Breguet Marine Grand Date: Return To Glory

• • The name Breguet carries rockstar status among luxury watch enthusiasts.

• • The Breguet Marine blends Breguet heritage with modern sports watch versatility.

• • A solid gold dial is silvered and hand-cut.

• • Breguet’s caliber 517GG movement exhibits finishing worthy of His name.

Abraham-Louis Breguet is high horology. If you’re an enthusiast of luxury watches, Breguet is Babe Ruth, Thomas Edison, and Napoleon rolled into a monolithic übermench. Speaking of Napoleon, he ranks among the who’s-who of 18th-19th century luminaries that dot the pages of old client lists at Montres Breguet, the modern custodian of the Breguet legacy.

And those same lists note patronage from Marie-Antoinette and the Duke of Wellington. Talk about triple-dipping! But Breguet’s legend transcends nationality and ideology; almost 200 years after his death, A.L Breguet’s The Man in the watch world. And it took a giant of similar stature to rescue the Breguet reputation with watches like this Breguet Marine 5817ST.

Nicolas Hayek saved the Swiss watch industry as the founder, CEO, and later Chairman of the Swatch group.

In the 1980s, he inherited a failing constellation of brands; in the 1990s, he took Swatch from discount retailer to luxury watch empire; in the 2000s, he gave it up to run Breguet.

Hayek stated before his 2011 death that Breguet, purchased by Swatch in 1999, was the love of his professional life. In the final decade of life, Hayek dedicated himself to lifting Breguet from latter-day anonymity to its current station at the summit of Swatch group’s luxury holdings. The Breguet Marine embodies the eye for refinement, penchant for innovation, and respect for tradition that bind A.L. Breguet and Hayek to the same luxury legacy.

Introduced in 2004, shortly after Hayek took direct control of Breguet, the Marine reprised an old Breguet name in a thoroughly modern package.

The genius of the model is its seamless blending of modern technology and utility with loving references to the pocket watches of Abraham-Louis’ prime productive years.

Each feature of the Breguet Marine 5817ST’s dial pays deference to the tradition of the master without compromising the functionality that modern luxury watch users demand. The centerpiece of the Marine is a solid 18-karat gold dial that has been silvered and hand-turned on a rose lathe. The “guilloché main,” or hand-engraving technique employed herein is a laborious process.

A gold blank must be poured, stamped, and silvered before the work can begin.

Hours on a rose lathe, a nineteenth-century finishing device, produce the distinctive spiral cut of the center dial disc.

Beyond this textured section, an hour track lined with stately Roman numerals exhibits smooth surfacing with just an accent of circular graining; on a slightly higher plane, the 60-minute chapter ring features an unconventional measure for a dress watch; luminova markings.

And therein lies the key to the Breguet Marine’s success; it’s not a dress watch. While the timeless kiln-fired Breguet hands suggest a formal timepiece, the steel case, burly welded lugs, and jet-black rubber strap whisper “sports watch.” Divert one’s gaze from the magnetic pull of those cobalt-blue hands, and the stout substance of this Marine becomes evident; sizeable crown guards shield a robust screw-down unit, and a 100-meter (330-foot) water depth delivers upon the hardware’s promise.

To this winning formula, Breguet adds a tough deployant buckle and case lugs that swap spindly spring pins for bomb-proof screwed-in bars. Why not? After all, Breguet was an official supplier to the French Navy for over a century.

Breguet cases mean coined flanks, and the Breguet Marine is no exception. More than a cast or machined pattern, the “ribs” of the case are cold-rolled into the metal before an individual artisan perfects the finish by hand. While time consuming and expensive, the result boasts a luster and refinement that speaks for itself.

Inside that 39 mm steel vessel beats a true high horology movement, the Breguet 517GG.

Like all Breguet movements, this one is sourced from the top manufactures within the Swatch empire; F. Piguet of Le Sentier gets the call for the Marine. Based on the F. Piguet caliber 1150, the 517GG features all of the hallmarks of a top-shelf movement. Essential features of the 517GG include automatic winding, a superb 65-hour power reserve, and the Marine’s signature complication, a two-digit “Grand Date.”

Breguet’s historic movements were beautiful, and this latter-day Breguet automatic movement  looks the part. Screw and bridge finish are two bellwethers of overall movement refinement, and the Breguet Marine’s 517GG delivers on both counts. True hand-laid anglage is a dying art in a luxury watch market given to mass-production.

Today’s computer-guided machines can do amazing things to beautify metal.

Products of brands such as Rolex, Omega, Panerai, and IWC feature outstanding examples of machine finishing. But Breguet’s mirror-polished round bevels elude even the most sophisticated CNC jigs. The same degree of delicate polish can be seen on the circumference of each Breguet screw; even the slots of the screws features subtle camfering as a testament to the past labor of a human hand.

A true boardwalk-or-boardroom timepiece, the Breguet Marine is a go-anywhere solution for a watch enthusiast looking for a do-it-all luxury watch. The Breguet Marine is a modern-day heir to the tradition of Abraham-Louis Breguet and his vision for usable watches. Despite his penchant for complication, innovation, and experimentation, Breguet always intended for his watches to be reliable, usable, and versatile. If he built watches today, Abraham-Louis Breguet would embrace dual-purpose work/play watches like this Breguet Marine.