Aquastar

The history of diving watches in the 1960s typically focuses on three names: Rolex Submariner, OMEGA Seamaster 300, and Blancpain Fifty Fathoms. These watches earned their reputations through marketing prowess, military contracts, and decades of continuous production. Yet among the divers actually descending into the abyss during that transformative decade, when humans first learned to live beneath the waves for extended periods, a fourth name appeared with remarkable frequency on their wrists: Aquastar. This Geneva-based manufacture, founded in 1962 and specializing exclusively in professional aquatic instruments, developed innovations that would become industry standards, earned patents that revolutionized dive watch safety, and accompanied Jacques Cousteau’s teams on expeditions that captured the world’s imagination. Then, like so many tool watch specialists unable to survive the quartz crisis, Aquastar faded into obscurity, remembered only by vintage collectors and diving historians until its dramatic resurrection in 2020.

Frédéric Robert and the Birth of Professional Diving Instruments

Aquastar emerged from a lineage of Swiss watchmaking spanning five generations. Frédéric Robert, born into the family that had founded the JeanRichard brand in the late 1800s, took control of the company from his father in the early 1960s. Robert brought an unusual combination of expertise to watchmaking: he was a trained watchmaker, mathematician, pilot, sailor, and most crucially, a passionate scuba diver. This multidisciplinary background informed his conviction that existing diving watches, designed primarily by watchmakers who had never experienced the underwater environment, failed to address the specific needs of professional divers.​

In 1962, Robert made the decisive break with his family’s watchmaking heritage, rebranding JeanRichard S.A. as Aquastar S.A. to reflect the company’s new exclusive focus on creating professional-grade instruments for aquatic activities. The name change was not merely cosmetic but represented a fundamental shift in philosophy. Aquastar would not produce dress watches, chronographs for motorsport, or general-purpose timepieces. Every watch would serve a specific function for divers, sailors, or marine professionals.​

Robert’s approach to distribution reinforced this professional focus. Aquastar watches were initially available exclusively through professional diving equipment outlets such as Scubapro and Aqualung, never offered through traditional jewelry retailers or watch boutiques. This strategy ensured the watches reached their intended users (commercial divers, military divers, underwater archaeologists, marine scientists) while maintaining the brand’s credibility as a maker of genuine tools rather than lifestyle accessories. The trade-off, as history would demonstrate, was that Aquastar remained largely unknown outside professional diving circles despite its technical achievements.​

The Patents That Built Modern Dive Watches

Working with Marc Jasinski, a Belgian scientist and diver who served as Aquastar’s head of research and engineering, Frédéric Robert developed a remarkable series of innovations between 1958 and the early 1970s, each protected by patent and incorporated into specific watch models. These weren’t incremental improvements but fundamental advances that addressed genuine safety concerns identified through actual diving experience.​

The friction ring bezel, patented in 1958 while the company still operated under the JeanRichard name, solved a potentially fatal problem with early diving watches. Rotating bezels allowed divers to track elapsed time underwater, but the smooth rotation that made them easy to set also made them vulnerable to accidental movement when the watch contacted equipment, cave walls, or other obstacles. An unnoticed bezel rotation could cause a diver to miscalculate remaining air supply or decompression obligations. Robert’s friction ring created resistance requiring deliberate effort to rotate the bezel, preventing accidental adjustment while remaining operable with gloved hands. This simple yet critical safety feature, devised and patented by Aquastar, would subsequently become standard across the dive watch industry, appearing in countless watches from manufacturers who never acknowledged the innovation’s origins.​

The inner rotating bezel patent led to the Model 60 (the designation referring to 1960, the approximate introduction year) and its successor the Model 63. Rather than an external rotating bezel vulnerable to impacts and damage, these watches featured an internal bezel ring controlled by manipulation of the crown. Pulling the crown to the first position and rotating it backwards operated the internal bezel, while rotating forwards wound the movement. This protected mechanism prevented underwater damage while maintaining functionality, though the unconventional operation required familiarization. The Model 63’s asymmetric date window at 4 o’clock, matched by asymmetric numerals on the date wheel itself, represented thoughtful design extending to components most manufacturers treated as generic parts.​​

The multiple dive non-decompression bezel created for the Deepstar represented Marc Jasinski’s most significant contribution to diving safety. This dual-scale bezel combined a standard 60-minute elapsed time tracker on the inner ring with an outer ring engraved with calculations based on French Navy decompression tables. The system enabled divers to track current dive time, determine no-decompression limits for their current depth, and calculate required decompression stops for subsequent dives, all from a single bezel without consulting printed tables. Jasinski, who served as underwater cameraman for BBC archaeology programs including ventures to locate Spanish Armada wrecks and Dutch East India Company ships, developed this tool from practical necessity during multi-dive archaeological expeditions.​

Robert also patented an improved crown and pusher sealing system incorporated across the Aquastar range, and created what the company described as “the predecessor of today’s digital dive computer,” a wrist-mounted panel housing a waterproof watch with rotating bezel alongside a compass, thermometer, depth gauge, and laminated marine non-decompression dive tables. This modular instrument system anticipated by decades the integrated dive computers that would eventually supplant mechanical dive watches for professional use.​

The Deepstar Chronograph and Cousteau’s Expeditions

The Aquastar Deepstar Chronograph, introduced in 1965, represented the culmination of Robert and Jasinski’s research into dive-specific chronograph design. Traditional chronographs featured running seconds at 9 o’clock, 30-minute counter at 3 o’clock, and 12-hour counter at 6 o’clock, a layout optimized for timing motorsport laps or general chronometry but containing unnecessary complications for diving. The Deepstar eliminated the 12-hour counter (no dive extended that long), relocated the running seconds to a small rotating disc at 9 o’clock proving the watch remained operational, and positioned an enlarged 30-minute chronograph counter at 3 o’clock for easily reading dive time at a glance. This mono-compax layout created unprecedented dial legibility underwater.​

The original Deepstar chronograph employed the Valjoux 23 manual-wind movement, a 17-jewel column-wheel chronograph caliber offering reliability and serviceability. The 38mm tonneau-shaped case, unusual for the era, provided comfortable fit under wetsuit sleeves while the angular integrated lugs gave the watch a distinctly 1960s aesthetic. Water resistance reached 100 meters (330 feet), adequate for the recreational and light commercial diving typical of the period but modest by modern standards.​

The Deepstar’s association with Jacques-Yves Cousteau elevated the watch from professional tool to cultural icon. Cousteau’s teams wore Aquastar watches, particularly the Deepstar, during expeditions throughout the 1960s and into the mid-1970s. The watches appeared prominently in films documenting the groundbreaking Conshelf III mission in 1965, during which six divers lived for three weeks in an underwater habitat 100 meters beneath the Mediterranean off Nice. These images, broadcast worldwide and reshown for decades in documentary films, provided Aquastar with visibility that paid advertising could never achieve.​​

Aquastar’s involvement extended beyond Cousteau’s French expeditions. The watches were used during the U.S. Navy’s SEALAB missions between 1964 and 1969, experiments in saturation diving where teams lived in underwater habitats at various depths for extended periods. While Rolex Submariners received more prominent placement in official SEALAB documentation, researchers examining period photographs have identified Aquastar watches on divers’ wrists in multiple SEALAB missions. The Australian-led expedition that discovered the wreck of the Dutch frigate Batavia in 1963 relied on Aquastar dive watches.​​

French freediver Jacques Mayol, who would achieve international fame through his rivalry with Enzo Maiorca and later through the fictionalized film “The Big Blue,” wore an Aquastar Deepstar for years. Mayol’s use was unconventional: he valued the chronograph not for the decompression bezel (unnecessary for apnea diving) but for timing his breath holds during record attempts. He wore the Deepstar when setting his 1968 depth record of 75 meters (246 feet) on a single breath, a mark that stood for years.​

The Regate: Pioneering the Yachttimer Complication

In 1961, while still operating as JeanRichard, Frédéric Robert filed a patent for a watch with a 5-minute countdown function specifically designed for yacht racing. This patent represents what collectors and horological historians recognize as the birth certificate of the regatta yachttimer watches as a distinct complication category. The timing challenges of yacht racing differ fundamentally from diving or general chronometry, requiring a specialized solution Robert was uniquely positioned to develop given his sailing background.​

Classic yacht racing employs a staggered start sequence to ensure fair competition among boats of different sizes and capabilities. Ten minutes before the official start, a signal (gun, horn, or whistle) announces the countdown’s beginning. Five minutes later, a second signal marks the halfway point, and finally a third signal indicates the race start. Skippers must time their approach to cross the starting line at maximum speed precisely when the final signal sounds, as crossing early results in disqualification or the penalty of circling back to restart.​

The Aquastar Regate, developed in the mid-1960s from Robert’s patent using a modified Felsa 4000N movement, displayed five circular apertures arranged in an arc below 12 o’clock. When the single chronograph pusher was activated at the first signal, all five apertures turned blue and the orange chronograph seconds hand began running. Over the following five minutes, each aperture sequentially changed from blue to orange, providing a clear visual countdown. At the second signal (five minutes remaining), all apertures displayed orange, then began turning silver (matching the dial color) to effectively disappear. When all apertures disappeared and the orange seconds hand reached 60 (marking ten minutes elapsed), the final signal would sound and the race would begin.​

The elegance of this system lay in its clarity under stress. In the chaotic minutes before a race start, with multiple boats maneuvering for position, wind conditions changing, and crew calling out positions, a skipper could glance at the Regate and instantly know how many minutes remained without calculation or interpretation. The system worked so well that the Lemania 1341movement was subsequently developed to power regatta complications, followed by the improved Lemania 1345 that Aquastar adopted in production Regate models from the early 1970s. This same Lemania 1345 caliber powered regatta watches from Tissot, Heuer, OMEGA, and Lemania itself, but Aquastar’s patent meant the brand could claim primacy for the complication’s invention.​

The Benthos 500: Pushing Depth Limits

The Benthos 500, introduced around 1970, took an entirely different approach to dive timing. Rather than a traditional chronograph with separate subdials, the Benthos 500 featured a central orange hand making one complete rotation every 60 minutes, activated by the chronograph pushers. This minute counter, prominently visible and impossible to misread, tracked dive time without requiring the diver to consult a small subdial. The 500-meter (1,640-foot) depth rating, achieved without a monoblock case design, represented exceptional engineering for the era and gave the watch its name.​

The watch employed a chunky case measuring approximately 42mm by 47mm with 16mm thickness, substantial dimensions that would become typical for professional dive watches only decades later. The crown positioned at 2 o’clock and helium escape valve at 4 o’clock anticipated features that would define serious dive watches through the present day. The Benthos Heritage H1, introduced in limited production of 500 pieces in late 2023, faithfully recreated the original’s visual cues and dimensions while incorporating modern 904L stainless steel construction and ceramic bezel.​

Decline, Dormancy, and Ownership Changes

Despite its technical achievements and professional credibility, Aquastar faced existential challenges by the early 1970s. The quartz revolution was beginning to devastate the Swiss mechanical watch industry, particularly affecting specialized manufacturers lacking the diversification to weather the storm. In 1974, Frédéric Robert retired from active management. His departure marked the end of Aquastar’s innovative period. The following year, the Geneva-based Eren Group acquired Aquastar and implemented a mainstream strategy, producing consumer-oriented dive and sports watches available through traditional retail channels, a fundamental departure from Robert’s professional-exclusivity model.​

In 1982, the Seinet brothers acquired Aquastar from the Eren Group. Marc Seinet, an avid sailor and third-generation watchmaker, pursued commercial strategies reflecting changing market realities. Recognizing that traditional mechanical Swiss watches no longer appealed to younger consumers accustomed to quartz convenience and affordability, Seinet filed patents for plastic-cased quartz watches, marking Aquastar’s transition from professional tool watch manufacturer to fashion watch producer. The brand continued producing mechanical, quartz, and LED regatta watches between 1983 and 2018, but these bore little resemblance to the innovative mechanical instruments of the Robert era.​

Throughout these ownership changes, the Aquastar name survived but its identity as a pioneering dive watch manufacturer faded from public consciousness. Collectors with long memories pursued vintage Deepstar chronographs and Model 63 examples, but without new production to maintain market presence, Aquastar became an obscure reference in diving watch histories, overshadowed by brands with continuous production and marketing budgets.​

Rick Marei and the 2020 Resurrection

The man behind Aquastar’s modern resurrection brought unique qualifications to the task. Rick Marei had previously orchestrated the successful return of Doxa (relaunching the legendary Sub series in 2001) and revived the ISOfrane and Tropic strap brands under the Synchron group. Marei understood both vintage dive watch authenticity and modern manufacturing requirements, having pioneered online marketing for Swiss watch brands in 1999 when such strategies were unprecedented.​

Discussions between Marei and Marc Seinet began in the late 1990s and continued intermittently for two decades, with Marei advocating for a return to Aquastar’s dive watch heritage while Seinet focused on regatta watch development. In 2019, they reached an agreement allowing Marei to reboot the brand with complete access to old stock, tooling, spare parts, trademarks, and crucially, all original blueprints and documentation from the Frédéric Robert era. This archival material enabled the faithful recreations that would define the modern Aquastar.​

The 2020 Aquastar Deepstar Chronograph Re-Edition launched the brand’s rebirth in October 2020, debuting during the global COVID-19 pandemic when luxury watch sales had collapsed and launching any new product seemed questionable. Marei and Aquastar’s strategy relied on creating a watch offering exceptional value through high-grade components and faithful historical execution. The 40.5mm stainless steel case retained all proportions and visual details of the original 1960s Deepstar, including the distinctive tonneau shape, angular integrated lugs, and brushed top surfaces.​

Rather than simply installing a Valjoux 7750 (the ubiquitous automatic chronograph workhorse), Aquastar commissioned a custom movement from LaJoux-Perret, a respected Swiss manufacture known for high-grade complications. The LaJoux-Perret bi-compax column-wheel chronograph operates at 28,800 vph (4Hz) with 55 hours of power reserve and bi-directional winding. Crucially, it employs a column wheel rather than the cam-actuated mechanism of the 7750, providing smoother pusher action and superior chronograph operation. The movement eliminated unnecessary complications (no date, no 12-hour counter), creating the pure mono-compax layout of the original Deepstar.​

The bidirectional rotating bezel faithfully reproduced Marc Jasinski’s patented dual-scale decompression calculator, though the modern watch includes disclaimers that the 1965 French Navy decompression tables engraved on the bezel are obsolete by current diving safety standards and should not be used for actual diving. Aquastar supplied the watch with both genuine Tropic rubber straps (another brand Marei had revived) and Horween leather, packaged in comprehensive presentation sets.​​

The pricing strategy proved decisive. With retail set at $3,590 and pre-order pricing at $2,790, the Deepstar offered a column-wheel chronograph from a respected manufacture with historical provenance at roughly one-third the price of comparable Swiss chronographs. The value proposition resonated with collectors frustrated by escalating prices across the industry. The watch’s launch during 2020’s chaos demonstrated either remarkable courage or questionable timing, but Marei’s gamble succeeded, with the Deepstar earning positive reviews and selling through initial production.​

Expanding the Modern Range

Following the Deepstar Chronograph’s success, Aquastar expanded its modern catalog while maintaining focus on historically-informed designs. The Deepstar II, a three-hand dive watch rather than chronograph, incorporated the brand’s signature asymmetric mono-subdial running seconds at 9 o’clock (matching the chronograph’s layout) and the patented decompression bezel in a more accessible 37mm case. This smaller sizing acknowledged that vintage proportions, while historically accurate, don’t suit all wrists, particularly when the case features a long lug-to-lug measurement.​

In 2022, Aquastar introduced the Deepstar III Chronograph, returning to manual winding after the automatic Deepstar Chronograph. This decision required LaJoux-Perret to develop an exclusive manual-wind column-wheel chronograph movement honoring the spirit of the original Valjoux 23while incorporating modern precision. The manual-wind architecture enabled a slimmer case profile while maintaining the mono-compax layout and providing the tactile engagement enthusiasts associate with hand-wound chronographs. The 55-hour power reserve and 28-jewel count demonstrated that modern manual chronographs could match or exceed automatic calibers in specifications.​

The Model 60 MKII, launched in 2025, returned to Aquastar’s earliest innovation. The original Model 60 from 1957 (predating the Aquastar name but developed under the JeanRichard umbrella) introduced the friction ring bezel that would become Aquastar’s foundational patent. The modern version maintains the 37mm sizing and classic skin diver aesthetic with bold hour markers, paddle hands, and center-mounted seconds. However, responding to modern diving safety standards, the MKII employs a unidirectional ratcheting bezel rather than the original’s bidirectional friction bezel. This represents pragmatic evolution: while bidirectional friction was revolutionary in 1957, unidirectional ratcheting is objectively safer for actual diving, preventing the bezel from rotating in the dangerous direction regardless of friction.​

The Benthos Professional, introduced in 2025, represents Aquastar’s most technically capable modern dive watch. Developed through years of consultation with professional and commercial divers, the watch features 300-meter water resistance, non-screw-down helium escape valve at 4 o’clock, screw-down crown at 2 o’clock, unidirectional ceramic bezel with 120 clicks, and a slim 13.7mm profile despite robust construction. Available in standard 904L stainless steel or DLC-coated black finish, the Benthos Professional employs a Sellita SW200-1 Elaboré grade movement, a pragmatic choice balancing reliability, serviceability, and cost for a tool watch intended for professional use. The genuine ISOfrane rubber strap supplied with the watch acknowledges the brand’s commitment to period-correct accessories.​

Collecting Vintage Aquastar: Market and Authentication

The vintage Aquastar market occupies a fascinating niche, with examples ranging from affordable three-hand divers to expensive chronograph rarities. The Deepstar Chronograph with original Valjoux 23 movement represents the most sought-after vintage Aquastar, with well-preserved examples commanding $7,000 to $12,000 depending on condition, dial configuration, and provenance. Watches retaining the distinctive “propeller” shaped seconds hand at 9 o’clock (found only on certain production runs) achieve premium pricing due to rarity and visual appeal. Examples double-signed for the Spanish market by Duward are particularly collectible, as Duward served as Aquastar’s distributor in Spain and co-branded watches represent limited production.​

The Model 63 with inner rotating bezel trades in the $1,000 to $1,500 range for examples in very good condition, making it an accessible entry point for collectors interested in Aquastar’s innovations without chronograph pricing. Models produced for diving equipment manufacturer Nemrod (featuring Nemrod co-branding) represent a subset within the Model 63 category. The Regate regatta chronographs with Lemania 1345 movement occupy a middle ground, typically selling between $1,500 and $2,500, though pristine examples with fully operational regatta complication (the color-changing apertures often fail due to dried lubricants or broken mechanisms) can exceed $3,000.​

Three-hand Aquastar divers from the Seatime and Atoll ranges, produced in larger quantities and featuring less complex movements (typically AS 2066 or similar automatic calibers), trade from $800 to $1,500, offering authentic vintage Aquastar diving watches at modest prices. These represent the brand’s more commercial period but still feature quality Swiss movements and period-correct aesthetics.​

Authentication challenges in the vintage Aquastar market primarily involve dial refinishing and case condition. The tropical dial patina highly prized on vintage Rolex and OMEGA watches appears less frequently on Aquastar examples, as the brand’s professional distribution through diving equipment outlets meant watches typically saw hard use underwater rather than careful preservation. Consequently, finding Deepstar chronographs with pristine original dials, unfaded lume, and sharp case edges requires patience and premiums. Original Tropic straps, correct signed crowns, and unpolished cases with visible serial numbers add value and authenticity.​

Conclusion: The Tool Watch That Time Forgot, Then Remembered

Aquastar’s trajectory from pioneering dive watch innovator to forgotten obscurity to calculated resurrection encapsulates both the fragility and resilience of specialized watchmaking. Frédéric Robert’s conviction that professional divers required purpose-built instruments designed by people who understood diving produced genuine innovations, the friction ring bezel, inner rotating bezel, multiple dive decompression calculator, and regatta yachttimer complication, that either became industry standards or created entirely new complication categories. Yet the very focus that enabled these achievements (exclusive distribution through diving equipment outlets, rejection of mainstream retail, professional-only positioning) also ensured the brand remained unknown to the watch-buying public whose support might have sustained it through the quartz crisis.​

The irony is that Aquastar’s professional credentials exceeded those of brands that received far greater recognition. While Rolex marketed the Submariner’s diving capabilities to civilian buyers who would never descend below swimming pool depth, Aquastar supplied watches to Jacques Cousteau’s actual expeditions, U.S. Navy SEALAB saturation diving experiments, and commercial diving operations where watch failure could mean death. While OMEGA promoted the Seamaster 300 through aspirational advertising, Aquastar’s Deepstar was worn by Jacques Mayol setting freediving records and by BBC underwater archaeologists documenting Spanish Armada shipwrecks. The watches earned their reputations through performance, not marketing budgets.​​

Rick Marei’s resurrection strategy demonstrates sophisticated understanding of the modern collector market. Rather than producing vintage-inspired watches bearing superficial resemblance to historical models while incorporating contemporary proportions and generic movements (the approach many revived brands pursue), Aquastar committed to faithful dimensional recreation, historically accurate details, and genuinely high-grade movements from LaJoux-Perret offering column-wheel chronographs at prices undercutting competitors by half. This value proposition, combined with the brand’s genuine diving heritage and association with Cousteau, creates compelling positioning for collectors seeking authenticity and quality over brand recognition.​

For collectors and diving watch enthusiasts, Aquastar represents an opportunity to own watches from a brand whose innovations shaped the entire category, whose vintage examples appeared on the wrists of diving pioneers during genuinely historic expeditions, and whose modern production maintains unusual commitment to historical accuracy and mechanical quality. The vintage market remains accessible compared to comparable Rolex, OMEGA, or even Doxa examples, while modern Aquastar watches offer specifications and finishing rivaling brands charging double or triple the price. Whether pursuing a Deepstar Chronograph for its Cousteau connection, a Regate for its pioneering yachttimer complication, or a Model 60 for its friction bezel innovation, Aquastar collectors engage with genuine tool watch history rather than marketed mythology, a distinction that defines the brand’s appeal and ensures its legacy endures beyond the obscurity that briefly claimed it.