Rebuilding Box Inlay: Help appreciated

Hello everyone 😀

I've got a Constellation box for cheap but without the inlay. Since I want to rebuild it, I would need some infos about the inlay which I hope you could provide me.

Things I would like to know:

0. What are the dimensions of the inlay (see my outer box below for reference)? How thick is the wall of the inlay?
--> On the pictures I have seen, it must be a bit thinner than the wall thickness of the outer box (maybe 3mm)?

1. How does the bottom part look like?
--> Is it just wood/plastic as the side parts?
--> Would be great if someone could post a picture from below (couldn't find any on the inet)

2. What do you think the lining material is?
--> Is it something artificial or is it actual suede leather?

3. The watch ring appears to be of a thick material (probably leather). Do you think it's being stabilized by a metal ring in between what appear to be two pieces of leather?

4. How do you think is the ring connected to the bottom part?
--> I think you can change the angle of the ring to the bottom, right? So I assume it is a piece of metal.

Sorry for the questions. Just trying to recreate it as close as possible to the original,

Thank you for your help! 😁



How it should look like:

One small thought here. If you are going to make an insert you probably want to use materials that do not off-gas or degrade. Do a ittle reading about stable polymers, adhesives etc before you build the final version (There is a lot of truth in the saying: I get it right because I build it twice)

Thank's for the reply!

My plan was to build the inlay frame out of a thin sheet of wood, cut them into parts and glue them together to form a tray. Then paint over and add suede.

Sadly, don't have access to fancy machinery but I will look what can be improved.

Just not sure about the details thus this thread.

I’ve been here before, and i have tried to build the inlays to the earlier Connie boxes - and failed miserably

so please take my advice - dont bother

the lesson here Is to Only buy Complete boxes with all The Inserts

Really? That sounds pretty discouraging.

What was the hardest part and where did you fail?

I tried to build a couple of these trays, with the deep grove in them, but they came out shite

This is what they should have looked like ( above)


Mine were so poor, i dont have any photos - so will have to take some tomorrow

It’s likely that the originals are built of stiffened card
They are robust enough but not particularly sturdily built.

you can see from the small selection of images you’ve provided that it’s not simple to specify details for the tray - there are several different version shown in your pics.

in the first four, you have a lining within the tray, with different details:
contrasting colour
corduroy effect
same colour
second contrasting colour.

the final version is the simplest, with the tray, no second lining and suede effect finish to the tray base and watch holder.

all have the gold line around the top but the earlier versions have crossed corners to the line and the last has clean corners

you will have to decide which version you want to match.

I don’t know how you will form a suitable small piece of steel, with three tangs and then successfully cover it in the suedette finish, to form the watch holder.

Best of luck if you do pursue the exercise.

Those were originally flocked. So you might look up the flocking process.

Ok, first things first, both my 18K gold connies are in a bank safe, so my 168.004 SS and gold cap is on modelling duties.

first up is my first attempt - superficially, i guess it looks OK - i didnt put in the recess for this first attempt

I’ll have to admit, that i’m not a great handyman, so the joins at the back are poor - but i used a bit of wood for the support and some real suede for the lining

The second attempt probably looks better, and i managed to put in a very shallow recess

Thank you all for your replies. I will try and see, shouldn't be hard with the construction approach I have in mind.

@Sherbie Thanks for the pictures. To make the reccessus more dominant, I would have glued the leather on top of a pre-bent stripe of thin aluminium to keep the hole in place. Maybe use some thicker double sided tape on both sides of the metal piece to make it feel like a cushion when pressing from both sides. Otherwise looks great.

If you're not going to flock it, I would check into "vegetable suede" fabric and spray adhesive.

The suede i purchased was a very good match wrt the colour and a actual material Omega used inside these Old Connie boxes, but It was too thick For me to shape and glue accurately and neatly. Also The B’stards who sold me the suede also fraudulantly used my Amex card (1.2k Spent within 45 mins and 7 purchases, all within central Houston) so am not going back there!

What dickheads. Hope that at least justice was served and that you got your money back.