Perpetual calendars come in all forms, shapes, metals, and prices. However, few brands stand out from the rest as far as their perpetual calendars in terms of history, reliability, and prestige. When you are looking for a perpetual calendar the first brand names that pop up would be Patek Philippe, Audemars Piguet, and Vacheron Constantin as these make the ‘holy trinity of watchmaking’. Audemars Piguet has a long history making perpetual calendars and after the successful release of the Royal Oak Perpetual ref. 26574 at the end of 2015, the brand pushed the envelope even further in 2018 presenting a prototype of what would become the world’s thinnest automatic perpetual calendar.
The Royal Oak RD#2 prototype presented at the SIHH 2018 was totally an attention grabber and one of the best watches released that year. A little over a year after the release of that prototype, Audemars Piguet decided to turn that project into a regular production watch and the Audemars Piguet Royal Oak Perpetual Ultra-Thin ref. 26586IP made its appearance a few months ago. Now, we have it here for you with our usual unique perspective on this hands-on review.
Things to Know About the Watch
Produced after the prototype released in 2018, the Royal Oak RD#2 ref. 26585PT , the Royal Oak Perpetual Ultra-Thin ref. 26586IP is slightly different from the prototype in two ways. The new regular production watch features a satin-brushed smooth blue dial instead of a 'Grande Tapisserie' one. Additionally, while the prototype was all platinum, the Royal Oak Perpetual Ultra-Thin ref. 26586IP features a case and bracelet in titanium with highly polished bezel and center links in platinum.
The blue dial features white gold applied hour-markers and Royal Oak hands with luminescent coating, the moon-phase indicator at 12 o'clock pays homage to AP's first perpetual calendar launched in 1955. At 10 o'clock, one can find the day of the week with overlapping day and night indicator, at 2 o'clock the month with overlapping leap year indicator and at 6 o'clock the date indicator. Even though we love the look of the Royal Oak Perpetual Ultra-Thin ref. 26586IP, we totally prefer the layout of the Royal Oak Perpetual ref. 26574.
Equipped with a bracelet in titanium with center links in platinum, the Audemars Piguet Royal Oak Perpetual Ultra-Thin ref. 26586IP wears extremely light and very nicely. The highly polished links along with the highly polished bezel, make for an interesting symphony of light refraction.
The Movement
Powered by a totally new in-house automatic movement the Royal Oak Perpetual Ultra-Thin is the world’s thinnest self-winding perpetual calendar. The calibre 5133 with a perpetual calendar represented a horological feat by having to re-engineer a triple layer movement into a single level one. The movement with a mere thickness of 2.89 mm includes a single layer perpetual calendar module that is not more than 0.35 mm thick.
To accomplish such a thin movement, Audemars Piguet had to combine and re-arrange the perpetual calendar functions to boost ergonomics, efficiency, and robustness, featuring a patented system with a central rotor.
Today, thanks to this new movement, the new Audemars Piguet Royal Oak Perpetual Ultra-Thin ref. 26586IP is now the thinnest automatic perpetual calendar on the market. The new automatic calibre 5133 is composed of 256 parts and 37 jewels and provides a power reserve of 40 hours when fully wound while beating at a frequency of 19,800 vph. The movement is fully visible via the display case back and the watch is water-resistant to 20 meters.
On the Wrist & Pricing
On the wrist, the Audemars Piguet Royal Oak Perpetual Ultra-Thin ref. 26586IP wears slightly smaller than its actual size and more like a 40 mm watch thanks to its very slim case profile and its ultra-light titanium case construction. Without a doubt, this is one of the most exquisite watches ever made by Audemars Piguet. No hype here, just pure horological mastery from our friends from Le Brassus. The only thing that would’ve made this watch better would’ve been having a tapisserie dial like the Royal Oak RD#2 prototype presented in 2018, after which this watch was made from.
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