Four Perpetual Delights To Cherish Forever

A perpetual calendar remains one of the most coveted complications. While there is in today's high-tech world no particular need anymore for such a mechanical timepiece, its complexity remains mesmerizing. Unlike an annual calendar, does a perpetual one not even need adjusting in the leap years. This unique feature is very challenging to make and means that, when it runs continuously, it doesn't need manual adjustment for decades, sometimes even centuries. Watch brands also love to take this esteemed complication to the next level, from both a technical as well as an aesthetical point of view. The following four are perfect examples of this and crafted to be cherished forever.

By Martin Green

Panerai Takes Platinum To The Next Level With Platinumtech Luminor Marina

These days, many brands have proprietary gold-alloys that improve the properties of conventional ones. Rolex Everose gold is a good example, which not only offers a richer color but combines this with the added advantage that it hardly tarnishes over time. Hublot even achieved significantly increasing the scratch resistance of gold by combining it with ceramic in their Magic Gold. Platinum alloys are far rarer. In part, this is because there is literally less room to innovate. With 18 karat gold, 750 of every 1000 particles in the alloy are pure gold, the other 250 particles are other metals. These are not only needed to make the alloy harder but can also change the color, most commonly into white, pink, or red. Most brands typically use 950 platinum, meaning that only 50 particles per 1000 are a different metal. For Panerai's Laboratorio di Idee this was enough to make a significant improvement.