Nostromo: The $15k DIY luxury desk clock designed to get you invested

If you've ever bought a clock worth north of US$15,000 and wished that it were more like a piece of flatpack furniture, then MB&F and Maison Alcée feel your pain. The result is the Nostromo, a haute horlogie clock you put together yourself.Top-end timepieces are not only works of art, but also feats of great craftsmanship. The purpose of such objects isn't just to display wealth, status, or beauty, it's to showcase what true master artisans can achieve with their brains and hands.The fly in the upmarket ointment is that it's remarkably easy to overlook that effort. You swipe your card, walk away with a masterpiece, only to put it on a shelf to admire but never to truly appreciate what has gone into creating it. Nostromo The Nostromo is an attempt to square this circle by borrowing a psychological trick from the opposite end of the market. Flatpack furniture can be a pain. You spend hours sitting on the floor, searching through parts bags, squinting at cryptic diagrams, and wielding an Allen wrench, only to discover you’ve installed the hinges the wrong way round.However, there is an upside. You become very invested in the end result and have much more respect for the object because of the effort and attention you put in. I still have a small office chest of drawers that I'm very reluctant to part with because I put it together – despite the fact that the top drawer won't open more than two inches.The Nostromo taps into this exact psychology. Maison Alcée, a French clockmaker known for build-it-yourself clock kits, teamed up with MB&F designer Maximilian Maertens to create a timepiece inspired by the ship from the sci-fi horror classic Alien (Nostromo being the name of the star freighter where all the action takes place). The Nostromo comes only partially assembledMB&F Instead of arriving fully assembled, the Nostromo leaves most of the benchwork to the buyer. While the delicate regulating organ comes pre-assembled, you are responsible for installing the remaining gears, wheels, and frame – a 222-component puzzle estimated to take around 10 hours. Along with the neatly packaged parts, the kit included watchmaking tools, a 250-page manual, and QR codes linking to video tutorials.The completed product is an elliptical, futuristic desk clock made of brass, German silver, and stainless steel. Resting on three sculptural legs, it displays hours, minutes, and seconds, includes a switchable hourly chime, and boasts a 14-day power reserve.The Nostromo is limited to a run of 50 units worldwide. One will put you back CHF12,000 (approx. US$15,000).Source: MB&F