I’ve known LeBoy for a decade. Our Marine years overlapped. The years since we have caught up where we could, between armies or stories, trying to give our own dreams shape on bar napkins. Camped out on the corner of Uzi and Hitman street on the outskirts of Gaza, Leboy showed me the first Bedouin prototype two years ago.

A brands first offering had no right to be beautiful.

I told him two things then; wear it, and make me one.

Beauty has a function all of its own. “Travel/backpacker/tactical” designs would have you think life in the wind is a dull granola of earth tones and colors-against-nature. Yet amongst the world’s real and last nomads, beauty is worked by hand into everything.

The sand dune dial.

I miss the desert. I missed it before I’d ever been. I dreamed of the desert before I first knew the wonder of the night’s firmament. I missed it before I knew the terror dulled years across it. I remember the desert with each warming glance at the Bedouin’s dune dial, and with it the urge to shake the talcum powder sand out of old boots.

The Mediterranean blue bezel. It’s not the oceans I or LeBoy grew up with, but the seas we grew up reading about. The elegant Aegean.

The elegant Eastern Arabic numerals and rice grain bracelet add a refinement not found in field watches. It’s a reminder that “The better you look, the more you see”.

The less you have in this world the more free you are, and conversely, these precious few objects become more personal, valuable, and useful in travel. In this I marveled at the first J.M LeBoy Bedouin, and the Bedouin Observer clasped to my wrist today.

The Bedouin Observer GMT is limited to 5 made-to-order watches, with a hidden Observer Roundel on the caseback, and a hand-enameled “Evil Eye” on the crown. Each Bedouin will come with an Observer Alpha case, a new design specifically for carrying and packing watches, pens, and other small tools on our bags or your belt.

Enjoy your time, and your fancy clock,

-Robert