Michael Kors: American Sportswear on a Wrist

Michael Kors sold his first designs from a shop window on Long Island as a teenager, and launched his own label in 1981 at twenty-two.

The design position has been consistent for four decades: American sportswear, made luxurious. Clothes for a woman with somewhere to be. It is a less romantic proposition than European fashion houses trade on, and it has proved considerably more durable commercially.

The watches arrived in 2004, made under licence, and became one of the most successful fashion watch lines ever launched. By the early 2010s Michael Kors was selling watches at a volume that made it one of the largest players in the category worldwide.

The design signature is consistent and recognisable: rose-gold and gold tones, pavé crystal settings, dials with visible detail, and cases proportioned properly for smaller wrists rather than scaled-down men's designs.

That last point is worth dwelling on. Much of the watch industry treats women's watches as men's watches made smaller. Michael Kors designs them as their own thing, which is a large part of why the Sawyer, Averi and Cinthia lines sell the way they do.

Why it matters here

This is the most-gifted watch brand in our store, and the range at 33mm to 39mm covers most of what someone wants from a watch that goes to work, to church and to a wedding without changing.

Be honest about what it is: a fashion watch. Quartz movement, designed by a fashion house, judged on how it looks. On that basis it does its job extremely well.