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Apple Watch designer reveals the device’s origins on its fifth birthday

In his two decades at Apple, Imran Chaudhri worked on many of the company’s most iconic product lines, including the iPhone, iPad and Mac. The designer left the company back in 2017 (landing on Microsoft’s HoloLens team two weeks back), but today he’s offering up some fun insight into Apple Watch’s beginnings on the wearable’s fifth birthday.

The thread is a treasure trove of fun facts about the device’s early days. One interesting tidbit that might not be a huge surprise to those following Apple at the time is that the an early prototype of the Watch consisted of a iPod nano strapped to a watch band.

Five years before it finally entered the smartwatch market in earnest, Apple introduced a square touchscreen nano. Three years before the arrival of the first Pebble, people were already considering the smartwatch possibilities. Accessory makers quickly took advantage, introducing wrist bands that would let it function as a touchscreen music watch. That sixth gen product ultimately served as a foundation for the popular device to come. 

Per Chaudhri:

i had just wrapped up ios5 and took it down to show the ID team what notification centre and siri was – and what it could be in the future. i never got to share it with steve. we lost him right after ios5.”

Other interesting bits here include,

  • The Solar watch face was designed as “as a way for muslims observing ramadan to quickly see the position of the sun and for all to understand the sun’s relationship to time.”
  • The butterfly animation was created using real (albeit deceased) butterflies (one of which is now framed in his home).
  • The touch feature originally went by the name E.T. (electronic touch).
  • The Digital Touch drawing feature was inspired by time as a graffiti artist.

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