Horological maestro Denis Flageollet teamed up with collector extraordinaire David Zanetta in 2002 to create the independent watchmaking tour-de-force that is De Bethune, striving to implement avant-garde designs rooted in traditional watchmaking principals. In the two decades since they began to make watches together, they have developed over thirty in-house movements and a cavalcade of technical innovations.

First introduced to the market in 2003, the De Bethune DB15 Perpetual Calendar is a highly legible, clean, delicate, and elegant perpetual calendar display combining De Bethune’s signature design cues for the dial and technically evolved movement elements. It was the first of De Bethune’s calibres with the now-ubiquitous spherical moonphase indicator. Considered a “transitional” model, the DB15RT featured a completely novel and re-worked movement, the caliber DB2004, a dial evocative of the contemporary offerings of the brand, but all in the smaller case size and early ogival lugs.

The importance of such a pivotal watch in the evolution of De Bethune as one of the foremost producers of high-end independent watches cannot be understated. In unworn, "new old stock" condition, and with a special “007” serial number and still fitted with its original factory caseback sticker, the DB15RT offered here comes with its original certificate of authenticity and presentation accessories.