Arnold & Son Unveils Perpetual Moon 41.5 Platinum, Fern Green Edition

NEW YORK (November 26, 2024) – Swiss watchmaker Arnold & Son today reveals a new Perpetual Moon 41.5 “Fern Green” edition. The fresh botanical hue creates a harmonious interplay with its celestial midnight blue sky and pale platinum case.

New creations continue to enrich the Perpetual Moon collection – consistently reaffirming the watchmaking and artistic talents of Arnold & Son. Following two other recent editions, one with salmon pink accents and another in sky blue, Perpetual Moon 41.5 Platinum is now available in this limited fern green version of 28 timepieces.

Its hue is inspired by the unique color of the fern, an undergrowth plant found in abundance in the English gardens of Cornwall, the county where John Arnold was born.

SHIMMERING

The “Stellar Rays” finish enlivens the dial with a sophisticated shimmer. This aesthetic is achieved through cleverly irregular engraving. Various depths and widths of rays coexist, radiating out one from another, creating a unique rhythm. Their succession produces a fluctuating play of light, accentuated by the depth created by several layers of transparent lacquer.

Realistically depicted and set against a grained sky with a midnight blue PVD treatment, the large white mother-of-pearl moon is also overlaid with Super-LumiNova. Invisible by day, this added color gives it a wholly new face by night.

COMPASS

Following in the tradition of the Perpetual Moon collection, the moon is surrounded by Ursa Major and Cassiopeia, both hand-painted and overlaid with luminescent material. The choice of these star patterns is an allusion to the history of marine chronometer-maker John Arnold.

These two constellations have always served as landmarks in the night sky, with Polaris visible halfway between the two easily identifiable groups. Its northerly position and its elevation angle can be used to estimate the distance from the equator, i.e. the latitude. Before the invention of instruments to determine the longitude, was this method offered the most reliable measure of a ship’s position at sea.

ACCURACY

On the case back, a secondary display of the phases of the moon allows fast and accurate adjustment of the moon age. The manually-wound A&S1512 caliber that powers this display also ensures its moon phases are rendered with exceptional accuracy. The total duration of a lunar cycle is 29 days, 12 hours, 44 minutes, and 2.8 seconds. Arnold & Son has approached this so closely that it would take 122 years for this movement, if constantly wound, to accumulate a 24-hour discrepancy between the display and astronomical reality.

Like all Arnold & Son’s movements, the A&S1512 caliber was entirely developed, produced, decorated, adjusted, and assembled at the manufacture in La Chaux-de-Fonds. This caliber uses two barrels and features an oscillation frequency of 3 Hz, delivering a 90-hour power reserve.

ABOUT ARNOLD & SON

Arnold & Son is named after John Arnold, a renowned English watchmaker of the 18th century. The golden age of maritime explorations and discoveries ushered this precision into a new technical ideal – determining longitude at sea. Its immediate corollary was the identification of local time, which changed constantly as the observer moved along an east-west axis. Astronomy, chronometry, and what we now call world time are thus inextricably linked within one and the same question, to which John Arnold and his son devoted their lives, their art, and their genius.

This is how these three dimensions – Astronomy, Chronometry and World Time – have come to be embodied in the House’s contemporary timepieces. Echoes of John Arnold’s inventions and preoccupations, these principles represent the foundations on which the Arnold & Son collections are based. The twenty-plus calibers presented to date by Arnold & Son have all been designed and developed in-house and produced by its sister manufacturer, La Joux-Perret in La Chaux-de-Fonds (Switzerland). This independence and creativity demonstrate the House’s ability to perpetuate John Arnold’s exceptional inventions.

For more information, visit arnoldandson.com.