Arnold & Son has created an elegant and minimalist timepiece with a highly detailed, three-dimensional moonphase indication, with a sparkly aventurine dial as the backdrop.
The Luna Magna Platinum Moonlight Chiaroscuro is presented in a 44 mm x 15.9 mm case made from 950 platinum, protected by a domed sapphire crystal on the front, and a flat sapphire crystal caseback. The watch display hours and minutes via a white mother of pearl subdial with Roman numeral indices and blued-skeletonized arrow-shaped hands.
Below the time display is an aperture that features a realistic three-dimensional lunar sphere that visually represents the astronomical moon phases. The sphere is 12 mm in diameter — crafted of light gray marble on one half and half aventurine crystal on the dark side — that can be viewed from either side of the watch.
A dark aventurine crystal dial — fittingly made to look like Outerspace, surrounds the time and moonphase subdials. The flange has been given a dark blue PVD treatment to maintain a seamless look to the dark-themed dial. Flip the watch over and you not only see the movement components, and the large moon sphere, but also an 8 aperture moon phase indicator with a blued hand (correction one day in every 122 years). This moon phase indicator, which operates in sync with the lunar sphere, provides clearly legible lunations for fine adjustments.
Arnold & Son’s Swiss-made hand-wound in-house caliber A&S1021 measures 37.6 mm x 12 mm, beats at 3Hz, and has a 90-hour power. The movement has been expertly finished and includes sunray and chamfered Côtes de Genève on the bridges, blued and chamfered screws with polished heads, and a circular-grained satin finish used to decorate the moon phase indicator.
“The duration of a complete lunar cycle is 29 days, 12 hours, 44 minutes, and 2.8 seconds. Arnold & Son have succeeded in approximating this cycle such that, if the watch was never stopped, it would take 122 years for the moon-phase display to accumulate a day’s discrepancy from the correct phase. The correction is easy since Luna Magna Platinum’s lunar function is accessible directly from the crown: a practical solution made possible by Arnold & Son’s total mastery of the watchmaking process,” as noted by Arnold & Son.
Each of the 28 limited edition Luna Magna Platinum Moonlight Chiaroscuro timepieces is paired with a blue hand-stitched alligator leather strap with dark magenta lining and platinum pin buckle. Limited to 28 pieces. (Ref. 1LMAX.A01A.C183A)
The retail price is approximately $55,900.
Photos by Arnold & Son.
