This Datograph Perpetual is why Lange is my favorite

A. Lange & Söhne is my favorite high-horology brand, and this Datograph Perpetual is my favorite version. The black dial, the lighter subdials and that big date at the top look absolutely sick together. I love it.

Lange calls that display its outsize date. Whatever the terminology, it’s the version I keep coming back to, and this new platinum-bracelet edition is about as good as it gets for me. I’m giving it 118 out of 120 bezel clicks.

The date at the top, and a lot happening underneath

Announced on October 24, this edition has a 41 mm platinum case, a matching five-row platinum bracelet and a black dial with eleven baguette-cut diamond hour markers. It is limited to 50 watches. The case is 13.5 mm thick.

The outsize date sits at twelve, above the two lower subdials, with the moon-phase display at six. There is a lot on that dial, and I’m a huge fan of the way this particular version looks. The black and rhodié-colored combination is the one I’d want.

I’m also a really big fan of perpetual calendars, despite the fact that I would manage to make owning one inconvenient. These are expensive complications, and I don’t have a particularly useful reason to need one. I just love them.

I would absolutely forget to wind it

The hand-wound L952.1 movement combines a flyback chronograph, perpetual calendar and moon phase. Lange says the calendar will need its next scheduled one-day correction on March 1, 2100, provided the watch keeps running.

That last condition would be the problem in my house. If I had one, I’d forget to wind it, let it get off track and end up having to mess with the calendar anyway. I can appreciate the mechanism and still know exactly how I would fail to keep up with it.

There is a rapid-correction pusher at ten o’clock that advances the calendar indications and moon phase together, plus individual recessed correctors.

Those shorter pushers look right

The chronograph pushers are another detail I really like. They’re shorter and stubbier than the big round pushers you see on some chronographs, and I’m very much into that more button-like shape.

It seems to me that less protruding pushers are getting more attention lately. I like what Lange has done here. Between those pushers, the dial colors and the date at the top, this is the Datograph Perpetual I’d choose.

For the graph, we’re using a $315,000 USD research estimate dated October 25, 2026. Hodinkee reports roughly €280,000 for this edition. At the ECB’s October 23 reference rate of $1.1193 per euro, that converts to $313,404; we’ve rounded it to $315,000. This is a converted European-price benchmark, not a confirmed US retail quote. The reported European price’s tax basis is unconfirmed, and we haven’t added US sales tax, import costs or delivery. My rating stays 118 out of 120 bezel clicks.

Sources: Lange’s October 24 Datograph Perpetual announcement and Lange’s official launch post, including reference 410.136 E.

Price estimate sources: Hodinkee’s report for this reference and ECB EUR/USD reference rates.