No Identity is a watch brand built out of an artist's joke that got out of hand. Its co-founder and creative director, who signs his work LABEG, began making whimsical interpretations of famous luxury watches out of cardboard and paint as a creative outlet. The pieces travelled: his watch art has been featured by the New York Times, Hypebeast, Hodinkee and Revolution, among others. When the founders and LABEG came together, the idea was to take that same hand-drawn sensibility off the wall and onto the wrist — the brand describes itself simply as transforming art into watches, and its stated aim is to make collecting feel fresh, expressive and fun rather than reverent.
The conceptual trick that defines the range is the trompe-l'œil dial. Several models use artwork to imitate complications the watch does not actually have: the Noidilus dial paints the look of a perpetual calendar, the Cuboid dial evokes a day-date. The brand is entirely open about it — the complications are purely visual — and treats it as the point rather than a shortcut, a wink at the codes of high watchmaking from someone who draws them by hand. Where it does not joke is construction: the watches use sapphire glass and Japanese Miyota mechanics, with the automatic Miyota 9015 in the main lines and the quartz Miyota 2115 in the smaller Mini versions.
The catalogue is organised into four families. Noidilus is the best-selling line and the one closest to LABEG's original drawings, an asymmetrical case around a hand-painted-looking dial, sold in colourways named like paint chips — Arctic, Avocado Green, Burnt Caramel, Ash Blue, Rosie Black, Black Knight, Charcoal, Mocha, Flamingo Pink, Ice Cream Blue — at roughly 605 to 665 dollars, with 410-dollar Mini versions in Flamingo Pink and Ice Cream Blue. Cuboid is the squarer, more graphic design, a 40 by 43.5 mm case offered in Navy, Azure, Green and Rose Gold from 710 to 780 dollars, with a smaller version at the same 710. Octonoid is the integrated-bracelet sports shape, made in 36 and 39 mm at 630 to 680 dollars in Salmon, Cream, Navy, Sky Blue, Burgundy, Delta Black and yellow-gold-accented variants. Aquanoid rounds out the range with its own rubber straps.
Collaborations are a significant part of the output rather than a sideline. No Identity has worked twice with Casio on the G-Shock DW-5600 — once with the Hong Kong retailer Open Dialogue, and again on the Chrono Clutter edition, limited to a hundred pieces, whose dial is LABEG's reimagining of a watchmaker's bench scattered with parts, at 370 to 415 dollars. There is also a run of Triplet x No Identity limited editions at 450 dollars and a Noir edition made with Left Turn Studios. The brand sells directly from Hong Kong and through a small retail network across Asia — Red Army Watches at ION Orchard in Singapore, The Vintage Concept and Popcorn Supply in Hong Kong, Open Dialogue at K11 Musea, and K-Ming A-Team in Taiwan — and buyers get a pack of watch trading cards with each purchase, which tells you most of what you need to know about the register the brand is aiming for.
