This is some pretty big news for Panerai: a new family of watches, the Luminor Due, has just been announced concurrently with the opening of the "Dive Into Time" exhibition of Panerai timepieces spanning the brand's entire history, in Florence, Italy. The new family of watches represents a substantial slimming of the traditionally rather thick Luminor case, and has been designed to keep the technical features of Luminor (including the use of in-house calibers) while making an alternative, and additional, Luminor design available. Notably, the collection represents the creation by Panerai of a more design-centric collection – at 3 bar/30 meter water resistance these are not Luminor watches with which to dive, but rather, to be worn more easily than the existing Luminor watches, and to emphasize the company's uniqueness from a design perspective.
The first new model is the Luminor Due 3 Days Acciaio. This is the thinnest Luminor model yet; the case is about 10.5 mm thick, and will be offered in both steel (PAM00676) and in red gold, in an "Oro Rosso" version (PAM00677). Inside is a new movement: the hand-wound caliber P1000, a 3.85 mm thick, 12-ligne movement running at 28,800 vph, with a three-day power reserve, which is openworked in the Oro Rosso model.
Both versions will be offered on an alligator strap. Pricing: $10,700 in steel, $25,600 in red gold.
There is also an automatic version of the Due, which, like the hand-wound model, comes in both a red gold and a steel model, though as you'll see there's a bigger difference between the two here, than between the hand-wound models. The automatic version is the Luminor Due 3 Days Automatic, and it's a bit larger, at 45 mm in diameter, and marginally thicker, at 10.7 mm, but it's still quite slim for a Luminor. Below is the steel model, PAM 000674, which houses Panerai's micro-rotor caliber P.4000; this is a 13 3/4 ligne, 3.95 mm thick movement. Like the hand-wound P1000, it features a balance bridge securing the balance at two points, for better shock resistance, as well as a three-day power reserve and a frequency of 28,000 vph.
The Oro Rosso version, PAM 00675, is identical in dimensions, but as we mentioned above, the movement's been quite elaborately openworked.
In steel, PAM 00674 is $10,700, and in gold, with the openworked caliber P4000/10, price is set at $25,600.
All four pieces will be available on September 16th, according to Panerai.
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