It was announced yesterday that
Sotheby's will be auctioning off Henry Graves 'Supercomplication' timepiece (pictured below). “The list of superlatives which can be attached to this icon of the 20th
century is truly extraordinary.
Indisputably the ‘Holy Grail’ of watches, The Henry Graves Supercomplication
combines the Renaissance ideal of the unity of beauty and craftsmanship with
the apogee of science,” Tim Bourne and Daryn Schnipper said in a joint
statement.
This fine horology beauty took 8 years to create; 3 years of
researched followed by 5 years of labor. It started in 1925, when Henry Graves,
a prominent New York banker and possibly the greatest horological collector of
the 20th century, commissioned Patek Philippe to produce the world’s
most complicated timepiece. The finished product was pure perfection. The 18k
yellow gold, openface watch has 24
complications, the most of any watch built by human hands, making it the ‘Mona
Lisa’ of watches. The features of this
horological masterpiece include moon phases, sidereal time, power reserve,
perpetual calendar, and indicate the time of sunrise and sunset. If you’re
wondering what a complication is, have no worries. We asked Eric, one of our
master watchmakers to break it down for us. “Basically, a complication is anything on the watch in addition to
the basic time function. So technically all watches that have a calendar,
have a complication. Some other complications are, the repeater (which has a
gong function used to "chime" the time, some just chime hours and/or
half/quarter hours, whereas some have a chime to tell the precise minute), the
Annual calendar (compensates for months with 30 days), and the Perpetual
calendar (compensates for months with 30 days AND leap years), the tourbillion,
the moon phase.” Eric goes on to say the Henry Graves watch isn’t just about
how many complications it has, but for the fact it was all made by hand, and
made extremely well!
Mr. Graves pocket watch
held the title for most complicated until a watch with 33 complications
surpassed it in 1989. Although the Patek Philippe Cailbre 89 may have more
complications, it was built with the help of computers, which makes the
Supercomplication the most treasured watch in the world.
News of the auction coincides with Patek’s 175th
anniversary. Time will tell how much this piece will go for in auction but it’s
safe it say it could fetch up to $17 million.
The 18k yellow gold, openface watch,
which boasts 24 complications, took 8 years to create; 3 years of research
followed by 5 years of labor. It started in 1925, when Henry Graves, a
prominent New York banker and possibly the greatest horological collector of
the 20th century, commissioned Patek Philippe to produce the world’s
most complicated timepiece. The finished product was pure perfection. As we mentioned earlier, this watch has 24
complications, which includes- moon phases, sidereal time, power reserve,
perpetual calendar, and indicate the time of sunrise and sunset. If you’re
wondering what a complication is, have no worries. We asked Eric, one of our
master watchmakers to break it down for us. “Basically, a complication is anything on the watch in addition to
the basic time function. So technically all watches that have a calendar,
have a complication. Some other complications are, the repeater (which has a
gong function used to "chime" the time, some just chime hours and/or
half/quarter hours, whereas some have a chime to tell the precise minute), the
Annual calendar (compensates for months with 30 days), and the Perpetual
calendar (compensates for months with 30 days AND leap years), the tourbillion,
the moon phase.” Eric goes on to say the
Henry Graves watch isn’t just about how many complications it has, but for the
fact it was all made by hand, and made extremely well!
