F.P. Journe Octa Automatique Lune Ref. AL Octa Rose Gold White Dial

F.P. Journe presented the Octa in 2001 as a single automatic platform intended to carry a moon phase, an annual calendar, a chronograph or a second time zone without being redesigned for each, and every Octa reference shares one case size whatever complication it carries. It was the first automatic movement with a reserve long enough to keep precision timekeeping for over five days, the effective reserve running to about 160 hours against 120 chronometric ones. Until 2004 its mainplate was rhodium-coated brass; from that year it was made in 18K rose gold, so an Octa's movement metal follows its production year rather than its reference code.

The case is rose gold, measuring 38 mm across and standing 10.6 mm deep, on a rose gold bracelet. F.P. Journe states the case size for this reference as 38 or 40 mm. The dial is whitened guilloché silver and the hands are blued steel.

The Octa Automatique Lune shows hours, minutes, a moon phase at 7 o'clock, a large date at 11, small seconds at 5 and a power reserve indication.

The moon phase is the complication that separates this reference from the Octa Automatique, which carries the same platform and the same date without it. The moon itself changed over the life of the reference: earlier watches carry a mirror-finished gold moon on a metal disc, and later ones a sapphire disc with the moon given a texture, so the disc is one of the ways an Automatique Lune is placed in time. The later redesign also enlarged the date aperture to 4.7 by 2.6 mm.

The same reference was also made with a Havana dial, a brown finish produced by plating the dial disc with gold and ruthenium, which F.P. Journe distributes through its boutique network.