization in Watch Engineering and Microtechnology and is able to look at the movement of a watch and tell you which pieces the watch will fit in and how it ticks.

LUOXO also has a “digital safe” in which its members can store information about their precious time pieces to be accessible only by them when needed. This doesn’t just mean Rolexes and Patek Philippes – it can be any watch, branded or not. “It’s a space that is completely neutral, meaning that it’s not attached to any brand, where people can really think and say whatever they want about horology and watch brands. There’s no pressure from a particular brand.” LUOXO has no affiliations so all members are free to criticise and debate watches as they please.

The location also has a two-tier roof. Their meeting room, which is totally soundproof,

has a view of the terrace and Wong Chuk Hang’s surrounding mountains and bay, but has blacked out windows so that it is completely private – something his members value more than anything.

Dubois emphasised that this club is for everyone, “you don’t even need to own an expensive watch,” he affirmed. It was difficult to understand exactly what he meant until he told us this story. “This guy who’s following me on Instagram had very good, pertinent questions about watches and water resistance. We were speaking and he brought up an interesting point. I told him, ‘Wow, I’m really impressed. That is a really good question.’ To which he responded, ‘I’m only 14 years old.’ From that conversation, Dubois invited the boy and his parents to come and learn about watches at LUOXO, proving that it’s not an elite club for high society. It’s for anyone who genuinely has an interest in horology.

While LUOXO is the first-ever physical location, Dubois is now planning to open three more locations in Shanghai, Singapore and Japan in 2022 and 2023.

luoxo.com