The Heuer Carrera would have to be one of the most iconic timepieces ever created. Designed by Jack Heuer in the early ’60s, the Carrera line still exists to this day with early models becoming some of the most desired vintage watches in the market.
With the Carrera, legibility underpinned all of its design cues, with Jack Heuer taking an obsessive stance on stripping away all that was unnecessary and presenting only the most important information on the watch dial. The result was a clean three register chronograph with baton markers and an outer tension ring that featured the minute markers.
Over the years, the Carrera saw many dial variants, from different color combinations to different scales featured on the dial. That being said, one of the most desirable variants of the Carrera would have to be the example you see today, the Ref. 2447NST, with the ’N’ standing for ‘noir’, denoting a black dial. The ’S’ standing for silver sub-dials and the ’T’ indicating the presence of a tachymeter scale.
Powered by the venerable Valjoux 72, it is one of the most popular and iconic movements of the 20th century, cased in watches such as the Rolex Daytona, it is a quality workhorse movement.
Of all the watches ever created, in my opinion, the Carrera is one of the most beautiful and timeless. The case of the Carrera, with those long angular inward lugs, has an amazing proportionality and while it does look good in photos, on the wrist it is so much better.
Even by today's standards, the 2447NST still looks like a modern watch. It shows that in design if you only design what is necessary, without superfluousness, you will end up with a product that will remain relevant for generations.