For the stay at home / non traveling executive aka land lubber, the IWC Portugieser Perpetual Calendar Ref. 5034 (often referenced with the Double Moon phase) may be for you. Its a masterstroke of horology. Featuring a robust 44.2mm gold case, it houses IWC’s iconic perpetual calendar and dual-hemisphere moon phase, requiring only an adjustment via the crown and no leap year corrections until the year 2100.
Why do I say this? You can wind it back in time. Imaging you set the wrong year. You a) have to wait for time to catch up, or b) take it in for a costly service. Its been said IWC would give you a one time get out of jail free card and reset the watch to the current time. Hardly a travelers watch but one hell of a time piece to enjoy in your own time zone. Its like a mechanical version of an iPhone clock and moon app with no batteries.
If you have a legacy IWC perpetual calendar running the iconic Kurt Klaus-designed movement (the vast majority of IWC perpetuals built between 1985 and 2025), no, you cannot. These watches are strictly driven forward mechanically. Turning the hands or crown backward on these legacy watches can severely damage the intricate calendar gear train, requiring an expensive trip to an IWC service center.
The Laidfactor: IWC has dummy proofed the perpetual calendar. Its new so be prepared for stick shock – like the price of a used Lexus GX. To make the LF List, it also has to have value. Many watches are great deals on the used market and can hold their value (expect for the collectable Rolex sport stainless models that trade on the secondary market above retail), but we’ll get into that topic later).
New ProSet Models: If you have one of the newer IWC Perpetual Calendar models equipped with the ProSet movement (such as the Big Pilot Perpetual Calendar ProSet), yes, you can. These models allow you to adjust the day, date, month, year, and moon phase backward and forward using just the crown, without risking damage. Pretty cool and now you can take it traveling while you sit in your dark business class seat while landing, squinting to set the time, day, month, year, moon after an 11 hour flight.
https://www.iwc.com/us-en/watches-and-wonders/iwc-proset
https://press.iwc.com/iwc-relaunches-portugieser-perpetual-calendar-44-en
