Breitling Navitimer: The Ultimate Guide to the Icon of Pilot's Watches
Introduced in 1952, the Breitling Navitimer is the quintessential pilot's chronograph watch as well as one of the most instantly recognizable Swiss watches in the world. Aimed exclusively at professional pilots in its earliest versions, the Navitimer was instrumental in popularizing the pilot's watch genre for the general public, and it remains, in all of its various sizes, colorways, and aesthetic executions, the flagship of Breitling's modern-day collection. Here is the story behind the Breitling Navitimer and how it evolved into an icon of its field, along with an overview of Navitimers on the market today. The First Family of Chronographs (1884) German immigrant Léon Breitling (below, left) founded his eponymous watchmaking firm in Saint-Imier, Switzerland in 1884, devoted to producing precise stopwatches and other timing devices for use in military and industrial fields as well as competitive sports. The rise of both the automobile and the airplane in the early 20th century provided the inspiration for Breitling and his son Gaston, who took over the firm in 1914, to produce a number of historic innovations, several of them patented, that would influence the world of horology going forward. Léon launched one of the first timepieces with an eight-day power reserve in 1893, and a chronograph with an unprecedented ⅖-second accuracy in 1896. Gaston (below, center) is renowned today as the inventor of the first wrist chronograph with an independent pusher, separ...
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