Anti-clockwise clock

 

At Innis House in Insch, Scotland, an extraordinary clock hangs on the kitchen wall.

I encountered something like this for the first very time in my life. It is a classic anti-clockwise clock, moving opposite to the standard direction of clock hands – a genuine reverse-running timepiece. At first, it required a fair deal of mental alertness and a shift away from old habits; however, over time, I began to read the time it displayed more efficiently and swiftly. After nearly a month, glancing at the dial daily became second nature, and the first hints of automaticity began to emerge in my mind.

This type of clock, referred to in English as an anti-clockwise clock, counter-clockwise clock, or backwards clock, is a fascinating object that turns our habitual perception of time upside down. The numbers on the dial are arranged anti-clockwise, and the hands themselves rotate to the left.

Traditional clock hand rotation mimics the shadow cast by sundials in the Northern Hemisphere. When the first mechanical clocks were crafted, their makers naturally replicated the shadow's rightward movement. Anti-clockwise clocks are therefore a return to an alternative, delightfully cheeky concept of measured time.

Today, they are most commonly found in a few distinct contexts:

In barber shops and beauty salons, where they hang on the wall behind the customer. When viewed through a mirror, the reflection allows the time to be read in a completely standard fashion.

As collector's items and novelty pieces, often referencing the famous Mad Hatter character and the motif of reversed time.

From a psychological and neurobiological perspective, as an excellent exercise in brain plasticity. They force the nervous system to abandon well-trodden cognitive paths and forge new connections in response to a familiar visual stimulus.

The experience of adapting to such a clock demonstrates just how remarkably adaptable our mind is. What initially requires conscious effort and logical calculation transforms, after a month, into a quiet new habit.

Ginkgo and Gaia