Our Favorite Perpetual Calendars For The 2024 Leap Year

It’s one of my favorite horological(ish) holidays this month, and it only comes around once every four years (give or take). February 29th is leap day! That means that if you’re one of those lucky ones with one of the most grand of complications – the perpetual calendar – it’s time to dust it off, make sure it’s properly set (for once), and get ready to watch it do its thing. Four years ago, we checked in with the staff to see their favorite perpetual calendars – quantième perpetuel or QP to the French – and now we’re back to doing it again.
Let this serve as a reminder to you all that a year isn’t exactly 365 days long. It’s not even 365.25 days long. It’s more like 365.2425 days long (though that’s not exactly true either; it’s closer to 365.24219). To adjust for the drift in the calendar versus the actual number of days it takes for the earth to rotate the sun, we have to add a day every four years to the Gregorian Calendar. Then, we skip the leap year for every interval divisible evenly by 100. Oh, and then we observe a leap year every interval that is divisible by 400 — confused yet?

For those of you who have forgotten in the last four years (or maybe are new to watches), unlike a more simple calendar that gets confused by things like the month of February – let alone leap years – a perpetual calendar (mostly) understands all this for you, though most have to be reset every 100 years.
Four years ago, I promised myself I would have a perpetual calendar by this leap year. It was a lofty (and frankly nearly impossible) goal; many perpetual calendars run in the $100,000 or more range because they’re incredibly complex beasts. Sure, there are more “affordable” options, but not many. Well, I missed the mark. But more accessibly-priced QPs have hit the market over the last four years. Baltic and Furlan Marri released perpetual calendars for Only Watch (Furlan Marri’s is ingeniously designed and not impacted by the 100-year issue). I would guess we will see exciting releases from brands like this in the next few years.

But for now, I gathered several of the Hodinkee team members to pick our favorite perpetual calendars that already exist and that we’d like to be wearing this February 29. It’s a perfect time to dream (and maybe plan for the next four years of saving). You’ll notice that some brands have seemingly mastered the complication, and it’s so inextricably tied to their history that they show up more than once on the list. And we start with one of the best https://www.highluxurystore.ru.