Rarefied Air

The Breguet family revolutionized watchmaking in the 19th century and aviation in the 20th. The modern Type XX collection is the culmination of its multi-generational savoir faire in both fields.

- Mark Bernardo

Montres Breguet, founded by legendary Parisian horologist Abraham-Louis Breguet in 1775 and renowned as the watchmaker to royalty like Napoleon Bonaparte and Marie Antoinette, is not a watch brand commonly associated with traditional “tool watches.” Take a closer look at the venerable maison’s history, however, and its contributions to the more practical side of timekeeping come into focus. (Of course, even Breguet’s most influential invention, the tourbillon, now regarded as an attractive but redundant feature in a wristwatch, was itself a practical invention in the beginning.) Its nautically influenced Marine series evolved from the marine chronometers that Abraham-Louis Breguet produced as official watchmaker to the French Royal Navy in the 1800s, for example. And the other Breguet watch collection that regularly marries utilitarian roots with luxurious contemporary details, the aviation-centric Type XX, traces its illustrious history to the early 20th century and the first Breguet scion to branch out from horology into the nascent field of manned flight.