Continuing in the spirit of Piguet, let’s talk about the newest realise, Royal Oak Perpetual Calendar Black Ceramic. Enhanced by the Royal Oak Perpetual models introduced in 2015 and 2016 Audemar Piguet expends the line working with different material, but still stays faithful to it’s usual shape. Black Ceramic Perpetual Royal Oak was proudly presented this year on SIHH.

First catching eye feature is black non-scratching, nicely hand crafted and finished  ceramic, worked for many long hours to be achieved the perfect visual effect. The ultra hardness of the material gives more quality to this watch because is highly resistant on high temperature and thermal shocks, although manufacturing an item made of specific black ceramic was a real challenge, and one of the hardest aims was to keep all that goodness this material can offer. Machine, hand finishing and assembling the bracelet took  over 30 hours.

Trough the non scratching sapphire window a grey Grande Tapiserie dail jumps out with all it’s illumines beauty, hour markers are made of white gold, the AP hands with luminescent coating, and four chronographs set in a crosse line are showing day, date, month, moon phases and week of the year. According to my taste the moon chronograph with his blue, grey and black shades comes like a real light pick on the display giving a bit of charm in the darkness, this indicator has been laser micro structured especially for this model and needs correction every 125 years and 317 days. Set in the position of 12 o’clock is the month chronograph with included leap year indicator clearly signed with L.

Inside 41mm black ceramic case (just like the standard model) there is an ultra thin movement with total thickness  of 4.31 mm and diameter of 29mm (calibre 5134 made of 374 parts and 38 jewels, based on the original Royal Oak lounged in 1972). The sapphire crystal case back allows full view of the movement which has been enlarged in accordance with the 41mm diameter case and oscillates on a frequency of 19,800 vph. The oscillating weight is led by a peripheral ring rolling in four ruby runners which reduces friction to the minimum.

If you would like to buy this master piece you are looking at a price of $93,000 USD, Black Ceramic with specific properties promising a lot for a price of gold. According to the AP Black Ceramic Royal Oak Perpetual Calendar should be available on the market in the second half of 2017.