On the subject of the green Nautilus, Thierry Stern told the Telegraph on 6 July: 'Even my children ask me, "Can I have one?", but the answer is no. The good thing is that it is part of the beauty and myth of Patek Philippe'. A myth that is in danger of tarnishing if no longer nurtured by the right people.
If it is true that "We try to avoid selling to people who buy watches only to resell them, but it is not easy to control" as the president of Patek Philippe states in the same interview, it is also true that control over dealers is not easy either, given that the watch in question went to auction still sealed, just as it left the factory. The tactic of ceasing production of the steel Nautilus, only to then create an even higher expectation for a similar model whose production will be very limited in time, does not seem to be going in the declared direction: cutting the legs off speculation around this watch.
What is regrettable is that doubts about the House are beginning to rise in the worldwide circle of collectors and enthusiasts, the so-called community. There has been a growing murmur in the industry about the true or false identity of the seller, whose name was accidentally discovered in a still from a video showing the watch - and its documentation - during the auction. From Antiquorum, of course, they confirm that it is a person who regularly bought the watch from a dealer. Who, evidently transgressing the manufacturer's directives, did not remove the Nautilus from the plastic or remove the protective films, as we know every authorised dealer is required to do. The buyer of the piece shelled out a whopping €400,000 to snatch it up, including the 25% buyer's premium for the auction house (he would have had to buy it for 320,000 on Chrono24, plus €167 for shipping - laughing emoticon). While the seller put 320,000 euro in his pocket, about ten times the list price, which in Italy is 30,860 euro including VAT.
There is no longer talk of collecting, but of a bubble of madness for an unobtainable object, which is, however, making most people dislike the brand and - much more serious - is casting doubt on the advisability of continuing to invest in Patek Philippe. This is why it is being talked about and why Stern himself says he is aware that this is hurting his company.
Did he perhaps think he could better manage the distribution of Ref. 5711/1A with a green dial? In retrospect, it would have been better if he himself had delivered a limited number to the great Patek Philippe collectors around the world, who were not unknown to the company and were certainly happy to buy a watch made just for them.
Dody Giussani
