When it comes to a brand with rich heritage and a modern tradition of offering the watch industry’s best value propositions bar none, it is telling that the St. Imier watchmaker has chosen their 50th million watch ever made to take the guise of a Longines Master Collection Annual Calendar.

Longines, once amongst a top triumvirate of watchmakers, supplying celebrated names like Patek, Philippe & Cie has in contemporary times, channeled its mastery of time measurement into providing exquisite watch complications like monopusher chronographs and annual calendars at ever attractive price points. Hence, the production of the 50,000,000th Longines watch in the form of solid gold Longines Master Annual Calendar is telling of the Winged Hour Glass’s penchant for elegance, performance, and affordability, opening the world of luxury watchmaking to an ever growing number of consumers.

Longines 50th Million watch is a Master Collection Annual Calendar

As a testament of the brand’s longevity and legitimacy, Longines exceeded 50 million watches towards end 2018. Thus, to celebrate this historic landmark, the St. Imier watchmaker created a unique piece Master Annual Calendar with the serial number 50,000,000 for the occasion.

The Longines Master Collection was launched in 2005 as a flagship series to highlight the brand’s exceptional know-how in mechanical watchmaking: models in this collection offer many complications – now including timepiece with an annual calendar.

The 40mm Longines Master Annual Calendar caught most industry insiders and journalists off guard by offering the beloved complication at a never-before-heard, even more beloved price – US$ 2,425 ( €1940). The annual calendar automatically manages the varying lengths of the months and a watch like the Master Annual Calendar is able to distinguish between a month with 30 days and a month with 31 days, with no manual intervention required. The Baselworld 2018 timepiece was also the first time the St. Imier watchmaker’s modern history to showcase this feature.

Combining classical elegance with excellence, the Longines Master Annual Calendar is driven by the new automatic L897 calibre made by ETA exclusively for St. Imier.. With 64 hours of power reserve and the annual calendar displayed at 3 o’clock, the competent if industrially finished calibre can be viewed through the transparent case back. The rhodium plated blued steel hands sweep over a sublime backdrop of pressed silver barleycorn dial.

Of further interest, Longines is one of the few brands with production serials created in consecutive numbering. Every Longines timepiece has its own unique serial number, initially recorded in the workshop books until 1969 still available at the brand’s St. Imier museum, and then on microfiches during the 1970s and 1980s. All watches can therefore be identified down the decades and have their own individual identity, including this recently uncovered – world’s oldest Longines pocket watch, in order to preserve the brand’s immense historical legacy, Thanks to the one-of-a-kind database, the Longines Electronic Archives (LEA), can quickly and accurately inform clients and brand enthusiasts on each of the 50 million timepieces produced to date.

This piece unique solid gold Longines Master Annual Calendar can be seen at the company’s Museum in Saint-Imier.

Gold Master Collection Annual Calendar 50,000,000th – Ref. L2.910.8.78.3 specs

Movement Automatic calibre L897.2 (base ETA A31.L81) with 64 hours power reserve
Case 40mm 18kt rose gold with 30 meters water resistance
Strap Brown alligator leather strap
Price Not for Sale