2005: Chopard LUC Lunar One, the first modern perpetual calendar watch with orbital moon phase
Matching legibility with design is often one of the great challenges faced by watch designers when using precious perpetual calendar complications. After all, it is a good line to fit the day, date, month, and leap year in a dial with a diameter of more than 40 mm while maintaining the internal code of the design.
Chopard first experienced perpetual calendars in the 80s and 90s, when it first started to develop its own perp cals. The earliest example of its full calendar watch is the Luna d’Oro series, which is a complete calendar with moon phase display, date and month windows, and date hands. What’s interesting is the brand’s experiment in case materials: bimetallic titanium and gold models are some of the references created.
Chopard replica and Sven Andersen
Independent watchmaker Svend Andersen is known for his creation of the Perpetual Secular Calendar, which is accurate to 400 years. what does this mean? Most perpetual calendar watches are accurate to the year 2100. In fact, this is not a leap year because it is a century-old year that is not divisible by 400. Andersen’s perpetual calendar is accurate to 2400 years.
However, in the 1990s, Andersen hoped to industrialize another perpetual calendar, the retrograde date perpetual calendar. The date display on the retrograde display will jump back to “1” when it reaches the end of the month, whether it is the 28th, 29th, 30th, or 31st. Really impressive design.
Chopard obtained the rights to Andersen’s design and developed it with Frederic Piguet’s basic movement and adjusted it according to its standards. This became Luna d’Oro, a special edition with a golden moon and a limited series. Released gold and platinum versions of watches. Other variants of Luna d’Oro also introduced a 48-month leap year indicator.
Chopard goes further on the road of complex timepieces. Refer to 36-1224. This is a chronograph and perpetual calendar driven by Jaeger-LeCoultre 889/1 movement, with overlapping indicators. Although the dial is complex, it can still Keep it clear and easy to read. After all, if you can’t decipher them, what is the point of wearing all these instruments on your wrist?
All these developments led Chopard to launch its own LUC 96 QP perpetual calendar movement in 2005, which is based on the brand’s 1.96 automatic base movement. A large date window, together with a date and month counter, make the watch very easy to read. What’s more noteworthy is that the calendar operation is an instantaneous jump display. The day and night indicator and the orbital moon phase display make the watch more interesting. You can choose the northern or southern hemisphere constellation on the moon phase.
The 2012 version of Lunar One introduced new improvements. The LUC 96.13-L automatic movement has the Geneva Seal and COSC certification, a 70-hour power reserve, a moon phase display accurate to one day in 122 years, and an instantaneous calendar display. There are many styles of this watch, including gem-set styles.
However, the most surprising release of the Chopard perpetual calendar may be in 2016, the last leap year, when the brand launched the steel watch LUC Perpetual Twin with a 43 mm stainless steel watch and double hair Bar box (hence the name)) and provides a 65-hour power reserve.
In the same year, the brand also released the LUC Perpetual Chrono, which combines two of the most popular complications in the industry-a vertically coupled flyback chronograph and a perpetual calendar, and a Fairmined gold case equipped with a manual winding movement, LUC 03- 10-L. This dual-certified movement uses a familiar dial design, with the chronograph disc stacked on the display of the perpetual calendar to ensure clarity and legibility.
Recently, the 2017 version of the Lunar One platinum watch has a dark blue sunray finish, which adds beauty to the watch. This is an eye-catching timepiece, and is still a rare industry standard because it is self-winding and has an chronometer and Geneva seal certification.
It has been several years since we saw Chopard’s perpetual calendar, although other models of the brand have added complications. However, for perpetual calendar lovers, Lunar One is a model worth admiring, especially considering that the brand has not only kept the name of the Discount watch unchanged, but its design and style have been steadily evolving over the years.
