Anyone who’s in the market for a perpetual calendar or an elegant dress watch, you might want to consider the Daniel Roth Instantaneous Perpetual Calendar.  Available in either white gold, pink gold, or platinum (and also each variant available with diamond bezel), I have nothing but unbridled enthusiasm for this rarely seen perpetual, a true work of art if I may say so, and I hope my brief “on-the-wrist” review will garner more interest for this underappreciated timepiece.

 
Daniel Roth Instantaneous Perpetual Calendar in WG

This particular perpetual calendar features a unique complication in that it is "instantaneous", meaning the registers on the dial for the day of the week, date, and month all change in unison exactly at midnight.  Daniel Roth is one of only a couple of brands who make instantaneous perpetual calendars.

At PuristSPro’s recent global Watching Perpetually PuristS 2008 events (WPP 2008), the Daniel Roth Instantaneous Perpetual Calendar was put to test and performed flawlessly.  We have first-hand proof of its working capabilities as advertised at our Hong Kong WPP venue.  One non-instantaneous perpetual calendar in our Los Angeles WPP venue was the turtle of the bunch and took a whopping 2.5 hours after midnight to fully complete the calendar date change from February 29, 2008 to March 1, 2008!  Otherwise, most of the perpetual calendars at the LA WPP made the successful date change from Feb to Mar in less than an hour.

As many of you all know, the watches in my collection are large, and a 44mm Panerai Luminor is my preferred case size.  The Daniel Roth Instantaneous Perpetual Calendar is smaller at an advertised 41mm; but in reality, the case is a tad smaller because the advertised 41mm includes the protruding lugs.  I guess with the large watch craze these days, perhaps Daniel Roth incorporated the lugs into its case measurements to make its watch appear larger on paper?  My own case measurements came out to 38mm length-wise (from 12 o’clock to 6 o’clock excluding lugs), 37mm width-wise (from 9 o’clock to 3 o’clock excluding crown) with a thickness of 8.5mm – L 38mm x W 37mm x H 8.5mm.  My ruler may not be not be 100% precise, so give or take +/- 0.5mm in my above measurements.

 
Looks great on the wrist doesn't it?

For those naysayers who are dubious about wearing any watch over 40mm+, the Daniel Roth Instantaneous Perpetual Calendar (let me start using the abbreviation “DRIPC” because the name is so long) is in reality only 38mm.  However, for those of you who are like me and prefer large watches, the protruding lugs make the DRIPC easily tolerable to wear on the wrist despite its smaller size.  It didn’t take me long at all to get used to the smaller size; and in terms of comfort and wearability in my opinion, the DRIPC is a watch best suited for those who prefer wearing 37mm all the way up to 42mm.  Those who only wear 47mm will definitely find the DRIPC too small, and those who wear 34mm will definitely find the DRIPC too large.

 
The size of the DRIPC can accomodate either a man or woman's wrist.

Not too thick and the DRIPC sits comfortably on the wrist without any wobbling.

The feel of the DRIPC on the wrist reminds me of the similar feel of Peter Speake-Marin’s 38mm Vintage Tourbillon watch when I had it strapped on my wrist for 15-minutes at one our past PuristSPro events co-sponsored with Jackson Square.  This watch felt as large as a 44mm Panerai on the wrist!  Peter’s watches all have protruding lugs as well just like the DRIPC, so if any of you have strapped on a Piccadilly or any other PSM watch, the feel of wearing a larger watch than expected is very similar.  I do not want to go off on a tangent, but I wanted to make sure I give a comparison feel of the DRIPC on the wrist because it does wear slightly larger than it looks.

I hopped into my car right after I strapped the DRIPC on my wrist for the first time and found myself enamored and staring at the beautiful skeletonization of the white gold dial and the exquisite hand engraving on the dial side movement plate, rather than keeping my eye on the road and heeding to the speed limit on the highway while the family was in the car.  What a dangerous thing to do I might say.  Luckily we made it safely back home without getting into a car accident.  But I guess if you look at the below picture, you can understand, as a fellow watch nut, why I was ogling the dial   And don’t tell me the view through the dial isn’t something to die for (figuratively speaking of course)!

 
Wow!  Look at the skeleton white gold dial & hand engraving of the movement!

An even closer picture detailing the exquisite hand engraving of the movement.

Besides the skeleton dial and the hand engraving, another astounding feature of the DRIPC is the amount of depth Daniel Roth has achieved with the dial.  With a thickness of only 8.5mm, the amount of visible depth to the dial is almost equivalent to that of my ultra thick 16mm Richard Mille RM11.  For such a thin watch to exhibit as much depth as the DRIPC is just added icing on the cake for this amazing watch.  

===
To read the rest of Anthony's review, please CLICK HERE  to get transported over to our Daniel Roth forum.