The History of the Panerai Watch

Giovanni Panerai founded Officine Panerai in Florence Italy in 1860. By the 1900 under his grandson’s leadership the brand had become the official supplier to the Royal Italian Navy the Regia Marina, supplying them with watches and precision instruments. These watches were used for underwater missions so they had to be water and shock resistant. At the time Panerai watches consisted of a case, which was designed by Rolex, and the movements engineered by the Swiss manufacturer Cortebert.   

The Florence-based watchmaker made about 300 diving instruments and watches for the Italian Marine Military from 1938-1993. But the company ceased to provide their products after 1993 because it was not cost effective as well as not meeting the newer naval specifications. Panerai then moved to the civilian market. Many say that the brand exploded due to one famous actor- Sylvester Stallone. He spotted the watch brand while in Rome in 1995 and wore a Panerai Luminor on the set of his new film: Daylight. He then fell in love with the brand and bought a batch of watches to give out as small presents with his signature engraved on the case. This incidence catapulted the brand into the celebrity spotlight. Subsequently this rise in fame attracted a company called Richemont who then bought Officine Panerai in 1997.

Richemont rebranded Panerai as a luxury watch brand and the prices of its pieces shot up. However all of its core watches stayed the same. Richemont still own Panerai today and thyre headquarters are still based in Florence, however the watches are manufactured in Neuchatel, Switzerland, using both movements developed in house and some movements designed by The Swatch Watch Company.

There are four major lines of Panerai watches: Historic, Contemporary, Manifattura and Special Editions. Most of their watches are normally produced in units of 500, 1000, 2000 and 4000 and always carry an issue number on the back of the case. Panerai release a special edition every year and always making less watches than the demand. Various Panerai models are referred to as PAM and then the model number that is because PAM stands for Panerai Movement Number. The dial configurations on most Panerai’s are striking and bold in look and colour and the classic OP logo with one arrow pointing down and one up, is suppose to represent land and sea. This dial configuration is very prized by collectors.    

Now with Panerai being an Italian brand its only natural they collaborate with other Italian brands and that was the case, as they teamed up with Ferrari in 2005. This collection was called Ferrari engineered by Panerai and had two product lines, the elegant Granturmiso and the super sporty Scuderia line. 

Written by Benjamin Dyson