The L.U.C. Regulator by Chopard, presented at Baselworld 2015, is a new version of an existing model, with a new case. The Regulator is a traditional pattern, based on clocks in watchmaking workshops, with just a very large minute hand (there are three such clocks in Chopard’s L.U.CEUM Museum in Fleurier). The watchmaker would use it to regulate the watch he was working on. Shrinking the pattern down to a watch is a tribute to traditional watchmaking, anc in this model, Chopard does it a little differently with respect to other brands by placing the hours on a subdial at 3 o’clock instead of the usual 12 o’clock. Their reasoning is that in this position, the hour subdial peeks out from under the cuff for easy legibility at all times. It’s a legitimate design factor, but you can only get an approximate idea of the time from the hour subdial, and you can only see the minutes hand when it is pointing right (unless you pull your sleeve up enough to see the watch).
It is slim enough to be a dress watch, at 9.78 mm thickness and 43 mm diameter. The case is in rose gold, with 50 metres water resistance; the sapphire caseback reveals the movement.
The other subdials are for power reserve at 12 o’clock, continuous seconds at 6 o’clock, and a GMT subdial at 9 o’clock. This is adjusted by a pusher on the caseband at the 40-minute mark. There is a date window between 4 and 5 o’clock.
The hand-wound L.U.C 98.02-L movement has COSC chronometer certification, while case and movement are stamped with the Poinçon de Genève quality mark. The L.U.C. Regulator has the same four-barrel technology as the Quattro, providing 216 hours power reserve (9 days).
The watch has a brown alligator strap with rose gold pin buckle.
Reference and price
The Chopard L.U.C Regulator is reference 161971-5001, price 29,800 Swiss francs / £21,640 / €27,960
