Firstly, a Happy New Year to all Deployant readers! May you all have a wonderful 2015!
In 2015, IWC Schaffhausen celebrates the 75th birthday of a watch family steeped in tradition: the Portugieser. In keeping with its jubilee, the new Portugieser collection comes with a host of technological and design modifications and new features for previous models.
The Swiss luxury watch manufacturer is developing more of its own in-house movements and
plans to launch three new calibre families in the years ahead. Initiating this move is the 52000 calibre family, which is found in four models in the new Portugieser collection. The newly designed and first ever annual calendar for IWC makes its debut.
The Portugieser Annual Calendar: A first for IWC
The new Portugieser Annual Calendar (Ref. 5035) is IWC’s first annual calendar. The month, date and day are shown in three separate, semicircular windows at “12 o’clock”. The date switching mechanism is able to take the differing lengths of the individual months into account but not those for the differing numbers of days in February owing to leap years. The newly developed 52850 calibre has twin barrels to supply the additional torque required to advance the three display discs.
Close up: Dial layout of the new Portugiser Annual Calendar Ref IW503502
The Portugieser Annual Calendar is available in 18-carat gold (Ref. IW503504) with a silver-plated dial or in stainless steel with a silver-plated (Ref. IW503501) or midnight blue (Ref. IW503502) dial- featured in the pictures above. The fine sun-pattern finish on the blue dial reflects incident light dynamically in a myriad directions. All versions of the watch are fitted with black Santoni alligator leather straps.
In addition to the annual calendar we will see the introduction of the Portugieser Perpetual Calendar Digital Date-Month Edition “75th Anniversary” (Ref. 3972), The Portugieser Hand-Wound Eight Days Edition “75th Anniversary” (Ref. 5102) and the new Portugieser Yacht Club Chronograph (Ref. 3905) which has had its case size reduced from 45.4 millimetres to 43.5 millimetres.
From 2015 the Portugieser Perpetual Calendar with a double moon (Ref. 5034) and the Portugieser Perpetual Calendar with a single moon (Ref. 5033) will be equipped with IWC-manufactured movements from the new IWC 52000- calibre family, featuring solid red gold rotors and blued screws.
The Portugieser Automatic (Ref. 5007) will also be powered by an in-house movement from the new 52000-calibre family starting in 2015. The legendary Pellaton winding system has been further improved: the pawls, automatic wheel and rotor bearing are now made of extremely hard, wear-resistant ceramic; and two barrels, rather than just one, build up an impressive 7-day power reserve with a frequency of 4 hertz.
Deployant looks forward to reviewing the new and updated Portugieser Collection.
Specifications from Press Release of the Portugieser Annual Calendar
Features
- Mechanical movement
- Pellaton automatic winding
- Power reserve display
- Annual calendar with displays for the date, day and month
- Small hacking seconds at 9 o’clock
- Glucydur®* beryllium alloy indexless balance with high-precision adjustment screws on balance rim
- Breguet spring
- See-through sapphire-glass back
- Rotor with 18-carat gold medallion
Movement
- IWC-manufactured calibre 52850
- Frequency 28,800 A/h / 4 Hz
- 36 Jewels
- Power reserve 7 days (168 hours)
- Winding automatic
Materials
- IW503501: case in stainless steel, silver-plated dial,
black alligator leather strap, folding clasp in stainless steel
- IW503502: case in stainless steel, midnight blue dial,
black alligator leather strap, folding clasp in stainless steel
- IW503504: case in 18-carat red gold, silver-plated dial,
black alligator leather strap, folding clasp in 18-carat red gold
- Glass sapphire, arched edge, antireflective coating on both sides
- Water-resistant 3 bar
- Diameter 44.2 mm
- Case height 15.3 mm
