Watches: Behind the G-Shock, 25 Years Later

When Casio set out to create a range of unique and unbreakable watches in 1981,  quartz movements were already a norm in the industry, and some degree of water resistance was a given in most new timepieces. The horology industry needed a new frontier, and Casio took it upon themselves to set the newest challenge: to create a watch that was truly unbreakable. They started “Project Team Tough” to head up the development of this new frontier in wristwatch design and construction.

This took two years, and over two-hundred prototypes, to perfect, before an unbreakable body had been finally achieved to house a watch. By 1983, Casio was ready to launch their first incarnation of the now-legendary G-SHOCK.

Five years later, in 1989, the line included its first analog dial. The brand has not stopped tirelessly innovating, improving and strengthening their offering ever since.

Though hardly requiring an introduction, G-SHOCK timepieces are more than just somewhat robust. To call a watch “unbreakable” was, and still is, a bold statement, and one which needs some clarification. What G-SHOCK set out to do was look at every way in which a wristwatch might cop some grief during the course of its daily usage, then make it exponentially tougher than it needed to be.

Some of the most rigorous and scientific testing you’ll ever find in a watch development facility. G-SHOCK watches are put through their paces in a streamlined and formulaic set of durability tests which are designed to ensure that the final products which head to market are more than capable of handling some of the most extreme conditions.

Yet despite packing all of this into one wearable unit, this is still a watch which has never lost its DNA; that originality and chutzpah of the original 1983 examples which broke the mould (and probably any surface onto which they were dropped). When G-SHOCK set out to make an unbreakable watch, they might not have foreseen models such as the GA710B-1A2 up ahead on the horizon.

But they never stepped away from this simple yet fervently chased goal of building something indestructible, and through every development they have made, it’s been a constant which has defined an iconic three decades of watchmaking.

And whichever features they’ll pack into the future generations, you can rest assured of one thing: G-SHOCK will always remain indestructible.