Chopard Understands What Collectors Want With First L.U.C Watches Of 2025

Chopard L.U.C is going through a renaissance that kicked off in 2023 with the revival of the legendary 1860 watch. Since then, it’s been a lot more cleaner dials and smaller cases, and it looks like 2025 is kicking off with a continuation of the trend. While we’ll have to wait a couple of months until Watches & Wonders to see the bigger picture of the brand’s direction, a pair of new —and admittedly pricey— releases go to show why some of the bigger established names in high watchmaking should feel the heat.

The new Chopard L.U.C Lunar One and Flying T Twin Perpetual are reboots of two of the higher-end pieces from the already high-end L.U.C collection. The direction that both go in are what’s promising for the bigger picture — as they both shrink down from 43mm cases to a slimmer 40.5mm size that is really just ideal. Oh, and Chopard is also introducing a new interchangeable strap system with these that is quite easy to operate and can be seen on the caseback photos in this article.

Let’s start with the Lunar One, which has been a true "IYKYK" piece for collectors since it debuted back in 2005 with a perpetual calendar and moon-phase complication that challenges the likes of the Patek Philippe Ref. 5327. Chopard has revamped the design but not the watchmaking that put L.U.C on the map. The 96.13-L movement is unchanged, which is a good thing. This movement is both COSC-certified and bears the Geneva Seal, which means that both accuracy and finishing are top-tier. The perpetual calendar movement has a big-date function as well as a moon-phase indicator that needs to be adjusted one day over the course of a 122-year period. The micro-rotor movement looks perfectly fit in the new, smaller 40.5mm case (I always found the exhibition caseback display to be too small for a 43mm case) and you’ll notice that recognizable 22K-gold micro-rotor, along with Geneva Stripes and graining throughout. The movement operates at 4 Hz and has a 65-hour power reserve.

There are two variants of the new L.U.C Lunar One: a white-gold model with a beautiful salmon dial and a rose-gold model featuring a striking blue dial. Both iterations boast the refreshed dial that foregoes Roman numerals for herringbone-type applied gold hour markers. Also, the dials go from being flat to having stunning, sunburst guilloché patterns done by hand. As for the case, it is 40.5mm wide and 11.63mm thick, with matching gold crown. Not just smaller, the case is reshaped with a narrower base and is finished with satin-brushed sides. Also note, the lugs are separately made and welded to the case.

The second release is the new L.U.C Flying T Twin Perpetual, which also foregoes the previous 43mm case for this new and slimmer 40.5mm-wide case. At 11.63mm thick, it’s also significantly slimmer than the L.U.C Perpetual T, which is 14.9mm thick and has a the Quattro-based 02.15-L movement Unlike the Lunar One, this is an entirely new beast altogether, as it adapts a new movement and combines a perpetual calendar with a flying tourbillon, a first for Chopard. The new L.U.C Caliber 96.36-L is also a micro-rotor based movement that is COSC-certified with Geneva Seal and operates at 3.5 Hz with a 65-hour power reserve. The same visual signatures, like the sunburst guilloché patterns, are present here, albeit in a lovely forest green dial and yellow-gold case.

As I previously noted, these are some of the more expensive watches in Chopard’s L.U.C collection, with the new Lunar One watches priced at $85,800 and the Flying T Twin Perpetual priced at $184,000. Hopefully we will see this design philosophy and focus on new iterations trickle down into the more accessible pieces, possibly at this year’s Watches & Wonders. Of course, we’ll keep you updated with Chopard’s newest offerings as they are released.