The public got their moment of fame while shopping last week, as a watch maker recorded people’s faces and voices in Croydon’s Whitgift centres for a new online speaking clock.

People were stopped by the British watch maker Accurist, as they searched for footage for their online project British Real Time.

The public has the chance to enter a booth this week until Sunday at the Whitgift Centre, to be a part of recordings of where they represent the hours, minutes and seconds of the clock.

Accurist, which is a family-run business founded in Clerkenwell in 1946, has created many landmark designs over the years, including formerly sponsoring the BT speaking clock.

The public can subsequently view themselves on the website and even email their image to their friends and family, through the new search facility also to be found on the British Real Time website.

Andrew Loftus, managing director of Accurist said: “Accurist is synonymous with perfect timekeeping which is why we hope that every computer in the country will be logged on to the British Real Time website, synchronising the everyday life of the nation.”