In The Details: The Chronograph Origin Story

Start. Stop. Reset. Words that will be familiar to anyone with more than a passing interest in horology – because they perfectly describe what happens when using a chronograph, probably the most popular watch complication beyond a simple date display.

It was long thought that the chronograph was invented in 1821 by Louis XVIII's watchmaker, Nicolas Rieussec, when he created a contraption that enabled His Highness to time his favourite racehorses.

Housed in a mahogany box, the device featured two rotating paper discs and an ink dropper that marked them in order to record elapsed time down to the nearest second. 

Since “chronograph” is a contraction of two Greek words meaning “time” and “write”, Rieussec's creation was certainly worthy of the name, but in 2013 it was confirmed that a watch sold at Christie's the previous year was, in fact, the world's first chronograph.

Made in 1816 by another Frenchman, Louis Moinet, it was intended for tracking astronomical objects and took the form of a pocket-watch-style counter with a dial divided into a 60th of a second and a mechanism that enabled it to be stopped and restarted with the push of a button.

Moinet called it the Compteur de Tierces – the counter of thirds – and it was powered by the first high-frequency mechanical watch movement that ran at an incredible 216,000 beats per hour (six times faster than the Zenith El Primero created in 1969, which is still regarded as one of the greatest of all chronograph mechanisms).

But it was Rieussec’s creation five years later that demonstrated how chronographs could be especially useful for timing sport, and soon watchmakers were working on how they could be made even handier by timing not just a single elapsed time event, but multiple ones.

That led to the earliest “rattrapante” or split-seconds movements, the turning point that came in 1844 when London-based Swiss maker Adolphe Nicole developed a mechanism called a cam-actuated lever that enabled the seconds hand to return instantly to zero.

Still in use today, it was only bettered in the same era by a more sophisticated mechanism that Henri Féréol Piguet created in the 1860s. It had a reset function that Nicole & Capt incorporated into its pocket watches so they could be started, stopped and reset using a single push piece.

Fast forward to the early years of the 20th century and World War I. It was now that the chronograph promised to prove not only useful, but potentially life-saving.

But chronographs incorporated into bulky pocket watches immediately proved impractical in the field – creating the challenge to miniaturise the mechanism in line with the emerging popularity of the wristwatch.

Movement-makers including Landeron, Lemania and Universal achieved this, but it was Gaston Breitling who developed the first true wrist chronograph in 1915.

His firm went on to develop the idea and, in 1933, patented the first wrist chrono with two push pieces – one for starting and stopping, the other for resetting.

Three years later, Longines followed by registering a mechanism that enabled the hand to be returned to zero without the need to stop the chronograph – the system commonly referred to as a “flyback” – and, in 1937, Landeron released the first three-button operating set-up.

The modern wrist chronograph was born and, as the decades passed, it proved itself to be a vital piece of operational equipment for far more than timing horse-racing and the astronomical movements.

Drivers and aviators could use a chronograph’s tachymeter scale for speed, distance and fuel consumption calculations; doctors could use a pulsometer scale to check a patient’s heart rate; military men were able to calculate the proximity of artillery with a telemeter scale; and, on a more prosaic note, those who liked their eggs boiled for a precise amount of time no longer had to trust the accuracy of the kitchen clock.

Since its founding in 2022, Aera has focused on producing rugged, good-looking timepieces based on the best traditions of the tool watch, but with the brand’s own, unique attention to minimalist design.

Practicality has always been key, too, and Aera received high praise for rolling all those features into its first chronographs, unveiled in 2024 in the form of the C-1 Cloud with a case of natural finish 904L steel and its black PVD-treated counterpart, the C-1 Shadow. 

Now, Aera has taken the essence of the C-1 and married it to the celebrated “reverse panda” dial style, made famous by some of the great motoring watches of the 1960s, to create the C-1 driver’s chrono.

Neither specifically retro nor specifically modern, the C-1 Chrono is likely to look right at home behind the wheel of everything – from the latest hypercar to a pre-war Bugatti.

Its signature, one-piece dished dial features a quick-to-read, red lacquered central chronograph hand for recording times down to one-fifth of a second on the clearly defined rehaut, while minutes and running seconds are displayed on the “reverse panda” subdials in contrasting white.

Clarity is further ensured by the minute markers engraved into the fixed outer bezel (each one being hand-filled with black lacquer for maximum legibility), while the problem of after-dark timekeeping is taken care of by hand-applied Super-LumiNova that lends a bright green glow to the full length of the C-1 Chrono’s hour and minute hands and the tips of the central seconds and subdial hands.

(And, thanks to the Globolight treatment of the white-glowing dial logo, you’ll never forget you’re wearing an Aera…)

Durability, too, is essential in a driver’s watch that – especially in the heat of competition – needs to be able to shoulder knocks, bumps, vibration and (in open cars) the weather.

For that reason, Aera’s favoured ultra-hard, 904L stainless steel has again been used for the robust, 42mm case which features the maker’s famously ergonomic, wrist-friendly lug design and houses a Sellita SW510 automatic movement – a tried and tested mechanism well known for its accuracy and reliability.

Delivered in a black pebble grain leather pouch and supplied with two straps (one in black leather, the other a grey “scuba” rubber) the C-1 Chronograph costs £2,200 and is available now.

The only thing is, just 300 will be available – so it’s very much a case of ‘driver’s, start your engines. And floor that accelerator, quick…’