Rolex 1806 Day-Date

A checked version of this page, approved on 8 June 2026, was based on this revision.

Day-Date → 1806

The 1806 is the Florentine-finish Day-Date, the most heavily decorated of the 4-digit Presidents. Where the bark 1807 and the Morellis 1811 carry their texture on the bezel and bracelet center links, the 1806 takes the Florentine finish across the bezel, the case and the lugs, a fine hand-engraved cross-hatch of intersecting lines drawn from Italian goldwork. Most examples wear it on the rare "brick" bracelet, a flat brick-link special order that was the most expensive bracelet Rolex offered at the time. It shares the 36mm gold case, caliber 1555/1556 movement and dial catalogue with the fluted 1803; the Florentine is what sets it apart.

Core facts

detail	value
reference	1806
family	Day-Date
production	late 1960s into the 1970s (4-digit era)
movement	caliber 1555 (to c. 1965), then caliber 1556; hacking from 1972; no quickset
case	36mm 18k gold President, Florentine-finished case, bezel and lugs — yellow, white, pink/rose gold
crystal	acrylic
bezel	Florentine finish
bracelet	usually the Florentine "brick" flat-link (special order); President also documented
dial	the 4-digit Day-Date catalogue, shared with the 1803 (including Stella examples)
crown	Twinlock screw-down
sibling references	1803 (fluted), 1804 (gem-set), 1807 (bark), 1811 (Morellis)
predecessor	originals-era 6610 / 6611 / 6612 cluster
successor	5-digit 18xxx era

Where it sits in the line

The 1806 is the Florentine member of the decorated 4-digit group, alongside the bark 1807 and the Morellis 1811. All three replace the 1803's fluting with a worked gold surface, but the 1806 goes furthest: the Florentine cross-hatch covers not just the bezel but the case and lugs, and on the brick-bracelet examples the bracelet too. The finish is a fine geometric hand-engraving, an Italian goldsmithing technique of thin intersecting lines, distinct from the coarse vertical bark of the 1807 and the watered moiré of the 1811.

Everything else is 1803. The 36mm gold case, the caliber 1555/1556 movement, the quickset-free day-and-date mechanism and the dial catalogue all carry over, and the 1803 entry holds the full account. Earlier BezelBase entries described the 1806 as a bark-bezel reference; that was an error. The bark belongs to the 1807, and the 1806 is Florentine.

Production outline

The Florentine 1806 ran through the late 1960s and 1970s alongside the plain 1803, in small numbers. No Rolex production figure has surfaced. Like the other decorated references it sold slowly when new, and the hand-finishing plus the optional brick bracelet pushed it to the top of the gold-Day-Date price list, which kept volumes low. Documented examples cluster in the mid- to late 1960s on the caliber 1555 and run into the 1970s on the caliber 1556.

Movement notes

The 1806 uses the standard 4-digit Day-Date movement: caliber 1555 from the start, replaced by caliber 1556 around 1965 with the 19,800 vph rate and the free-sprung Microstella balance. Hacking arrived across the 1500 family in 1972, and no 4-digit Day-Date has quickset. The Reference:Movements page holds the caliber lineage; the 1803 entry covers the 1555-to-1556 transition.

Dial map

The 1806 took the standard 4-digit Day-Date dials and, as a catalogue sibling of the 1803, the same special dials. Green Stella lacquer over Florentine gold is among the documented combinations. The dial does not define the reference; the Florentine finish does. The 1803 entry carries the dial-variant taxonomy for the group.

Case, bezel, crystal, and crown

The Florentine cross-hatch and the flat brick-link bracelet up close. Photo: Bulang & Sons

The case is the 36mm gold Oyster shared across the 4-digit Day-Date, with a Twinlock screw-down crown, screw-down caseback and acrylic crystal, but the gold itself is worked. The Florentine finish covers the bezel, the case flanks and the lugs in a fine cross-hatch of intersecting engraved lines, the most extensive surface decoration of any 4-digit Day-Date. It came in yellow, white and pink gold.

Bracelets, end links, and clasps

The characteristic 1806 bracelet is the "brick," a flat brick-link bracelet finished to match the Florentine case. It was a special-order option, the most expensive bracelet Rolex listed at the time, and it is rare. A Florentine 1806 on its original brick bracelet is the complete expression of the reference. Some 1806s also turn up on the President. As ever, a clasp date code dates the bracelet rather than the head, and the Reference:Bracelets page holds the cross-family detail.

Special branches

The decorated 4-digit references

The 1806 is the Florentine member of the trio that decorated the 4-digit Day-Date: the Florentine 1806, the bark 1807, and the Morellis 1811. The 1806 is the most thoroughly finished of the three, carrying its texture across the case and lugs rather than the bezel alone, and the brick bracelet makes a full-Florentine example the rarest configuration. Because the textures are easy to confuse, attribution rests on matching the finish to the engraved reference number between the lugs rather than on a listing's label.

Auction record

The Florentine 1806 reaches the major houses occasionally; Antiquorum has catalogued a yellow-gold example with Florentine lugs and a brick bracelet. Most trade through specialist dealers, where the full-Florentine, brick-bracelet examples command the strongest prices and the green-Stella-on-Florentine combinations sit at the top. As with the bark 1807, an original Florentine brick bracelet is the value driver, since service replacements to plain President links are common and break the set.