SAVOIR FAIRE The Carrera Goes Full Red

Once upon a time, chronographs were “black and white.”  For Heuer and many other Swiss watch brands, from the time that the chronograph moved from the pocket to the wrist (circa 1920) into the 1960s, the dials were either black or white (or in some instances, they combined black and white, with contrasting dials and registers).  There were some white-dialed chronographs that had red or blue scales printed on their dials (typically for tachymeter or pulsations), but these were only accents on the white dials.

For Heuer, the use of bright colors accelerated in the late 1960s.  Since its origin in 1962, the Autavia had used only black dials, but by 1969 Heuer added a bright red chronograph second hand and red hash marks adjacent to the hour markers.  Heuer’s use of red accents became even more prominent in 1969, when Heuer introduced the Monaco chronograph, with either midnight blue or charcoal gray dials.  The Monaco’s main time-of-day hands had wide red inserts, along with triangular red tips.  The Autavia was updated circa 1972 to incorporate similar red accents on the hands and dials.

With the arrival of the 1970s, Heuer embarked on the transition from using red as an accent on black dials to producing full red dials.  In 1971, Heuer introduced two “economy” models – the Easy Rider and Temporada – with dials that were balanced with red and white areas, and red continued to be a common color for accents (for example, on the Montreal and Skipper models).

In 1974, Heuer introduced the Silverstone, a new model chronograph that would capture the style and energy of the 1970s.  The Silverstone was produced in three colors, with dials in blue, fume (smoke) and red.  The Silverstone marked the first time that Heuer would offer a watch with a solid red dial, with the deep red tone of the dial made all the more prominent by the Silverstone’s use of a matching inner bezel.  While the Silverstone would mark Heuer’s first use of a full-red dial for a chronograph, it would also be the last use of such a dial by Heuer or TAG Heuer, for the next 45 years.

In 2019, to celebrate the 50th anniversary of the Monaco, TAG Heuer produced a series of five different Monaco chronographs, with each of model representing a specific decade.  To represent the decade 1979 to 1989, TAG Heuer produced a Monaco with a deep red dial and gray registers.  The first Autavia with a red dial would come in January 2020, when TAG Heuer introduced a Special Edition with a deep red dial in a bronze case, to celebrate the Chinese Year of the Rat.

With Heuer having used red accents on its chronographs for over 50 years, and full-red dials on a handful of models (including the Autavia, Monaco and Silverstone), we ask the question – “What about the Carrera?”  The Carrera was introduced in 1963, as a chronograph for racers, and we would expect that the collection would have been the ideal subject for the excitement and drama captured by red tones.

Red was the national color of race cars from Italy, used by Ferrari, Alfa Romeo and Maserati in the 1950s and 60s.  The red line on a tachometer marks the maximum speed of the racing engine.  Red is also the color for danger — we see the red flag following an accident on the track and racing has also endured tragedies associated with the loss of blood on the track.

Still, Heuer produced over 100 versions of the Carrera from 1963 to 1985 and, while used as an accent, the color red was not prominent on any of them.