Breguet Watches

Breguet Watches

A.L.Breguet launched the fabled and innovative watch making enterprise in 1775. It was started at Quai del’Horloge in Paris. For the next two hundred years the innovation genius of the company helped in determining the future of watch making in the world. For innovation and style the name Breguet is in the forefront. The  fame enjoyed by the company for more than 220 made it a great name.

When we consider the great strides in the challenging world of horology, many of them have originated from the house of Breguet. In 1780 Breguet launched a version of self-winding watches known as perpetuelles. The invention of gong spring in 1783 was another great invention of Breguet. The making of the perpetual calendar in 1785 was another great jump for the world of horology. It also developed a technique for correcting the time and date equation for a century. This means that the watch would correct itself for a hundred years. The company has not forgotten the visually impaired. They developed a watch known as the Tact Watch which enabled the user to know time by touch. This was way back in 1799. The regulating technique known as the tourbillion developed in 1801 was another great innovation of the company. All these wonderful achievement spread the fame of the Breguet watches.

There have been a number of illustrious watches that have come from the fascinating world of Breguet. One of them is called Classique. This one has movement that would wind automatically. It shows date, power-reserve through a special indicator and illustrates various phases of the moon. It is a scintillating artifact known for its charms. This watch is indeed very popular the world over. It has hand engraved dial in background of silver. It has a sapphire case back and it is presented in yellow gold and white gold.

The Marine is another fantastic watch from the house of Breguet. The watch has numerals written in the classic Roman style and the minute markers are luminous which enable unhampered measuring of time at night also. There is a large date indicator at the position 6 0’Clock. The engine can be seen from the rear through the sapphire crystal. The presentations are in 18K yellow gold. The dial made of 18 k gold has been given the silver finish.

Heritage is another brilliant watch that is loved the world over. It is a fantastic watch crafted in 18 K white gold. It has an automatic movement. The large date indicator is set at 12 0’clock. The seconds hand is placed at 6 0’Clock. The model is produced in both 18K yellow gold and pink gold.

Actual and Fictional Users of Breguet Watches

The Breguet watch factory was launched in 1775, the enterprise of Abraham Breguet in Paris. Now the company is owned by The Swatch Group. From a 1976 the watches began to be manufactured in Valee de joux in Switzerland. Breguet is credited with a range of inventions in horology. Tourbillion technology is an invention of Breguet. The breguet usually carries certain recognizable signatures on the watches like the coin-edge case, a technique of engraving known as guilloche and the celebrated pomme hands now popularly called the Breguet hands.

                                                

With the introduction of Breguet to the court of Louis XVI he got the much needed incentive to make watches for the King. The king bought several of his watches. The queen Marie Antoinette was fascinated by Breguet’s watches. She gave him the commission to make a watch that contained all the functions known in watches at that time in a single watch. It took 34 years for the watch to be completed and she did not live to see the watch to be completed. This association of the watch with the ill-fated queen became a celebrated saga in horology and augmented the fame of the Breguet watches. The watch has association with a galore of celebrated men and women of history and of our times.

                                             

Apart from the legendary real owners of Breguet it had many fictional owners like Dr. Lorrain the famous Petersburg doctor in Tolstoy’s War and Peace. The watch is a real presence, by its association with Baron Danglers, the dubious rich merchant, in Alexander Dumas’ The Count of Monte Cristo. Breguet appears in the celebrated science fiction of Jules Verne’s Around the World in Eighty Days. Pushkin’s Eugene Onegin has many references to articles of luxury. Breguet luxury watches were Pushkin’s predilection.

Breguet has an amazing range of watches distributed between men’s and women’s collections. A simple categorization places them among Classique, Marine, Heritage, Type XX, XXI, La Tradition and Reine de Naples. Women’s watches are larded with a lavish supply of diamonds.

The historic and the unique Parisian lineage, the connection with a galore of distinguished men and women of the past, the spontaneous fictional presence of the Breguet watches in works of literary art and the amazing range of watches have conjured up an image of the watch in the luxury niche of the world that is seductive and needs no serious marketing effort. 

The Russian Writer Pushkin and Breguet watches

  A dandy on the boulevards... strolling at 

                                                leisure until his Breguet, ever vigilant reminds

                                               him it is midday

                                               Alexander Pushkin,  Eugene Onegin, 1820

Pushkin is a well known Russian writer of universal fame. In his Eugene Onegin, a novel in verse, he tells how time is measured in the house of Larins: Zheludok—verniy nash Breget. The phrase can be rendered into English: The stomach is our accurate Breguet. How deeply the brand has penetrated into the Russian psyche. The celebrated French watch maker was a favorite of the Tsars. Pushkin’s works found favor with the Tsars. It is a daring use of a brand name as a synonym for timepiece. The reactionary writers of pre-communist days eschewed foreign words and foreign goods. But Pushkin loved the old world charm of luxury. As an artist his psyche spontaneously relished anything French for their sheer quality of excellence.

                                                   

The famous ad of Breguet: The Breguet Watch. One thing you can have in common with Napoleon, Josephine, GeorgeIV, Wellington, the Tsar Alexander 1…The advertisements in a way epitomizes the glitter and glamour associated with the brand. It is surprising that Breguet so much banks on the dead celebrities in their ad campaigns. Recently in one of the Breguet advertisements the person looming large was Winston Churchill with a caption, Sir Winston Churchill, from 1901, a client of Breguet. To the western world, Churchill with his ubiquitous Vazir cigar between his lips is the savior of their world and the fact that his choice of watch was Breguet is appealing indeed. Even when the celebrity was defeated his early glory makes the brand alluring as in the case of Napoleon who took his Breguet on his Egyptian campaign in the late 1790’s.

Poets similar to Pushkin, the numerous crowned heads of yesteryears and the neon light celebrities of recent times have made the Breguet brand name one of the most identifiable symbols of wealth and luxury. This has given the brand a highly hyped value in the watch market.