In our quest to cover all bases in the Rolex Day-Date 'President' department, we're presenting to you this stunning 18238 version from 1994. Our favourite part? The dial, of course! It reminds us of the fantastic Vantablack watches from H.Moser & Cie, but this one has all the perks that go with a solid gold Rolex.
This 18238 Day-Date 'President' comes with a 36mm diameter case, the classic size for this watch. It has a thin fluted gold bezel to catch the light, along with the polished rounded centre links to the President bracelet. As you'll know, watches like this have been worn by various US Presidents over the years, so there are a plethora of Day-Dates to choose from that are arguably more historically relevant than this watch.
However, we once again come to that aftermarket black onyx dial with no markers. Who needs to know the precise time when you have a watch like this? No markers at all, not even a seconds track. The only things you have on the dial are the windows for the day and date indicators (which have applied gold surrounds), the applied gold logo and the writing you'd typically see on a Rolex watch. It's nice to see that it still reminds you that the movement within is a high-precision Superlative Chronometer despite the lack of need for precision time-keeping with this piece.
Inside this luxury piece is the calibre 3155, a brand new movement at the time with a brand new feature that would improve practicality and remain in the Day-Date to this day. The 3155 movement, introduced in 1988, featured a double quickset system. This builds on the single quickset of the calibre 3055, which was in the 18038 Day-Date. In the 18038, you could easily set the date, but the name of the day window required you to move through the dates, and God help you if they became unsynchronised.
In the calibre 3155 in the 18238, the day of the week indicator has its own quickset system set via the crown. That makes it super easy to set the day of the week if the watch is allowed to stop (and, by the way, that's only acceptable if you're wearing another Day-Date 'President'!). The calibre 3155 is also an excellent movement. It's got the legendary Rolex robustness built-in as well as an industry-standard 4Hz beat rate and a power reserve of 48-hours. The 3155 was also built-on in the form of the 3156, which came along as Rolex was in the process of updating its movements to feature their new Parachrom Blue hairspring, which was a lot less reactive to magnetism and temperature.
But, back to the 18238. The watch is currently available for sale from our website for the price of £14,500 (price correct at the time of writing). It comes with a 1-year Watches of Wales warranty and a complimentary insurance valuation certificate when you purchase from us.
Did you know that we now accept cryptocurrency as a form of payment? Simply choose 'uTrust' as your payment method of choice at the checkout and go from there; it's effortless!
