This is what history looks like.

How about this for a milestone? Longines just produced its 50 millionth watch.

It certainly took a while to get there (the brand was founded in 1832), and historians and archivists were put to work tracking piles of workshop books, microfiches and digital databases. BUT it is finally here and it's totally legit, this milestone timepiece that puts another marker on Longines’ long and illustrious journey.

And of course, it has to be something special. The Longines Master Collection 50,000,000th is suitably regal, emanating classiness appropriate for its stature. Hailing from the Master collection, the dress watch is encased in rose gold and rocks a silver-finished ‘barely corn’ dial with blued steel hands and day/date annual calendar display.

At the back, the watch’s see-through sapphire glass – a window to the automatic ETA-based Calibre 897.2 – is etched with the words ’50 Million’ and Longines’ famous winged hourglass logo. Nothing too complex and ostentatious, but a subtly sophisticated look befitting the occasion.

Bring on the next 500 million then?