Aurélien Barrau — watch collection

About Aurélien Barrau’s watch collection

Aurélien Barrau is one of France's leading theoretical physicists, specializing in quantum gravity, black hole physics, and cosmology. A researcher at the Laboratoire de Physique Subatomique et de Cosmologie in Grenoble, he holds a position at the CNRS and has authored substantial academic work on loop quantum gravity and Hawking radiation. Beyond the laboratory, Barrau has become a prominent public intellectual in France, appearing regularly in mainstream media and publishing books aimed at broader audiences that address science, philosophy, and environmental ethics. He is among a rare group of working scientists who engage seriously with both peer-reviewed research and public discourse simultaneously.

In terms of personal style, Barrau leans toward an aesthetic that mixes intellectual informality with deliberate accessorizing — layered bracelets, a stacked wrist — which makes the watches he chooses all the more visible and identifiable. The Aurélien Barrau watch collection, as documented through public sightings, currently includes at least one confirmed Rolex: the GMT-Master II reference 126715CHNR, the model collectors call the 'Root Beer.' He was photographed wearing it on a wrist dressed with several bracelets, and the reference was confirmed by its unmistakable combination of a black-and-brown ceramic Cerachrom bezel and an Everose gold Oyster bracelet. Rolex reintroduced this color pairing at Baselworld 2018, making the 126715CHNR the first two-color GMT-Master II bezel executed entirely in ceramic.

The choice of the 'Root Beer' GMT-Master II is a telling one. It is not an entry-level Rolex, nor is it the most aggressively sought reference on secondary markets, but it carries genuine collector credibility and a clear aesthetic identity. For someone who operates at the intersection of rigorous science and visible public life, it reads as a considered rather than a reactive choice — functional in its dual time-zone utility, and specific enough in its colorway to reflect a degree of genuine horological awareness.