Introducing: The Patek Philippe Ref. 6007A-001 Calatrava, Celebrating The New Manufacture In Geneva

One of the crucial uncommon options (for watch fans) of this extraordinarily uncommon, tough, and unpredictable yr, has been an upset of the traditional calendar of recent releases, which is essentially the most dramatic I’ve seen in twenty years and extra of writing about watches. Most likely the one most notable information on this entrance has truly been the absence of reports from two firms. These are Rolex and Patek Philippe which, in something approaching regular circumstances, are normally on the high of everybody’s checklist of must-sees at Baselworld. Competitors, certainly, is fierce amongst watch journalists to be first to publish tales about new watches from each manufacturers.

Usually at Baselworld, the primary press day was a mad scramble to get info up from not solely Rolex and Patek, but in addition Omega and different main gamers as nicely. However this yr, whereas we’ve got seen new releases from different Basel Day 1 manufacturers, Rolex and Patek Philippe have gone silent. At present, nonetheless, this modifications with the discharge of a brand new Calatrava, and in metal, no much less. The reference 6007A-001 is debuting as a restricted version of 1,000 items to have a good time the corporate’s newest new addition to its manufacture in Plan-les-Ouates, Geneva.

Patek broke floor on the brand new manufacture in 2015 as a part of an ongoing effort to centralize all elements of manufacturing in a single facility. This initiative had initially been led by Philippe Stern in 1996, in keeping with Patek, in an try to extend efficiencies and enhance all elements of producing and design. The corporate says that within the interval instantly prior, there had been over a dozen vital manufacturing websites for Patek, which had been scattered throughout town and Canton of Geneva. This was an virtually common function of watchmaking in Switzerland for hundreds of years, the place varied suppliers and specialists working in several areas manufactured every part from escapements to circumstances, to mainsprings and different elements, primarily independently. Amusingly (and predictably) sufficient, not everybody was a fan of modernizing, and writing for the Monetary Occasions in April of this yr, Nick Foulkes famous that there was some dissent even throughout the Stern household.

“The change,” Foulkes wrote, “between the previous model of working and the brand new was marked; I bear in mind visiting Patek Philippe’s previous HQ on the Rue du Rhône above the flagship retailer in the beginning of the 1990s and, if not precisely Dickensian in really feel, there was a cosily historic ambiance enhanced by the lingering aroma of the Borkum Riff pipe tobacco smoked by Henri Stern, Philippe’s father. It was from right here that actions had been coordinated throughout the city.”

“However having celebrated the agency’s 150th anniversary in 1989, and presciently predicting that curiosity in mechanical, particularly difficult, watches was about to extend, Philippe Stern realised that this primarily 19th-century system of sub-suppliers and scattered workshops acquired by the corporate through the years wanted to alter. Not everybody welcomed the concept, chief amongst them the agency’s then patriarch, Philippe’s father, Henri.”

“‘He got here as soon as and by no means once more,’ laughs Philippe. ‘It was too large for him.'”

If that is how Henri Stern felt concerning the 1996 facility, I can not assist however surprise what he’d have considered the brand new headquarters which opened this yr. This may be a difficult yr for the watch business, however you’d by no means understand it at Patek Philippe. The brand new facility, which had an estimated tab of CHF 450 million all-in once we reported the start of building again in 2015, has ended up producing a closing invoice of CHF 600 million. The constructing is big by the requirements of watch manufacturing – 10 flooring (4 under floor). There are amenities for almost each side of watch manufacturing you may think about, together with every part from fundamental machining, to ateliers for hand-finishing and assembling actions, to metiers d’artwork studios for such crafts as engraving, guillochage, and enameling. The constructing options what Patek calls “New York fireplace escape-style” stairs and has monumental, wrap-around home windows to make sure loads of the pure mild so vital to watchmaking. 

There’s even a restaurant on the highest flooring with room for 880 (!) company and area for nearly 700 automobiles within the underground storage. Not unhealthy for a yr wherein most manufacturers are nervously eyeing the information and questioning when the money stream essential to hold enterprise afloat goes to begin coming in once more – in keeping with HODINKEE Government Editor Joe Thompson, do not maintain your breath. However at Patek Philippe, everybody nonetheless appears to be respiratory simple, even on this business-as-unusual yr.

The watch launched to have a good time the brand new facility can be very a lot up-to-date in its design and represents a continuation of the innovation in its fundamental design language which has more and more marked its releases in recent times – and never solely that, it is being launched in chrome steel.

Ref. 6007A-001.

It’s maybe the least authentic statement one could make about Patek Philippe, however the truth stays that other than the varied Nautilus and Aquanaut fashions, metal fashions are a rarity. Of the 28 metal or metal and gold fashions within the present catalogue, 21 are in these two ranges, with one other six within the Twenty-Four assortment. The only present catalogue metal mannequin not in any of these three households is the 5212A Calatrava Weekly Calendar, which is an uncommon wristwatch in quite a lot of respects as nicely. As a matter of truth, the Weekly Calendar to me appears to be like as if it’s totally a lot enjoying from the identical fundamental design guide as the brand new 6007A-001 – they’ve in frequent, in fact, a spherical metal case, which taken simply by itself makes them nearer family to one another than to every other watches within the present catalogue, however there are a few different frequent parts. 

The ref. 5212 Calatrava Weekly Calendar.

Each, for example, even have considerably comparable dial layouts, in that the dial composition in each circumstances consists primarily of two concentric circles – within the case of the Weekly Calendar for the day of the week, whereas within the 6007A-001, the interior hour scale is there much less out of necessity when it comes to info displayed, than as a component which serves to set off the sample on the interior dial, which Patek describes as “carbon” sample embossing. (I am unsure why carbon particularly – it might be so simple as that it is meant to be a form of stylized carbon fiber design, though carbon atoms can type cubic crystals in diamonds, which can be me studying an excessive amount of into the design.) This cross-hatch sample has truly appeared as soon as earlier than – seven years in the past in, of all issues, a singular piece reference 5004T split-seconds perpetual calendar, in titanium, which was created for Solely Watch. 

The interior hour scale is, maybe, a bit superfluous given the presence of the Arabics, however in having separate hours and minutes scales, Patek has given the watch a extra fascinating composition than if both had been absent. After all, for Patek collectors, metal is catnip – the corporate’s place as a bastion of conventional horology implies that for many of its historical past, its watches went into valuable steel circumstances, and metal Patek watches of any type are subsequently a relative rarity. They’ll, as each fanatic is aware of (as was the case with a metal 1518, for example), command appreciable premiums at public sale. The American industrialist and automotive fanatic Briggs Cunningham was uncommon amongst mid-20th century Patek shoppers in truly proudly owning three Pateks, all particular orders and all in metal circumstances.

Additionally uncommon for a non-sports mannequin, the 6007A-001 has luminous materials on the arms and utilized Arabic numerals. Luminous materials appears to be fairly out of the unusual for Calatrava-family watches on the whole – actually, within the present assortment of 19 different fashions, not a single one appears to have luminous arms and dial markers, together with the metal Weekly Calendar, which makes the 6007A-001 distinctive within the household, not less than for now.

The topic of what precisely “costume watch” means is one thing I have been desirous to dig into for a while (the archivist in me would love to search out out what the primary attested use of the phrase in English may be), however traditionally, if I can use the time period with out going too deeply into its historical past for now, there was because the invention of luminous paints, a bent for the business to keep away from them in watches that do not fall into the device watch or sports activities watch class. I am unsure why this could need to be the case – in spite of everything, the position of a watch is basically to inform the time, and there may be scarcely a watch you may level to whose legibility in low mild would not be improved by a little bit of radium or tritium or LumiNova. 

Maybe it’s principally a matter of character – there may be an instrumentality to luminous materials which appears, in a method, discordant with the character of a costume watch (no matter that’s) to say nothing of the truth that till the arrival of Tremendous-LumiNova, the paint was all the time a brief function of the watch and would have to be changed nicely throughout the typical proprietor’s lifetime. On this occasion, although, I believe Patek has discovered a option to make it work in a Calatrava, which has partly to do with the case materials – metal, in spite of everything, doth not thumb its nostril at lume, characterologically – and partly to do with the marginally instrument-watch vibe created by the double chapter rings. The blue calfskin strap, with its embossed woven sample, additionally does an excellent deal to tone down any banker-in-a-chauffeured Rolls really feel (which you’ll positively get from a number of the valuable steel Calatravas) and ties collectively the usage of lume, Arabic numerals, and the metal case materials.

When it comes to proportions, that is nonetheless very a lot a Calatrava, fortunately, and the unassuming dimension, whereas simply barely sufficient over a purist’s 37mm-38mm diameter to supply Pavlovian rage in some quarters (together with the date window – who you’re), stays very manageable at 40mm x 9.07mm. I’d want for a barely higher water resistance than 30 meters, however that is, in spite of everything, greater than sufficient for this form of watch, whose biggest aquatic hazard is apt to encompass a spilled glass of wine or water from overenthusiastic hand-washing (and we will hardly be too obsessed with hand-washing these days). The motion is a traditional as nicely – the self-winding Patek Philippe caliber 324 SC, which is 27mm x three.3mm and clips alongside at 28,800 vph.

The one quibble I’ve with the watch is the writing and emblem on the caseback, however in spite of everything, this can be a watch meant to have a good time a particular second in time for the corporate, and it’s hardly a deadly flaw. Personally, I choose to have an unobstructed view in watches with an haute horlogerie motion, however the narrowly classical Swiss excessive watchmaking method of enterprise within the entrance, occasion within the again will not be fairly what this watch is about anyway. At first look, I had reservations concerning the dial design – the interior hour scale appeared, at finest, an extra design component that might simply have been neglected with not less than no hurt to the general design. But it surely has, in a short while, come to look if not an absolute important when it comes to legibility, not less than an vital contributor to the character of the general design and, as nicely, it does act as a form of visible bridge to its metal cousin, the Weekly Calendar. 

Although it comes very late within the yr comparatively talking, we nonetheless have a bit greater than half a yr left to go and, with sporadic however hopeful indicators of opening up amongst factories and retailers, it’s to be hoped that Patek will give us, within the weeks and months to return, an increasing number of to speak about. Within the meantime, that is an intriguing first act, and one which I’m positive will present numerous fodder for hypothesis on what else Patek might have in retailer for us because the yr wears on. The carefully associated visible language between this restricted version and the Calatrava Weekly Calendar actually has me considering. As we all know, metal common manufacturing Pateks are very a lot out of the unusual, however checked out collectively, the Weekly Calendar and the brand new 6007A-001 virtually appear like the seeds of a brand new sort of look ahead to Patek: the metal, non-sports watch day by day driver, for a brand new form of shopper who nonetheless needs all of the blue-blood enchantment that Patek has to supply, however in a extra modern and stealthy chassis.

The Patek Philippe ref. 6007A-001 Restricted Version: case, chrome steel, 30 meters water resistance, 40mm x 9.07mm; grey-blue dial with embossed carbon sample; utilized white gold Arabic numerals and white gold arms, each with luminescent coating. Motion, caliber 340 SC heart seconds, self-winding with gold rotor; time and date, 45-hour most energy reserve. Restricted to 1,000 items worldwide; value, $28,351. See the Calatrava Assortment at Patek.com.