The Watch Collectors' Club runs regular events where we teach members a little about watches, watchmakers, watch

A club for everyone who likes watches.

There are many millions of watches out there that do only one thing. Tell the time. They have no date, no fancy features, they just tell the time. Their job is to do that reliably, accurately and safely. We call these time only watches.

Achieving this took a surprisingly large amount of innovation in the watch industry during the move from pocket watches to wristwatches in the early decades of the 20th century. It was not simply about making everything smaller; putting a mechanical device on the wrist exposed it to far more movement, dust, and water risk than when the watch was kept in a pocket. This meant that technology had to improve at a rapid pace and it hasn't stopped since. Accuracy and reliability in watchmaking remain the goal whether the watch costs $10 or $1 Million.

It is possible today to buy a reliable digital watch for only $10, and a reliable mechanical watch for around $40. You can also pay millions of dollars for a handmade watch that also only tells the time. Two of the most popular watches in the world, the Rolex Oyster Perpetual and the Patek Philippe Calatrava only tell the time and have long waiting lists. So how do high-end watchmakers sell their time-only watches for thousands of pounds, and why are some of them so famous?

Why are some time only watches so expensive?

The story of making watches more reliable and accurate is ongoing. Some big watch companies design and make their own mechanisms, so-called in-house movements, aiming to bring out new and improved mechanisms every decade or so. Some do it with great fanfare, such as Rolex, others do it more quietly, but the quest to make watches better continues. These brands see technological development as a core part of their offer to customers.

Continued innovation in high-end watchmaking leads to higher accuracy and reliability, and most notably in recent years, a much longer service interval. Watch companies used to recommend a mechanical watch be serviced every 2 or 3 years, but now regularly offer 5 or 7 years guarantees on a movement and expect no service need until then. This is a massive benefit to the wearer and has come about thanks to huge amounts of research and development. These improvements cost money.

The watch world is still dominated by brands made in Switzerland and Japan. Both of these companies have a very high cost of living, and thus the employees of watch manufacturers and their suppliers based in these companies are very well paid by global standards. Similarly, the costs to manufacture are much higher than in other parts of the world. For customers who want their watch to be Swiss or Japanese-made, they have to pay these higher costs.

Finally, some watch companies hand adjust and hand finish their movements. This is incredibly labour intensive, and this labour is expensive, wherever it is done. The more hand-crafted a watch is, the more expensive it will be. 

Why are some mechanical watches so cheap?

There is a very simple answer to this: Asian Manufacturing. The excellent progress of simplifying movement design made by the Japanese over the course of the 20th century was then added to the sheer scale and quality of Chinese high-volume manufacturing. Citizen Watch Group make many of their low-end movements in China, and Seiko make many of theirs in Malaysia, but using Chinese-made parts. 

This enables simple movements, including time only movements, to be made at very very low cost as they make tens of millions of them. The same is true of quartz and digital watches.

However, these movements are not particularly accurate, and can often break. They are accurate to around 45 seconds variance per day, which over a week can lead your watch to be 5 or more minutes out. When they do break it is often not worth the cost of a service to fix them, they are usually replaced entirely by the watchmaker.

The good news is that the availability of these movements, plus ones made by Chinese manufacturers, has enabled the creation of a huge number of new Microbrands, allowing enthusiasts and entrepreneurs to start their own watch brands for very small amounts of money. We wrote a whole series of articles on Microbrands last year, and we love seeing what new ideas people dream up. Low cost movements allow this, without taking anything away from the higher-priced movements sold by other watch brands.

In 1927 Rolex introduced the first wristwatch to be a proper "hit". The Rolex Oyster was the first waterproof watch to hit the big time, with the Rolex brand and watch name marketed widely, something still unusual for watches at the time. They even put the watch in fish tanks in jewellery store windows to prove its claims! In 1932 Rolex added the Perpetual automatic, or self-winding movement, and this watch was even more successful. The watch has been so successful they still sell it today, 95 years later. The current version is powered by the Rolex Reference 3230 movement, which is the culmination of a century of improvements, with the latest version having no fewer than 91% new parts compared to the previous one when it was introduced this year.

The Patek Philippe Calatrava is the simplest watch in the Patek range, and for a firm most famous for complicated timepieces with many functions, it is still a very popular watch. Its simple design was influenced by the German Bauhaus design movement in the early 20th century. In 1952 it was given a revolutionary new automatic movement, and it has featured one ever since. The relaunch of the watch in the 1980s saw it given the name Calatrava, which it has retained ever since. Remarkably, this name is now so iconic that some people are referring to time-only watches from other brands as "Calatravas", despite it being a Patek Philippe brand name.

There are many more iconic time-only watches from the great Swiss and Japanese brands, such as the Jaeger LeCoultre Reverso, and the Credor range made by Grand Seiko. They are often priced as true luxury watches, even if they don't have the most complex functions or movements, they are well regarded by collectors and very reliable for their owners.

The fact that time-only watches are the most numerous available means there are many very reasonably priced vintage watches available. This is often a great place to start if you like a watch brand but cannot afford its current range. You can buy incredibly high-quality watches for relatively little money, so long as you are very careful. See our guide to buying vintage watches for more details about how to get started.

There are so many watches in the world with interesting functions, fancy complications and crazy designs that it is easy to overlook the fantastic range of time-only watches on the market, from the youngest Microbrand to the most prestigious high-end Independent watchmaker. They are also the most accessible way to buy the big brands, whatever the price point. We at The Watch Collectors' Club don't have a favourite time-only watch but we see many in our members' collections. We hope you will join us to explore this part of the watch world. Please follow us on social media and make sure you are on our mailing list so you don't miss out on any of our events.

Why are some time-olny watches so expensive?

Exploring Time-only Watches

We explore the range of watches that simply tell the time.

Why are some time-only watches so expensive?

We're already half way through 2022 and it's been a great year so far building momentum for The Watch Collectors' Club! We've held 12 Events, with more planned this Sunday (details here) and in July. Last Tuesday we had our general Meetup in London, and it was a fantastic success, with a great mix of watches and people from different backgrounds. When watch lovers come together it's really easy to have a good time, and we keep proving it! 

It's the biggest brand in the world and there are a lot of them, but it's always lovely to see some Rolexes. No fewer than 8 were brought along on Tuesday! There were both new and vintage models, and it was especially nice to see the two Explorer models side by side. There are definitely two of the more subtle watches in the Rolex range. With their distinctive dials and tough construction, they are great daily wearers.

On the vintage side, there were some fascinating Elgin Drivers watches, which have hinged lugs to allow you to wear it on the side of the wrist while your hands remain on the wheel. I'd never seen or heard of these before, and they are a great example of the idea that you'll almost always learn something new at a meetup. It's one of the most fun things about them.

Finally, we had a nice range of High Quality Swiss and Japanese timepieces, some rarer than others, but all remarkable to see in person! Let's hope future meetups are as blessed. If you have something you're proud of and would like to share, please do come along.

Our audience and following continue to grow, and we will hold at least one online and in-person event every month from now on. If you have any event ideas you'd like to see us create, please let us know. In the meantime keep an eye out for our event promotion on our events page. 

We are building our educational resources and hope to launch our Club Membership towards the end of the year. If there's anything you think we should cover then do let us know! What do you most want to learn about? 

We are currently hiring interns, so if you want to intern with us or know anyone who likes watches and might jump at the chance to intern for a startup (paid, of course!), please send them our way.

As part of our ongoing development, we have changed our website domain and will change our email address after this week. So please update your safe senders, as all future Blog Posts and event communications will come from: join@thewatchcollectorsclub.com

Thanks for following us and please do give us any feedback about what you'd like to see us cover, any event ideas you have, and if you like what we're doing, tell anyone else you know who likes watches. The bigger this community, the more events we can run, and the more fun we will have.

June Meetup HIghlights and Watch Collectors Club Plans for the summer

A selection of fantastic watches from our Meetup earlier this week.

The Omega Speedmaster is one of the most famous watches in the world. Since its launch in 1957, there have been many changes, improvements, case shapes, and limited editions, and the watch that was the first to land on the moon is rightly famous and popular. The one that preceded the Moonwatch is also huge in terms of popularity and importance; this watch is referred to as the "Ed White". A simple classic design, and a famous movement, or mechanism, the Calibre 321, led to great popularity among collectors. This Blog Post will explain what is so special about it and why you might want one.

The fact that the Omega Speedmaster qualified to become the official watch issued to astronauts at NASA, the US Space Agency, is well known. The toughness of the tests it had to pass is not.

They were crazily difficult and the competing watches from Rolex and Longines-Wittnauer failed at least one of them. The tests included high temperatures of 93 Degrees Celsius (200 Fahrenheit), a temperature fluctuation in a pure vacuum test to mimic space, and very aggressive acceleration, decompression and vibration tests. That any watch survived them is remarkable, but the Speedmaster came through them ticking. This model, the Reference 105.003, entered the history books and is now known as the "Ed White".

How did an Omega Speedmaster become the Moonwatch?

On March 1st 1965, the watch became the official Flight Qualified watch for all Manned Space Missions and therefore NASA ordered watches directly from Omega to give to astronauts during training for their missions. Previously, astronauts had supplied their own watches.

Ed White was an early member of the NASA Astronaut program in the 1960s.  He is remembered for being the first American to "walk" in space. This means he undertook activities outside the small spacecraft in which he was orbiting the Earth. Most excitingly of all, he used a small gas-powered gun to move through space away from the vehicle, and he timed this movement using an Omega Speedmaster strapped to the outside of his spacesuit. In fact, he wore two Speedmasters on that trip, a journey known as the Gemini IV mission. 

As the first mission after the Speedmaster had passed the NASA tests and become the official watch for astronauts (which it remains to this day), it was very successful and proved that Omega had chosen correctly. The Spacewalk was 23 minutes long and proved the equipment was good enough to survive the tough environment of space. This test directly led to the momentum for the Moon landings four years later.

A tragedy cemented Ed White's legacy as a pioneering astronaut. While conducting a test for the Apollo 1 launch an accident on the launch pad saw the crew cabin containing three astronauts burst into flames. All the men died quickly, and the Speedmaster Ed White was wearing then was destroyed. His son inherited the other, and today it survives in a watch collection in Japan. The Speedmaster worn by the other astronaut on the Gemini IV mission, James McDivitt, is now held in the collection of the Smithsonian Museum in Washington D.C.

The original Ed White is called the Speedmaster Reference 105.003 and is one of the most collectable Omega watches. There are plenty of them available as they were made in great numbers to celebrate the certification by NASA. There are many good and bad examples, so it is important to be careful if looking to buy a vintage watch. The most useful reference website for all Speedmasters of this period is the Speedmaster 101 website.  

In 2019, to celebrate the 60th anniversary of the Moon landing, Omega recreated the famous Calibre 321 movement by exactly copying one from an Ed White belonging to another astronaut, Gene Cernan. He flew with this watch on the final Apollo mission, Apollo 17 in  1971. The following year they released a brand new version of the Ed White model, which is an exact copy but made to modern standards. You get the 321 Calibre but made of modern materials, such as the Sedna gold coated base plates. It has modern lubricants and also the case is now 50m waterproof with a Sapphire case back. This has proven an exceptionally popular offering from Omega and is a great premium Speedmaster for those looking for something new.

The Watch Collectors' Club believes exploring the history of Speedmaster watches is worthwhile precisely because there are so many of them, and their involvement with NASA's various space programs means there are many fascinating stories. Understanding the differences in the details can be a lot of fun. The Ed White remains one of the most popular amongst collectors, and we hope we've explained why that is. For more content like this to help you learn more about the watch world, join our monthly watch events and make sure you follow us on Social Media.

What is the Ed White watch? What's the Speedy Ed White? Who was Ed White?

The story of the Speedmaster "Ed White"

Exploring the origins of this classy vintage and modern Speedmaster

We are delighted to announce our next virtual event, and we are starting by keeping it simple. It's on Sunday 24th July, at 7:30pm BST

You bring the watches, we will host the discussion. Here’s how it will work:

    The Watch Collectors’ Club exists to bring people together to explore, learn and share the world of watches.

    1.) Send us a pic or pics of a Watch from one of the largest watch groups. It can be any brand as in the photo.

    4.) Each person will get two minutes to introduce the watch, what it means to them, and what they like about it

    5.) If people want to discuss it, we discuss it

    6.) We all learn a little, and see some great watches.

That’s it. A stress-free way to learn what’s out there, and hear why people wear what they wear. If you don’t want to participate, that’s fine, you can just listen in. It’s a showcase and a get together. We will be kind, considerate, and interested. We ask you be the same.

Join us on Zoom for a wider reaning chat about watches.

join us online for a wide ranging chat about watches

WCC July Virtual Showcase 2022

Our next General Meetup will be on July 12th from 6:30pm in Central London, and we will release the details early in the week of the event. It will be a relaxed evening in a private space where you can come and share your passion for watches with like-minded people. We will give two short talks to help you learn more about this fascinating space, and there will be refreshments available.

Everyone is welcome, whether you have been collecting for years or are just getting started. We are creating a place to share knowledge and help each other out, and you don't even need to own a watch.

We assure you that the venue will be COVID-compliant, and there will be plenty of sanitiser available.  Please register using the link and if you have any friends how might like to come, also ask them to register in advance.

Join us to share your watch stories and explore the watch world.

watch meetup in central London July 2022 for watch collectors

WCC July in-person Meetup

Join us on Sunday June 19th at 7:30PM UK Time, for an engaging and interactive exploration of Patek Philippe. You'll hear about the 4 men who have made it the company is today, 4 of the most important watches from the last 100 years, and learn about the 4 little numbers that denote a Patek Philippe reference, and hence the name collectors use to talk about them. We promise a short, exciting, and of course interactive experience, where you'll learn a lot more about one of the world's most famous watch companies. It's free, and it's on Zoom, and everyone is welcome. Please register using the link below.

Join us for a short introduction to what makes Patek Philippe so special.

Live introduction to Patek Philippe and what makes it special

Virtual Patek Philippe Talk

June Virtual Meetup - Patek Philippe Talk

History

Willy Breitling inherited his family company at the age of 19 and pioneered many legendary innovations including one of the most iconic watches of all time. From 1884 until 1979 Breitling was led by 3 generations of the Breitling family. Each achieved startling success and changed the watch world. Today we will look at the fantastic watches Willy Breitling brought to market.

Breitling was founded in 1884 as a manufacturer of timing instruments for industrial and leisure use. They went on to create pocket watches and then wrist watches beginning in the early 20th century.

In 1927 the early death of Gaston Breitling left the company leaderless. His son Willy Breitling was only 14 at the time, but at the age of 19 took over as Managing Director in 1932. He was responsible for introducing what became one of the most common watch formats of the 20th century - the two-pusher chronograph. This watch has a pusher, or button, at the 2 o'clock position and another one at the 4 o'clock position, so on either side of the crown. In some rare examples they can be on the other side of the case from the crown. The top one starts and stops the stopwatch function, and the bottom one resets it to zero.

This required a completely new movement or mechanism design inside the watch case. It was an immediate success. It allowed for much easier, quicker use of the stopwatch function. It also allowed for further innovations such as the flyback chronograph, and the Rattrapante, or split-seconds chronograph, which you can learn more about in our Introduction to Chronographs blog post.

At this time Breitling was still an important supplier of timing instruments to industrial customers, and from the First World War onwards built its market for timing instruments used in aeroplane cockpits. In 1938 the HUIT aviation department was established, so-called because the cockpit instruments had an 8-day power reserve, meaning they only needed winding once a week. They were also robust and very easy to read, which is important for safe use by pilots while in the air.

As the Second World War looked more likely, Breitling signed a big contract to supply the UK Royal Air Force with cockpit instruments and this led to the company supplying the Allied Forces throughout World War II, often overcoming great difficulty to do so. 

Despite World War II raging across Europe, Breitling did not ignore their wristwatches. Their continued focus on useful timing instruments or tool watches led to the development of a watch called the Chronomat. 

Today, the main additional function of this watch seems odd; it is called a Slide Rule, and is a calculator dating from before the invention of electronic or digital versions. Using two logarithmic scales carefully calculated by Breitling, the watch can be used to multiply or divide large numbers. This seems extremely niche, but imagine if a pilot has an emergency while in the air and needs to calculate distances, fuel levels or navigation bearings quickly. A few turns of the bezel will allow them to make these calculations while still in charge of the plane. The watch also contains the two-pusher chronograph mechanism to allow for distance timing while in flight. The Chronomat was launched in 1943 and was fairly popular.

What came next became one of the most famous watches in the world. The Breitling Navitimer was launched in 1952 in conjunction with the Aircraft Owners and Pilots Association in America.  This was a bigger version of the Chronomat, with a larger scale allowing for large calculations, as well as the chronograph function. The manual and operating guide from the first series is great, and it really is a fascinatingly complex tool.  At first, the watch was only available to members of this organisation, but Breitling swiftly made it available for general sale. It has been on sale almost continuously since then, with a recently expanded and updated range launched just this year. 

It is a true classic; a large, interesting looking watch with a very useful function and a long association with pilots and fashionable celebrities. Their most famous early wearer couldn't have been further from the aviation world: Miles Davis, the jazz trumpeter.

Willy Breitling introduces fashionable Chronographs

Willy Breitling managed the transition from being a mostly tool watch focused company to adding more fashionable watches. Chronographs in the Premier line in the 1940s were sleek, with some interesting functions. These are also echoed in today's range. In the 1960s, the company introduced the SuperOcean dive watch and the Top Time chronograph line, both of which show super cool 60s-styling, and were very popular on launch.

Breitling was instrumental in joining together with Dubois Dépraz, Heuer-Leonidas and Hamilton Büren to create the first automatic chronograph movement at the end of the 1960s. While Zenith pipped them to the post in terms of being first to market, this collaboration was a great success, leading to the varied and interesting Chronomatic line of watches for Breitling in the 1970s.

Unfortunately, the 1970s were very tough for the swiss watch industry as the adoption of quartz watches and the high value of the Swiss Franc led to the collapse of mechanical watch sales. The company struggled and Willy Breitling wound it down. In 1979 he ended his involvement with the company by selling the trademarks to another family, led by Ernest Schneider. Schneider later relaunched the brand with a fantastic new version of the Chronomat with a mechanical movement, while integrating high-quality quartz movements into the rest of the range.

Willy Breitling led the company through its most important and successful period and left a legacy of fantastic timepieces for watch lovers to explore. The current owners are reissuing and updating many of the famous models, and it is a great opportunity to learn more about their past. 

We at The Watch Collectors' Club love to explore how the history of a brand influences the current range, and think Breitling is doing an excellent job of it right now. We hope that you enjoy this too, and our events and content are designed to help connect the dots across time for these historic brands. If you know anyone else who might enjoy the watch world with us, please let them know about us and tell them to follow us on social media.

Breitling innovations, and the story of who created the Navitimer

Willy Breitling and Inventing the Modern Chronograph

The innovative leadership of Willy Breitling

Chronographs are probably the most common complication, or additional function, found on modern wristwatches. Almost every watch brand will make a few different chronographs. 

If you want to see some of the wide range of chronographs available from the big luxury brands, then make sure to sign up to our latest event, which is taking place at Watches of Switzerland in London on April 12th. You can sign up here.

A chronograph is a watch with a stop-watch function. It can be used to measure how much time has elapsed. It is usually started and stopped by pressing a button near the 2 o’clock position on a watch. You then reset the chronograph by pressing a button at the 4 o’clock position. If you want to learn more about how they work, here’s a quick blog post. 

The first chronograph pocket watch was designed by Louis Moinet in 1815. Its purpose was to serve as a pocket stopwatch for astronomers. It is remarkable in a few ways; firstly, it was largely unknown until 2012; secondly, it operated at a ridiculously high frequency (216,000 vibrations a minute), which is approximately 8 times faster than a modern chronograph. This meant that it was a fantastically accurate recorder of time and could record time to 1/60th of a second. A remarkable achievement. 

However, until the 2012 auction of Louis Moinet’s pocket stopwatch, the honour of “world’s first chronograph” bestowed upon a French watchmaker called Nicolas Mathieu Rieussec. He had created and named a device called a “chronograph” in 1821 to accurate time horse races. The chronograph was housed in a wooden box and allowed the user to accurately time multiple horses. The chronograph had two dials to facilitate the timing of multiple horses. 

What Was The First Chronograph Wristwatch? 

By the early 20th Century, pocket watches were being replaced by the more convenient wristwatch. As demand for wristwatches grew, particularly driven by military and professional users, so did the demand for chronograph wristwatches. 

The first wristwatch with a chronograph was released by Longines in 1913. It was the 13.33z, and was what is called a “monopusher” chronograph. This just means that a single button is used to start, stop and reset the chronograph, as well as set the time of the watch, and wind it. Breitling were hot on the heels of Longines, and released their own chronograph wristwatch in 1915. The Breitling chronograph was the first to have a separate button for operating the chronograph function. 

What Was The First Automatic Chronograph Wristwatch? 

Over the next five decades, many watch makers released their own versions of the chronograph wristwatch. Anywhere that it was important to accurately keep time, a chronograph could, and often was, used. Chronographs continued to be used in aviation and the military, but the 1960’s saw the start of the connection between chronographs and motor racing. This was spurred by Heuer. The brand had been putting tachymeters, a tool used in conjunction with a stop-watch to calculate speed, on racing car and aircraft dashboards during the 1960’s. In 1967, Heuer released a wristwatch with a tachymeter and a chronograph, called the Autavia, which became very popular. You can read more about Heuer, the tachymeter, and racing here.

The first watch to feature a chronograph and an automatic, self-winding, movement, was the Zenith El Primero. Before then, all chronograph wristwatches were hand-wound. The Zenith El Primero has a fascinating story, which we’ve written about here. The watch was almost lost to the quartz crisis, but an engineer hid the tools in an attic of the factory, where they were found decades later, and used to revive the model, and the watch brand itself. 

A few months after the release of the prototype of the Zenith El Primero, a collaborative group of watchmakers, which included Breitling, Hamilton and Heuer, released their own automatic chronograph, called the “Project 99”. These brands had pooled expertise and resources to design an automatic chronograph movement that all of the contributing brands could use. At roughly the same time, the Japanese brand Seiko also released an automatic chronograph, called the 6139. 

The past hundred years have seen a constant stream of new chronographs released; however, some of the older models quickly established as classics have remained so, and are some of the most coveted watches today. The Rolex Daytona, the Omega Speedmaster, the Breitling Top Time and the Tag Heuer Monaco, are all old designs that have not only stood the test of time, but are thriving in the modern watch market. 

How do brands, which need to release new models every few years, compete in a market-place that seems to know what it wants? They tend to try to make small innovations. Either in the materials used, the accuracy of the movement, and sometimes even the way that the counting of time is displayed. My favourite example of this is a watch that was released this week. The new Patek Philippe 5470p typifies the modern chronograph, albeit in a very expensive and exclusive way. Hodinkee have written a very detailed article explaining how it works, which you can read here. 

Compare Chronographs With The Watch Collectors Club

If you want to try on and compare chronographs, come and join our event on Tuesady 12th April. We are hosting it in a Watches Of Switzerland Boutique in London. We are focusing on watches made by Breitling and Tudor, two brands with a long history of making excellent chronographs. Make sure to sign up here.

As we grow our community, we need help from our members to find like-minded watch collectors. Please send this blog on to anyone you know who likes watches. 

From the 1800's to the modern day

The Rolex Explorer is a very famous watch and a key part of the Rolex lineup. It is a watch that's changed little over the last 70 years and remains a simple and popular option for many. The most famous story connected to it is highly controversial. Today's Blog Post will introduce and explore the watch and the controversy.

In the 1940s and 1950s Rolex were busy creating watches that were ever more practical and useful for their customers. Having established a reputation for quality and seen great success with the waterproof Rolex Oyster and Oyster Perpetual in the 1930s, Rolex needed to move on. They introduced the Submariner, a dive watch, and the famous Day-Date calendar watch, but also wanted to update the Oyster Perpetual to be more robust and hard-wearing.


Many watch companies at the time were also focussing on this, including the largest British watchmaker of the time, Smiths. Both Rolex and Smiths sent their watches with mountaineering teams so they could test them in the most extreme environments. They wanted to prove these watches stood up to long days of vigorous activity and huge temperature ranges.
 The British Everest Expedition of 1953 was sponsored by Smiths, so 15 watches were sent along. Rolex gifted 10 pieces to the British members of the Expedition. The stage was set for one of them to be worn to the summit for the first time.

Which watch was first to the Top of Everest?

Edmund Hillary and Tenzing Norgay were the first climbers to succeed in summiting Mount Everest on May 29th 1953. However, in 1924 an expedition was run by the British climbers George Mallory, with their final climb starting on June 8th. Sadly, they never returned from the attempt. In 1999 Mallory's body was recovered, including the watch in his pocket. This was a watch in a Borgel case with a Fountainmelon movement and would have been very expensive at that time. Since it is not known if Mallory achieved the summit before he fell to his death, we cannot say for sure that this watch reached the summit.


 So what happened with the Rolex and the Smiths?


 Well, here the story gets interesting. Rolex have always been famous for their marketing and this story is one of the most interesting marketing coups of the 20th century. Rolex's advertising agency, J Walter Thompson paid a reporter from The Times newspaper in London to message them in code announcing the expedition's success. As a result, Rolex ran an advertisement on page 3 of The Times on June 2nd, claiming that their watch was first to the top of the mountain. The news story exclaiming the achievement wasn't even until Page 7 of the Paper.


 Smiths didn't get their advertisement published until three days later on June 5th. Rolex was also clever in two other ways. They hosted a party for the whole Expedition in Bombay as they were travelling back to England. At the party, they gave out more gold Rolexes, and by the time the party arrived back in London Edmund Hillary, Tenzing Norgay and expedition leader Colonel Hunt were all official Rolex ambassadors. Unsurprisingly they did not discuss Smiths watches much from then on.

Was a Rolex the first watch to the top of Everest?

Unfortunately, the answer is probably no. Many Rolex fans have undertaken a detailed photographic study of the pictures from the expedition and they believe that neither Hillary nor Norgay were wearing one when climbing the mountain, not least because Norgay is clearly wearing a steel watch in all the pics, and the Rolex he owned at the time was gold.


The best evidence however comes from the Managing Director of Rolex UK at the time. In September 1953, the Managing Director of Smiths was clearly annoyed at the success Rolex had with their claim to be first and their subsequent marketing of the newly launched Explorer model. He wrote to the leading watch magazine of the day, the monthly magazine of the British Horological Institute (which still exists and you can find them here).


Here is what he said, and I've highlighted the relevant part:

Now this could just be another marketing claim if it Rolex hadn't replied, in the October issue, with this clear admission:

For anyone familiar with the norms of the day, this was a genuine attempt by two leading figures of the industry to set the record straight and avoid being called liars. That is why the Rolex Director wrote in when he didn't have to. If you examine any Rolex ads since that first one, not a single one claims that their watch was on the summit first, they simply state (a lot) that Rolexes are often on Everest, worn by the bravest climbers.


They have never reduced their association with climbers and still sponsor mountaineers as influencers today. They remain proud of the Explorer watch, and it is branded as a tough go-anywhere timepiece.  However, it is fairly clear that it was not the first to the summit.


The Smiths watch was a Smiths Deluxe, or A409 and Hillary gave it to the Worshipful Company of Clockmakers in the City of London. It resides on display in the Science Museum in London.

One of the reasons Rolex is so large and famous today is precisely because they were willing to create interesting marketing stunts over the course of the 20th century. Their continued efforts to associate themselves with adventure, feats of bravery, and interesting people have maintained a level of quality associated with their watches. Rolex customers associate the brand with success and its stories like this that made it this way. Fortunately for their customers, they make great watches.

Rolex launched the watch formally known as the Explorer in Summer 1953. The first reference number was the 6350, which remained very simple and added the no famous 3, 6 and 9 indices on the dial to make it easy to read. They also made the black dial option standard for the same reasons. 

In 1956 the 6610 was introduced with the Mercedes style hands and again the bold numbers in luminous paint. The introduction of the 1016 in 1963 was another upgrade and was important as it stayed in production for over 25 years, making it possible the single-longest Rolex reference in production. In 1989 it was replaced by the 14270, which shows the indices and numbers lined in white gold. It is still pretty much the same today.

This model has not changed much and has been on sale for nearly 70 years. This shows the incredible staying power of Rolex. They make watches people want, improve them consistently, and deliver reliable designs. Coupled with the interesting marketing tactics and strong brand image, it keeps the company and their watches at the top of the industry today.

We at The Watch Collectors' Club want to help everyone explore the world of watches. We want to bring you the interesting stories that are behind the watches we see on the market, and we want to help you share your watch stories. Our regular meetups are the perfect place to come and learn more about watches like the Explorer and tell us which watches you like and would love to know more about. At our next one, we will be exploring and comparing the brands  Tudor and Breitling and it's taking place on April 12th in Central London. You can find all the details here.


 If you know of anyone who might like this story, please forward it on and let them know where to find us. We are on Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn and Twitter, and our mailing list is the first place to find out about all our events. Join us at the next one!

Was a Rolex the first to the top of Mount Everest? Which watch was first to the top of Mount Everest?

The Rolex Explorer Everst Controversy

Rolex Myth-making and the birth of the Rolex Explorer

The Patek Philippe Nautilus is probably the most surprisingly successful watch in the whole of the watch world. It wasn’t a success for years after its launch, but the current status of this watch is extraordinary. It is, without doubt, the single hardest-to-get watch at retail value in the whole world. People are regularly paying 3x the retail price for this watch in the second-hand market, for brand new examples. The Retail price is around $40,000. 

Last Saturday a version with a specific dial made for Tiffany & Co. was sold for charity and the hammer price was a mighty $5.35 million dollars. For one watch, made of steel. This thing is a big deal, and this is its story.

The origin of the Patek Philippe Nautilus

The Nautilus has a surprising origin story. The most famous watch designer of all time, Gerald Genta, was having lunch in a restaurant and noticed some senior members of Patek Philippe sitting across the room. He had been musing about making a watch based on a porthole, and was on a roll of designing radical chunky watches in steel. He had recently launched the Royal Oak watch for the company Audemars Piguet, which shocked the watch world and was a totally new departure for the company.

He went to Patek Philippe President Henri Stern to present his design, and lay out his vision that Patek could benefit from having a new expensive steel sports watch in their line-up. This is the sketch that he presented:

Henri Stern was a keen sailor and regularly competed in races on Lake Geneva. He recognised that a waterproof sporty model was something Patek had never offered. Unlike the rest of the industry, they had no heritage in racing or diving watches to draw from. This would be something completely new.

This model is known as the Reference 3700 and was available in steel first and then later in gold. The shape is of a smoothed octagon, and on each side there are two “ears” which represent the hinge of a ship’s porthole. You can see them represented in the sketch above. In the 1970s it was not common or easy to make experimental cases in stainless steel, and it took Patek Philippe two full years to get this case right. It opens forwards, not backwards, and to service the module you take it out from the front. This is known in the industry as a monobloc case and is quite different to the vast majority of watches, and indeed every other Patek Philippe watch.

This photo, courtesy of Monochrome watches also shows the porthole hinge of the case on the first model. The bracelet was also radical. This was the first bracelet to make H shaped pieces that are attached to the middle rounded pieces. Each bracelet has roughly 150 pieces, and all of them are polished by hand. This is still true for the bracelets sold today.

This was a massive watch for the time, at 42mm across, and despite being made of steel not gold it cost $3000, or the same as a Jaguar car! Everything else that Patek sold was in precious metal, before this watch they had only made a handful of steel models. It was a huge departure for them, and a radical bet on the future.

The Nautilus took ten years to be a success

It was launched in 1976 and was not a roaring success. In fact, it didn’t do anywhere near as well as they had thought it might.

This may seem crazy when you know how popular it was now, but it has taken a long time. In hindsight, they were just early. In 1980 they released a small ladies version at 27mm across, which was half the size, and powered by a quartz movement. In 1982 they released the second extension to the Nautilus family, releasing a model called the Reference 3800 which was 37.5mm in size. This was the right size at the right time.

Coupled with a wider growth in awareness of the Patek brand thanks to other product launches such as the new Calatrava, and a fantastic ad campaign focussing on how confident you will be when you own a Patek, the Nautilus finally started to sell.

Patek Philippe is famous for thinking ahead and moving very deliberately in the watch world. Four generations of the Stern family have guided the company very well over the last 90 years, and the development of the Nautilus range is a great case study of how they succeed. In its first 20 years, not much changed. They released a few different sizes and experimented with the dial. However after 1996 things kicked up a gear, and the watch became a platform for many of Patek Philippe’s greatest complications, or functions. There are chronometers, or stopwatches, annual and perpetual calendar modules, and a very fancy travel time model. The range is now available in steel, gold, rose gold and platinum with a variety of dial colours. 

This had two effects; firstly, to make it clear that despite being a chunky waterproof sports watch this is a range that features the very best movement design that Patek Philippe produces, and secondly to ensure that the simplest models, showing only the time and date remain rare. Now known as the Reference 5711, the simple steel Nautilus is one that Patek are not too fussed about selling as it is the cheapest. The message is that if you want a Nautilus you have to be prepared to spend on something fancy.

What next for the Patek Philippe Nautilus?

Last week we wrote about this special limited edition with Tiffany & Co. created to celebrate 170 years of working together. One then sold for $5.5mn at auction! They have promised that the Olive Green dial model currently on sale is the last of its type. It is the most hyped and most in-demand watch in the world. Where do they go next? 

Fans and collectors will undoubtedly be waiting a while for what comes next, and knowing Patek Philippe, it may not be quite what people are expecting.

We at The Watch Collectors’ Club do not have a favourite brand or watch. We like to explore the icons of the watch world as much as we like to explore new microbrands creating new timepieces from scratch. Sometimes the history of an icon teaches you more about how a brand works than anything else you can learn about them. This is certainly true for Patek Philippe. 

If you’d like to know even more about this company, we are excited to present a virtual event exploring the history of Patek Philippe and some of its most famous watches, including the Nautilus, on Monday 20th December at 8PM via Zoom. If you would like to join us, please reply to this email or register here.

A short history of the Patek Philippe Nautilus

Patek Philippe Nautilus Suprising Icon

How did such a simple steel watch become the most coveted timepiece on earth?

The Patek Philippe Nautilus - the most surprising icon in the Watch World

This week has seen the launch of an exclusive watch that commemorates the 170th anniversary of the relationship between Swiss watch company Patek Philippe and American Jeweller and Silversmith Tiffany & Co. Whatever your opinion on the watch, a marvel in steel and Tiffany blue, the relationship between these two famous firms is a fascinating story. This blog post will explore how it works, how it came about, and what it’s meant for watch lovers.

It all started when Antoine Norbert de Patek, one of the two founders of Patek Philippe, went to the United States to try and sell watches. He visited Charles Tiffany, the founder of Tiffany & Co. in New York, but while he impressed the company, he came away disappointed. On a trip that included robberies, bad weather, floods, and all kinds of hardships, he worked very hard to get Patek Philippe watches better known.

Fortunately for him, a few months into 1855 a huge order arrived for 129 watches of all different kinds, including high-end engraved and jewelled pocket watches. At this time most retailers would place an order for a handful of watches at a time, and indeed most still do this today. Tiffany was by far the largest jeweller in the world, and the US market was wide open for Swiss Watch Companies including Patek Philippe.

What is a Patek Philippe Authorised Dealer?

An Authorised Dealer is a retailer or jeweller that buys the watches from Patek Philippe first and then has to sell them. It does not take orders and then relay them to Patek. The retailer has to decide which watches it can sell. The retailer orders watches from Patek, pays for them, and then sells them to customers. This has been true since Patek was founded in 1851, and remains true today. In the case of Patek Phillippe, the company has flagship stores in some cities, where you are buying directly from the company, but every other place you can buy their watches, including Tiffany & Co. you are buying from an authorised dealer.

Until the start of online watch sales, you could rarely buy a watch directly from a manufacturer. To confuse things further, there are online authorised dealers who have no physical stores, and authorised dealers across the world are now happy to sell watches to clients in other countries. If you have any doubt whether the website you are on is an authorised dealer, you should just email them to ask before making a purchase. For more information about buying online, we wrote a guide here.

Tiffany and Patek’s Special Relationship

Tiffany enjoyed great success in the 19th Century in America. They became famous for their jewellery, watches, clocks, and silver goods. As well as importing and selling Swiss timepieces, they sold American clocks under their own name, and in the early 1870s built a factory of their own to produce watches in Geneva. It had the very latest technology, almost unheard of in Switzerland, using American machinery and a steam boiler power plant. 

Interestingly, they only had the factory for four years before selling it to Patek Philippe. After this short experiment, realised that Tiffany did not need to concentrate on making their own watches. Instead of “made by Tiffany” they could market Swiss brands “made exclusively for” Tiffany. In 1878, the factory, equipment, and managing engineer all transferred to Patek Philippe and Patek gave a five-year exclusive contract to Tiffany to sell their watches in the United States.

Astonishingly, Charles Tiffany’s son Louis did not have a high opinion of watches. While he was an extraordinarily successful designer in the Art Nouveau style, he did not appear to believe in the move to the Art Deco style and invested no time at all on watch design. This led to Tiffany & Co. selling Swiss watches as before, but without any focus on their own design philosophy. The relationship with Patek Philippe continued of course, but it was not until 1980 that Tiffany re-entered the watch world with their own designs. The crucial feature that Tiffany retained throughout their relationship with Patek was the prominence of the Tiffany & Co. logo on the dials of the watches sold by this dealership. No other retailer currently benefits from this joint branding, and it makes the watches especially collectable.

If there is one thing Patek have maintained as a key selling point, it is extremely high-quality timepieces. Over the 20th Century they have designed, build and sold a large number of watches of extreme beauty, often with interesting complications, or functions. For example, in 1925 they produced the first wristwatch with a perpetual calendar, a calendar that will tell the correct date including leap years for over 100 years, so long as the watch remains wound up. 

The company introduced many iconic timepieces and next week’s blog post will explore some of these in detail. On Monday 20th December 2021 at 8:00PM UK Time  The Watch Collectors’ Club will be hosting a Virtual Talk on the company and their watches, and you can find out more here.

Patek Philippe and Tiffany Celebration Watches

To bring things right up to date, Tiffany and Patek Philippe have combined their design might on two watches. The first celebrated their 150th anniversary of working together in 2001 and is an interesting Annual Calendar model. This stands out not for the overall design, which stems from Patek’s long line of calendar watches, but for the stunning T shape that replaces the 12 o'clock numeral. This is very unusual, and I think quite fun. They made 450 of them in three different metals, and they are beautifully engraved on the back.

This week saw the launch of an even bolder model, in celebration of the relationship’s 170th year. They have produced the most iconic Patek Philippe watch, the Nautilus Reference in steel, and added a dial coloured Tiffany Blue with the retailer's name written underneath the brand name. They are making 170 of these, and if you like it, there is one for sale for charity in the Phillips auction this weekend. As this is published the rumours are that it will sell for over $2 Million. As you can see, it is gloriously Tiffany Blue:

We at The Watch Collectors’ Club enjoy the finest and fanciest aspects of the watch world as much as the simple and sturdy. Companies with such long heritage as Tiffany and Patek Philippe can be enjoyed for their ongoing commitment to interesting design and quality timepieces, even if their rarity and value make them unlikely to feature in most people’s collections. The watch world is likely to see many more interesting partnerships over the next decade as collaborations bring fans of multiple brands together. We look forward to seeing what is created.

We are here to help you learn more about all aspects of the watch world, so please feel free to get in touch if you have questions. Exploring the watch world is best done together, so tell your friends about us, and if you want to join the virtual event on the 20th December, just register here. Find us on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and LinkedIn, and we hope we will see you at one of our events soon. 

What is the relationship between Patek Philippe and Tiffany? Are they an Authorised Dealer?

Patek Philippe and Tiffany Authorised Dealer Relationship

A Short history of the Relationship between Patek Philippe and Tiffany & Co.

Patek Philippe and Tiffany - the oldest Authorised Dealership in the world

Last week’s blog looked at the original high-end independent watchmakers, George Daniels and Philippe Dufour. This week, we’ll explore some of the most innovation modern independents: Voutilainen, MB&F, Laurent Ferrier and Czapek. 

Kari Voutilainen – The Finnish Master of Dials 

Kari Voutilainen has been making watches with his own name on the dial since 2002. His early career was spent at the independent brand Parmigiani, Fleurier, where he studied under a famous watch and clock restorer called Charles Meylan. Voutilainen says he learnt “everything they don’t teach you at watchmaking school” from Charles, and it was in fact Charles that encouraged Voutilainen to make his own watch. After a short period as a teacher, he was encouraged to set up on his own by Philippe Dufour, who we profiled in last week’s blog. The whole story of Kari Voutilainen’s career has been very well documented by A Collected Man – you can read it here. 

Every watch that Voutilainen makes is a unique commission, and the watchmaker works with every client to design their watches. He is famous for collaborating with some of the best craftspeople in the world, and the resulting watches are often awe-inspiring. 

His watches are often recognisable by the intricate dial designs and detailed movement finishing. My favourite feature of every Voutilainen watch is the hands – which are made from three separate pieces of metal, and are all handmade by Kari himself. 

If you ever get the chance to meet Mr Voutilainen, we would recommend jumping at the chance. We’ve met him a few times, and he is a genuinely nice and fascinating guy, who is generous with his time and knowledge. 

Max Busser & Friends was founded by Max Busser in 2005, with the aim of making “Horlogical Machines” as he refers to them. He is a micro-engineer by training, and stumbled into the watch industry by chance. Whilst at university he had met the MD of Jaeger-LeCoultre whilst researching his thesis. A chance meeting once he graduated led to him being hired as the product manager for JLC, part of a small team that turned the fortunes of the brand around. His next job was as the CEO of Harry Winston Rare Timepieces. After 7 successful years, he launched MB&F, which would focus on combining his creativity with that of some legendary watchmakers, including Kari Voutilainen. 

Busser is a creative businessman, as well as designer. He didn’t want to sell any share of his company to set it up, so he pre-sold 25 of his first watch, the HM1, and got the retailers to pay 35% upfront, two years before the watches were delivered. He also keeps the number of employees to 20 or fewer, to ensure that layers of management don’t stifle the creativity of the brand. As you can see from the pictures, his watches are very usual, often turning watch design convention on its head. These are truly special and unique watches. 

Laurent Ferrier – Understated Elegance 

Laurent Ferrier founded his brand in 2008, having worked at Patek Philippe for 30 years. His father was a watchmaker, who worked on very complicated movements – so the young Laurent was able to gain an appreciation of the highest complexity of watchmaking. Having graduated at the top of his watchmaking school, he was hired by Patek Philippe. He ended up working in the department that dealt with the non-movement parts, for example the case, lugs and crown, and even worked on Patek Philippe’s most famous watch, the Nautilus. 

Motor racing and watches have a long-intertwined history, and Laurent Ferrier is a part of that. During the late 1970’s, he and a friend, François Servanin, competed in the Le Mans 24 hour race, finishing third in 1979. Remarkable, considering they were amateur drivers, competing against professionals. The two would later establish the Laurent Ferrier brand together in 2008. 

The first watch the brand released was an unusual, and expensive choice. It was a tourbillon movement, hidden behind a very simple white Grand Feu enamel dial. The gamble paid off, and the brand gained a lot of attention. 

From that very first watch, Laurent Ferrier has kept to the principle that “if there is nothing left to remove, perfection is achieved”. His watches are very simple, discrete, with soft corners. Their simple-ness hides some remarkable attention to detail. For example, the hands used on every watch are individually stamped out of gold as a single piece, a method which is 17 times more expensive than traditional manufacturing. Photographs struggle to capture the beauty of these watches – you’ve got to try one on! 

Unlike the other names on this list, Czapek is actually a very old brand. It traces its origins back to a partnership between two Polish immigrants François Czapek and Antoine Norbert de Patek. This partnership was called Patek, Czapek & Cie. It dissolved after 6 years, but Antoine Norbert de Patek would go on to found Patek Philippe. Czapek’s company grew throughout the 19th century, as supplied watches to lots of European royal families. However, in 1869, François Czapek mysteriously disappeared.

The brand was re-launched in 2015 by three entrepreneurs. They used crowdfunding to raise the necessary money to launch the first new model, allowing collectors to own part of a modern independent watchmaker. 

Czapek’s modern watches mix classical pocket-watch and cutting edge wristwatch designs. They proudly work with some of the best suppliers in Switzerland to manufacture incredible watches. 

We love exploring the variety that these independent watchmakers can show off by owning their own brands. The Watch Collectors’ club exists to help our members explore all types of watches, whether they are independents, or parts of large groups. 

If you liked this series, please tell your friends, and please make sure you are following us on Facebook, Instagram and LinkedIn to see more pictures of these fantastic watches. 

The weird and wonderful world of modern independents

Independent Watchmakers – The Modern Trailblazers

A few months ago, we wrote a short series of blogs exploring the largest watch groups in the world. You can read the series here. These groups all manufacture millions of watches annually and spend tens of millions of dollars on marketing. They are the big brands that you’ll recognise if you are a watch collector, or if you are not. We also wrote a series of blogs exploring some of our favourite microbrands, small brands making a limited number of well-priced watches. 

Willy Breitling and Inventing the Modern Chronograph

A Short History of the Chronograph

The Rolex Explorer Everest Controversy

The Patek Philippe Nautilus - the most surprising icon in the Watch World

Patek Philippe and Tiffany - the oldest Authorised Dealership in the world

Independent Watchmakers – The Modern Trailblazers

An Introduction to High-End Independent Watchmaking – The Original Independents

Rolex and the Prisoner of War Watches

Is the Hamilton Ventura the most featured watch at the movies?

A Short History of the Omega Seamaster

A Brief Introduction to James Bond’s Watches

Glashütte, the home of German Watchmaking

The World's First Sports Watch - The Jaeger LeCoultre Reverso

A Short Exploration Of The World’s Largest Watch Groups – LVMH

A Short Exploration of the World’s Largest Watch Groups – The Swiss Giants

British Watchmakers - A Short History of Fears Watches

Reissues, Recreations and Reimagining

Racing, Heuer, and the Ever-Present Tachymeter

The Zenith El Primero Story