SAVOIR FAIRE The History of the Calibre 11 and the TAG Heuer Monaco Chronomatic

To a customer walking into a TAG Heuer boutique today, the automatic chronograph will be ubiquitous, inescapable even. In fact it would seem strange to remark on it at all, because whether you’re browsing the TAG Heuer Carrera Chronograph Extreme Sport with its contemporary skeletonised dial or the faithful revival of the TAG Heuer Carrera Chronograph Skipper, a loving nod to mid-century design, a version of TAG Heuer’s in-house calibre TH20 will be beating reliably within. 

But when the original TAG Heuer Carrera Chronograph Skipper made its debut in the 1960s, watches could either be automatic or chronographs. Combining both technologies together was unheard of, until in 1969 a consortium of watchmakers, including Heuer, succeeded in creating their first generation of automatic chronographs, a development that would revolutionise sports watch design and that even today ranks as one of the most significant moments in horology since the wristwatch itself was adopted.

The automatic winding rotor was invented in 1926, but automatic watches only achieved mainstream popularity in the 1950s as multiple firms developed their own families of self-winding calibres. Leading chronograph manufacturers like Heuer, which had been instrumental in developing the first chronograph watches for the wrist, could see by the early 1960s that demand for their best-selling hand-wound chronographs was slowing, as the public became accustomed to automatic winding as the new standard for their watches. 

Heuer, which at the time did not produce any automatic watches, had long been aware of the problem, with former CEO Charles Heuer considering the creation of an automatic chronograph as early as 1963, when the first micro-rotor automatics (which, because they did not need to stack the rotor on top of the movement, could be significantly thinner than full-rotor calibres) became available. He concluded, however, that the finished watch would still be too thick, and it wasn’t until 1967, when the watchmaker Buren released a much thinner micro-rotor movement, that the idea was revisited. 

Heuer approached the complications specialist Dubois-Depraz, with which it had a long history of collaborating on sports timing stopwatches, about the feasibility of adding a chronograph module to the Buren base automatic. An agreement was reached, but Dubois-Depraz’s estimate of the costs was much higher than Heuer had imagined. CEO Jack Heuer took the unusual but crucial step of reaching out to a competitor to help bankroll the project. A partnership was reached, and as he recalls in his autobiography The Times of My Life, it was one that played to Heuer’s market strengths both thematically and geographically, with its strong reputation in the USA and UK and peerless position as a maker of motor-racing related watches. 

The consortium of four firms worked together under the codename Project 99, with the additional agreement that the movements created – and the first watches that would house them – would be known as Chronomatics. In 1968 Hamilton acquired Buren, and became a partner in the project, for which it was allocated a maximum of 10 per cent of the finished movements once production had begun. 

Meanwhile, other watchmakers were also striving towards the same goal. As 1968 neared its end, Heuer’s consortium had created 100 prototype watches for final tests, and had fixed a launch date of March 3rd, 1969. Despite the unexpected occurrence of a press conference that January by a rival watchmaker which announced its own automatic chronograph – something that Jack Heuer recalled nearly made him choke on his morning coffee – Heuer stuck to its guns and trusted its leader’s redoubtable instincts. Come April, and the Baselworld watch fair, it became apparent that Heuer’s efforts were far closer to final production with more, and more varied, prototypes of watches available. Other efforts to create the world’s first chronograph would only make their debut internationally the following year. 

For Heuer, it was not enough to conquer the engineering challenge of combining automatic winding with a chronograph function: he wanted the resulting watches to clearly demonstrate that they belonged to a bold new generation of sports watch. Two decisions were key to achieving this impression. 

The iconic square-cased watch is so well known today that its impact might be hard to imagine, but at the time – as the smooth curves of 1960s product design had yet to give way to the more angular, geometric styles of the 1970s – it was something truly futuristic. It had been impossible to create square-cased sports watches prior to that point as Heuer insisted on a minimum standard of water-resistance, something contemporary case-making techniques did not provide. Heuer’s supplier Piquerez came up with the solution, and Jack Heuer rapidly agreed exclusive use of the square design, recognising that it would make the perfect statement with which to launch the first automatic chronograph.

The TAG Heuer Monaco Chronomatic thereby made its debut on March 3rd, 1969. Its stainless steel case was paired with a slinky multi-link bracelet, and its dial design introduced all the elements for which the model is so recognised today, such as the rounded-off square subdials, six o’clock date and triangular seconds hand. It also introduced the familiar navy blue and red colour scheme, a desirable combination that has found favour among vintage collectors and customers of modern TAG Heuer Monaco references alike. Now, fifty-five years later, the Monaco remains one of TAG Heuer’s most enduring and totemic designs, a permanent reminder of the brand’s commitment to forging a new path.