Aquastar is a Swiss watch brand founded in 1962 in Geneva, Switzerland, by Frédéric Robert. Robert was a diver, sailor, and mathematician born into a family of watchmakers who took over his father’s watch business, JeanRichard, and rebranded it as Aquastar to focus exclusively on creating professional dive timepieces and oceanic instruments.
Watch enthusiasts and collectors appreciate Aquastar for its technical innovation, functional utility, and deep connection to maritime history. Between 1957 and 1977, the brand filed eleven patents that helped establish foundational standards for modern dive watches, including the internal crown-controlled rotating bezel, the dual-gasket waterproof crown, and the no-decompression dive bezel. The brand’s focus on purpose-built tool watches led to partnerships with major diving equipment firms like La Spirotechnique and Scubapro, as well as usage by historical oceanographers and divers such as Jacques Cousteau’s crew, Don Walsh, and Jacques Mayol.
The brand’s catalog is defined by several key historic models and modern reissues: – Model 60: First introduced in the late 1950s, this skin diver established early standards for compact dive watches using an outer friction-ring rotating bezel. – Deepstar: Launched in 1962, this emblem of the brand is a dive chronograph featuring Marc Jasinski’s 1964 patented no-decompression bezel scale. – Benthos 500: Debuted in 1970 as a 500-meter water-resistant dive watch built around a serviceable dual-gasket crown system, notable for its central 60-minute chronograph counter. – Regate: Introduced in the 1963 period as a purpose-built wrist timer designed for competitive sailing with a 5-minute countdown indicator disc system.
