Building a Championship Watch: Kicking Off a Custom Artisans de Genève Rolex

I was in San Antonio for Game 5. Alone, technically. I bought my ticket and flew down by myself because as a Knicks fan, there was no version of this where I wasn't there. By tipoff I'd found Scott, Seth, Niraj, and Darren, and by the final buzzer I was part of a group of thirteen Knicks fans who had never planned to spend a championship together but did anyway. I've spent years building a Knicks memorabilia and card collection. None of it comes close to standing in that arena when the buzzer sounded.

Some moments demand a physical marker. This was one of them. So I'm commissioning a custom watch to commemorate it, and I wanted to bring you along for the process, because it's going to take close to a year and there's a lot to learn along the way.

Why not Cool Hand Brooklyn

Spike Lee built Cool Hand Brooklyn with Artisans de Genève back in 2017, and it's a great piece. Knicks colors, obvious passion behind it, no notes on the execution. But it always felt slightly off to me. The Knicks don't play in Brooklyn. I wanted something that was mine, built around my relationship to this team and this moment, not an homage to someone else's build. No disrespect to Spike. I just wanted bespoke.

Why I finally pulled the trigger

I've circled the idea of a custom watch for years without committing. Laurent Ferrier, Satory Billard, Fears. I've admired all three, gotten close to starting something with each, and never actually kicked off a project. Every one of those builds felt like it needed a bigger reason than "I want a cool watch."

A championship is a bigger reason.

Why Artisans de Genève

AdG has been on my radar since I first saw the Warm Burgundy, their take on the Daytona. Then the Heart of Namibia, with a stone dial that stopped me cold, and a moonphase complication built into a watch that had no business having one. Then the Patek 066, a skeletonized titanium case and dial that's honestly one of the most beautiful things I've seen come out of a workshop.

For a long time I thought I understood what AdG does. Change the dial color, swap some hardware, done. My friend Jason, who has studied their work closely, walked me through what's actually happening under the hood, and later I got the same tour from CEO Philippe Wassmer directly. The dial swap is the part you can photograph. The real work is in the movement alterations and the case refinishing, the kind of hands-on craftsmanship that doesn't show up in an Instagram post but is the entire reason these pieces command what they do. That's when I understood the comparison I'd been making in my head for years: AdG is the Singer Porsche of watchmaking. Incredible on the surface, and somehow more incredible the deeper you look.

AdG primarily builds on Rolex and Patek Philippe, and this championship deserved a company operating at the top of its craft. Extravagant felt like the right register for what this team just did.

Why not the reference AdG is known for

Everyone expects a specific look when they think of AdG. I wanted to go a different direction, both because I like doing the unexpected thing and because the piece I landed on gives me something I can actually put on my wrist and wear without a second thought. This wasn't going to be a watch that lives in a safe.

I'm not announcing the reference yet. The design work is still early and I'd rather let the piece speak for itself once it exists instead of setting expectations around a base model that might shift.

Design direction: wearable, not a costume

My brief to the design team is simple. This has to be something I wear, not something I admire from a case. The Knicks connection will be unmistakable, but it can't tip into cheesy. Orange and blue everywhere with a logo slapped on the dial would be easy and wrong. The harder, better version threads the needle: unmistakably Knicks, unmistakably wearable, never costume.

Where things stand

I've sent the AdG team a set of renderings I pulled together, purely as inspiration rather than a final direction. The ADG team has now come back with one set of designs and we're now collaborating on the next. I'm excited with where this is headed and it feels good to be able to co-design a watch.

This is going to be a series. I'll bring you through design, material choices, the back and forth with the team, and eventually the reveal. If you've got ideas for how a Knicks championship should look on a beautiful Rolex, I want to hear them.