Nicholas Manousos started his professional life as a software engineer, but it soon became apparent that his tastes in engineering verged more towards the old school.
Encouraged by his wife, he walked out on the tech industry, and his hometown of San Francisco, to pursue a more fitting passion: watchmaking.
At the Hayek Watchmaking School in Miami, he turned his analytical brain to cogs and springs, and it was time well spent.
Ask Nicholas for a slice of advice on how to make it in the watch world, and he will tell you: “Go to watchmaking school. Having a foundation as a watchmaker opens many doors, even when you aren’t working at the bench.
“I often meet people who have a passion for watches and want to translate that into a career in the watch industry. It is rare to find anyone who is willing to put in the extra effort and study watchmaking at a full-time school first.”
Nicholas now dedicates his working days to furthering education around watchmaking as the executive director of the Horological Society of New York (HSNY), a non-profit organisation that started as a trade body in 1866.
His days include managing a team of employees and volunteers who help to run the society’s monthly lectures, annual galas, watchmaking classes, research library and scholarship programme.
A particular high for Nicholas this year was the chance to host the society’s annual gala, which was cancelled in 2020 and 2021, ending the society’s 154-year uninterrupted run of annual fundraisers. “By all accounts, it was a very successful event,” he says of this year’s event, sharing that it raised $100,000 that will be used as financial aid for watchmaking students and schools around the US.
Looking forward, Nicholas says he is looking forward to shifting HSNY’s events programme away from Zoom and back to Manhattan.
That, and finishing a very special personal project in his home workshop: “An adaptation of a 19th century escapement to work in a modern watch movement.”
