The Breitling Chronomat was initially released in 1941 in

Switzerland Switzerland, officially the Swiss Confederation, is a landlocked country located in west-central Europe. It is bordered by Italy to the south, France to the west, Germany to the north, and Austria and Liechtenstein to the east. Switzerland ...

Breitling SA Breitling SA () is a Swiss luxury watchmaker founded in 1884 in Saint-Imier, Switzerland, by Léon Breitling. The company is known for its precision-made chronometers designed for aviators and is based in Grenchen, Switzerland. The company is ...

. Since then it has been one of the best selling

watch A watch is a timepiece carried or worn by a person. It is designed to maintain a consistent movement despite the motions caused by the person's activities. A wristwatch is worn around the wrist, attached by a watch strap or another type of ...

es produced by Breitling. Its set of four bezel rider tabs became a Breitling signature design detail, seen as well in the Breitling Colt. Chronomat is a trademark and collection line first released in 1942, and is one of the company's best-selling models.

History

The first Chronomat had a

circular slide rule A slide rule is a hand-operated mechanical calculator consisting of slidable rulers for conducting mathematical operations such as multiplication, division, exponents, roots, logarithms, and trigonometry. It is one of the simplest analog com ...

and its design followed the tension of the era for military watches. The movement of the first Chronomat was the Venus 175 with 17

jewels A gemstone (also called a fine gem, jewel, precious stone, semiprecious stone, or simply gem) is a piece of mineral crystal which, when cut or polished, is used to make jewellery, jewelry or other adornments. Certain Rock (geology), rocks (such ...

, a manual wind

movement Movement may refer to: Generic uses * Movement (clockwork), the internal mechanism of a timepiece * Movement (sign language), a hand movement when signing * Motion, commonly referred to as movement * Movement (music), a division of a larger co ...

. The Chronomat was a patented design introduced in 1940 by

Willy Breitling Breitling SA () is a Swiss luxury watchmaker founded in 1884 in Saint-Imier, Switzerland, by Léon Breitling. The company is known for its precision-made chronometers designed for aviators and is based in Grenchen, Switzerland. The company is c ...

and the world's first two-pusher

chronograph A chronograph is a specific type of watch that is used as a stopwatch combined with a display watch. A basic chronograph has hour and minute hands on the main dial to tell the time, a small seconds hand to tell that the watch is running, and ...

wristwatch. The first model of the Chronomat collection had a

and its design followed the appeal and design cues of the era for military watches. The movement of the first Chronomat was the Venus 175 with 17

, a

manual winding A mechanical watch is a watch that uses a clockwork mechanism to measure the passage of time, as opposed to quartz watches which function using the vibration modes of a piezoelectric quartz tuning fork, or radio watches, which are quartz watche ...

. The current Chronomat was released in 2009, and was the first watch produced entirely by Breitling, featuring the in-house B01 caliber. The B01 movement has a 70-hour power reserve and

COSC The Contrôle officiel suisse des Chronomètres (COSC), the Official Swiss Chronometer Testing Institute, is the institute responsible for certifying the accuracy and precision of Swiss watches. Background Founded in its current form in 1973, t ...

certification. In the 1990s the two-tone, steel-and-yellow-gold model with a dark blue dial and Rouleaux bracelet was worn by

Jerry Seinfeld Jerome Allen Seinfeld ( ; born April 29, 1954) is an American stand-up comedian, actor, writer, and producer. As a stand-up comedian, Seinfeld specializes in observational comedy. Seinfeld gained stardom playing a semi-fictionalized version ...

. The Rouleaux bracelet was discontinued for several years and re-introduced in 2020 in the Chronomat B01 42. The current Chronomat was released in 2009 and was the first watch produced entirely by Breitling, featuring the in-house B01 caliber. The previous model had a Valjoux 7750 movement. The B01 movement has a 70-hour power reserve and

certification.

In popular culture

Adam Sandler as diamond district merchant Howard Ratner wears a large Breitling Chronomat with gilt numbering on the bezel in ''

Uncut Gems ''Uncut Gems'' is a 2019 American crime thriller film directed by Josh and Benny Safdie, who co-wrote the screenplay with Ronald Bronstein. It stars Adam Sandler, LaKeith Stanfield, Julia Fox, Kevin Garnett, Idina Menzel, and Eric Bogosian ...

'' (2019).

References

{{reflist Breitling SA Watch models Products introduced in 1941