Setting the Lang und Heyne Augustus

With the tight dependencies of the event dates and the current date, you might be afraid to let this manual wind watch run down and have to reset the time and date. But no worries, thanks to the mode selection button built into the center of the crown, winding, setting time and date, or selecting which event to display is easy and only a few crown rotations away. As this is not a perpetual calendar watch (which I know seems odd), you will need to advance the day of the month every so often–but it is very easy to do and a great excuse to interact with this timepiece.

Lang und Heyne Augustus

With a 43.8 mm gold or platinum case that is 12.5 mm tall, this watch wears a bit larger than its dimensions might indicate. This may be due to the triple strap lugs per side. Originally the triple lugs were chosen to give the strap more stability, but they have become a distinctive design element of all Lang & Heyne watches. Hands are 18 kt rose gold and blued steel over a silver dial. The cases are nicely polished and the dust and fingerprints in the hands-on photos are solely the fault of this overly eager reviewer.

Lang und Heyne Caliber VII personalization

Each customer gets to select the names and dates of their special events or people, so these are very bespoke watches. The current year display is good for the next 20 years. So after two decades of use, you have the watch serviced at Lang & Heyne and they will put in a new year disk and perhaps update your chosen events or people (which involves both the printed display disk and the cams that are specific to each event date).

So does that limit the resale market for this watch? Sort of a moot question as the current production rate is just 3 watches per year and collectors are likely to hold onto them. We were able to strap on the very first Augustus at Baselworld 2014 and Herr Lang reported that this year’s production (all 3 of them) is already sold out. They will be making deliveries of these 3 pieces before the end of the year. But you (and 2 others) can still order for a 2015 delivery. Lang & Heyne makes parts for 10 Augustus watches at a time, so while production is very limited, it will be steady and predictable based upon demand.

Their website mentions that the Augustus will be limited to 340 pieces. So at the current production rate, they will be making them for over 100 years! However Lang & Heyne is a growing brand so it may not take that long for full series production. Currently the brand creates about 50 pieces per year in total but has plans to increase overall production to 200 per year in the near future.

Price for the Lange & Heyne Augustus I watch is 128,520 Euros in 18k rose gold, 132,090 Euros in 18k white gold, and 138,040 Euros in platinum. lang-und-heyne.de