Join Breitling On A Trip Through Their Archives With The New Premier Heritage Collection
By Sarah Jayne Potter | 3 minute read
This season, we see luxury watch brand Breitling borrowing inspiration from their past with the launch of their new Premier Heritage Collection.
This heritage-inspired design with a stylish modern twist embodies some of Breitling’s most famous innovations, and revives Breitling’s legacy of inventing the modern chronograph. This truly is our heritage revived. GEORGES KERN, CEO OF BREITLING
The new pieces honour the very foundations of the brand and the three members of the Founders Squad; three generations of men who made Breitling what it is today. These members are Léon Breitling who founded the company in 1884, his son Gaston and his grandson Willy. All three had a helping hand in shaping the brand Breitling is known to be to this date. Their achievements were notable within watchmaking, from Leon’s tachymeter that could measure any speed between 15 and 150 km/h, Gaston’s chronograph with an independent pusher at 2 o’clock, and Willy’s evolution of this with a second chronograph pusher at 4 o’clock. Among Willy Breitling’s celebrated pioneering achievements was the establishment of the Huit Aviation Department in 1938.
As well as a keen understanding in the technology of a timepiece, Willy was also interested in people’s buying habits and their desire for elegance and glamour. This further ignited the idea of combining many of these functional and fashionable elements aspects into one collection, and the original Premier wristwatches were launched in the 1940s. The pieces were manually wound, something that Breitling have introduced in their new collection for this year in homage, and featured highly visible and complex functions.
The latest generation of Premiers – Breitling’s Premier Heritage Collection – brings this timeless elegance back to life. The collection includes six watches divided into three distinctive categories: The Chronograph, The Duograph, and The Datora.
All feature Arabic numerals, vintage-inspired hands and semi-shiny alligator straps with tone-on-tone stitching. Every watch is a COSC-certified chronometer and water-resistant up to 100 meters.
The Premier Heritage Chronograph, which is manually wound just like its predecessor, features the Breitling Manufacture Caliber B09, based on the Breitling Manufacture Caliber 01. It comes in two variations: with an eye-catching pistachio-green dial encased in stainless steel or a stately silver-colored dial encased in 18 k red gold. Either of these pieces would work well for daytime, and provide a unique aesthetic that will allow these pieces to stand out in a collection.
With stainless-steel and 18 k red gold cases measuring 42 mm, the Premier Heritage Duograph comes with a blue or black dial, respectively. Its rattrapante function – one of the most elaborate in watchmaking – enables the wearer to measure two elapsed times simultaneously thanks to its two superimposed chronograph hands. This piece houses the mechanical hand-wound Breitling Manufacture Caliber B15, which is based on the Breitling Manufacture Caliber B03.
The 42 mm Premier Heritage Datora stands out for its highly visible and complex functions, namely its day, date, and moon-phase displays and it is powered by the Manufacture Caliber B25. The Datora’s copper-colored face is framed by a stainless-steel case, while its silver-colored dial comes in an 18 k red gold one.
All three models of the Premier Heritage Collection highlight Breitling’s mastery of timekeeping as it has evolved over the generations.
