Tania Edwards Of Collectability On The Rise Of Patek Philippe¶
Published on Wed, 13 Nov 2024 18:00:00 +0000
Tania and Tony discuss Patek's history through the '80s and '90s, how the brand's identity and marketing campaigns have evolved to today, and her thoughts on vintage and modern Patek watches (including the Cubitus Collection, of course).
Synopsis¶
In this episode of Hodinkee Radio, host Tony Traina speaks with Tanya Edwards, co-founder of Collectibility and a veteran of the watch industry with over 30 years of experience focused primarily on Patek Philippe. Edwards shares her remarkable journey into the world of haute horlogerie, which began serendipitously as a university student in England when her boyfriend's father, a Swiss watchmaker, insisted she visit the Patek Philippe salon in Geneva. That early exposure planted a seed that would eventually blossom into a distinguished career.
Edwards spent nearly a decade at the Henri Stern Watch Agency (Patek Philippe USA) during the transformative 1990s, serving as marketing director during a pivotal era for the brand. She provides insider perspective on Philippe Stern's visionary leadership, which fundamentally reshaped Patek Philippe's trajectory. This included the landmark 150th anniversary celebration in 1989 featuring the Calibre 89, the consolidation of production facilities, the opening of the Patek Philippe Museum, and critically, the introduction of "small complications" like the revolutionary Annual Calendar (Reference 5035) in 1996 and the ladies' Twenty-Four collection in 1999. Edwards also reveals her role in developing the iconic advertising tagline "You never actually own a Patek Philippe, you merely look after it for the next generation" (or "take care of it" in the US version), explaining how the campaign captured the emotional significance of owning a Patek.
The conversation explores how the brand evolved from being relatively unknown outside collector circles in the late 1980s to its current position of dominance, shifting from a retailer-driven business model to one more directly connected with end consumers through social media and digital platforms. Edwards offers measured commentary on the recently released Cubitus collection, emphasizing the importance of seeing watches in person before forming definitive opinions, while placing the release in historical context alongside past innovations like the Nautilus and Ellipse that initially faced skepticism. She concludes by discussing her current work at Collectibility, her passion for vintage Patek Philippe pieces (particularly the Ellipse collection and ladies' complications), and the exciting opportunities in the neo-vintage market for collectors seeking exceptional value in perpetual calendars and chronographs from the 1990s and early 2000s.
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Transcript¶
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| Tony Traina | This episode is brought to you by Hodinki Insurance. Collecting watches is fun. Insuring watches is not. But with Hodinki Insurance, we offer a better and more seamless experience to insure your watches and even jewelry, minimizing the paperwork and maximizing the protection. Hodinky Insurance protect what you love. Visit insurance.hodinki.com for more details. Welcome back to another episode of Hodinky Radio. Today's guest is Tanya Edwards, the co-founder of Collectibility, the specialist dealer she co-founded with John Reardon in 2019. Tanya has been in the watch industry for more than 30 years, mostly focusing on Paddock. Her journey started with promoting the 150th anniversary of the brand in 1989, which led to her role as marketing director at the Henry Stern Agency, or Patek Philippe USA, where she stayed for just about 10 years. During this time, she played a pivotal role in Paddock's most successful ad campaign, you never actually own a paddock, you merely look after it for the next generation, while also seeing the brand grow tremendously. After Paddock, she made stops at auction houses and brands before co-founding Collectibility with Reardon. Thank you so much, Tony. It's a real pleasure. We had John on about a year ago, but I've known you at least for for a couple of years now, and obviously your your passion for the brand shines through. So I'm excited to get some of your expertise on Hodinky Radio for the first time. I want to start with the story of how you became introduced to the brand Patek Philippe way back when. Yeah, really |
| Tanya Edwards | way back when. And you can't you can't make this up. Um probably could tell by my accent, even though I've lived in in the States for over 30 years, I grew up in England and I went to university in England. And at the time I had a boyfriend whose father was a Swiss watchmaker. And as was the tradition during the summer vacations, we'd go backpacking across Europe and we had to fly into Geneva to start our travels because we had to go to Patek Philippe because I had to understand what the world's finest watchmaker was all about. Now, put this into context. I I'm a student at university. Do you think I care about the world's finest watchmaker? Absolutely not. But um my friend insisted and we arrive outside um the beautiful Patek Salon on Rue de Rhone and I said, We cannot go in there, look at us. We're scruffy students, they'll know we can't afford a watch. And um he said, No, no, no, this is Patek Philippe. Don't be ridiculous. They'll treat us well. And they did. And my friend asked the lovely sales associate to please explain what does Patek Philippe mean? What is its history and to show me the current collection? And she did that with grace and charm, as if Princess Diana had walked in and asked to see the collection. Um, and it just blew me away. And I walked out and I said to my friend, One day I will own a Patek Philippe and he said, Yes, you will. And uh the rest as they say was hist |
| Tony Traina | ory. Well that's right. You you much more than own a Patek Philippe shortly after that, you came to to work with them and then for them. So can you start by talking about I from what I understand, you started working with them around the hundred and fiftieth anniversary campaign, which would have been in 1989. So tell |
| Tanya Edwards | us about that. Yeah, so that that was another fortuitous uh moment. Um I had been sent to the from the London office to the New York office to learn about international marketing. And the company was pitching Hatec Philippe International Business to support the 150th anniversary. This was in 1988. And as is often the case when you're pitching a new piece of business, a memo will go around. Does anyone know about this brand? Does anyone want to be involved in it? And I said, yes, I know about it, and I also know how to pronounce it because nobody was pronouncing it properly at the time, because nobody had heard of Pategville. So this is really the critical point here that that back then and you'll hear it from me repeatedly during this interview I'm sure the knowledge for Patek awareness for Patek was very, very low. Um and uh when I started in the business and um so we won the business and we started working on really promoting Patek Philippe for its 150th anniversary, which was as she rightly said, 1989. And that was a pivotal year for Patek because they did um under the guidance of Philippe Stern, who was then managing director of Patek Philippe, the goal was to put Patek Philippe on the map |
| Tony Traina | . You mentioned it a little bit, alluded to it, the perception or perhaps lack thereof of the brand at that time. Well, that's a |
| Tanya Edwards | really important point. So first of all, very few people had heard of Patek Philippe at that time. Um you had to be a very privileged member of society to own one as you still do today. Um you know they've always been expensive. They've always been exclusive. But at that time very few people had that privilege. And awareness was completely different. The media market was completely different. We didn't have social media, so there wasn't instant information about everything. Also, let's put it into context. We're talking about the end of the 80s, the um mechanical watch world was still reeling from courts uh crisis of the 70s. And um and it was a tough time. It was a tough time if you if you made mechanical Swiss watches, because the Japanese were were making far cheaper watches and um that that was still resonating even then, even at the end of the 80s. So Philippe Stern, as I mentioned, felt very strongly that he had to change that. He had to change that perception. And he understood that it was it had to be marketing led. You had to change um people's awareness through publicity. So he did he he he he had various ideas. The most important one was that he started thinking about this 10 years beforehand. He started thinking about it in 1979, which was when he was made um managing director under his father, who was the president, Ornie Stern, and he realized that to get a big to make a big splash for the 150th anniversary, he had to do something very special. And in 1979, it was an interesting year. It was when, for example, ETA came out with their delirium quartz caliber. That's the tiny quartz caliber, that was the first important quartz caliber that was going to compete against the Japanese. So here we are, we're still very much in this quartz era. And yet he decided, oh, I'm going to make the world's most complicated timepiece. And that turned out to be the caliber 89, which was finished in nineteen eighty-nine. So it took nine years of research and development to make that extraordinary timepiece. And he wanted to prove that yes, quartz technology is seemingly the future is cheap. It tells at more accurate time, but but mechanical timepieces still matter. And together with an auction to auction off that first caliber 89, you put together um over 300 vintage timepieces. And Habsburg Feldman, the auctioneer auction house run by Osvaldo Patrizzi, put together the first ever single brand auction, the first themed auction. So this was a Patek Philippe only auction. So that was very revolutionary at the time. And um and that was really what started it all. And with that came limited edition timepieces as well to celebrate the 150th anniversary. And so it was a package. And he understood that he needed, as I mentioned, marketing. So he brought on an international pup public relations team. That's how I got involved. And um it was a big year. If we publicity wise, it was a very big year. We were even on uh Saturday night live. It' |
| Tony Traina | s amazing. Some of the stuff that we take for granted now, uh thematic auctions, limited editions on some level that that you just mentioned, even just uh a reversion to complicated mechanical watchmaking, like we take it for granted now, but it was what led sort of uh it it ended up being an inflection point that for for paddock Philippe as a brand, if not the whole entire Swiss watch industry that led to a boom in the 1990s for for the brand and Swiss watches more broadly, right? 100%. 100%. Be |
| Tanya Edwards | cause you know, from that moment, you know, Cartier did a Cartier only auction that was Yeah, 96, yeah. And and so yes, it was the start of and it was also the start of making auctions very attractive to people that you you needed to look at what was going on at auctions. Whereas prior to that, it was, you know, mostly pocket watches that were sold at auctions. So here was this Patek theme that had a lot of wristwatches actually in it, as well as pocket watches. So it was a real shift in the relevance of collecting on a much broader broader scale watches |
| Tony Traina | . Soon after that, you went to work for the Henri Stern watch agency or Paddock Philippe USA, and the 1990s were a time of huge strides forward for Paddock, as we've been talking about. It was the Philippe Stern era defined by opening a new museum, a new production facility, a new ad campaign. And that's before we even get to the product. So before we get to some of those specifics, can you just talk about what it was like working at Paddock Philippe USA in the nineteen nineties? It was um |
| Tanya Edwards | a very frustrating time because here we had the most beautiful watches in the world and nobody knew about them. Even though there was a big media blitz in nineteen eighty nine, it was momentary. It it didn't carry on into the nineties. And I remember when I first started working there, I you know, I'd say to my friends, oh, I've new job, I'm working for Patek Philippe, who? What? What are they? What do they do? Nobody had heard of Patek. And as the marketing director, I of course found that extremely frustrating. It was also, I think it's also important to recognise that at that time, retailers were the real voice piece for Patrifek Philippe. It wasn't the end public. It was up to the retailers to sell to the public. So they were very critical in educating people about Patek Philippe. It wasn't as it is now that we we'll we'll look on the internet, we'll learn from websites or whatever, wherever we can get our information from. Then it was up to the retailer selling directly to the consumer. And it was a tough time for retailers because to to to have a good display of Patek Philippe watches, you had to invest in them. They weren't on um commission. They were they were you had to buy buy them, you had to own them. And um awareness was still very, very low. So they were they were in that it was a it was a a time of frustration for us as a brand and the retailers. So we needed to change that. And how and that's where Philippe Stern came in and made the really what is now what was the foundation of modern Patek Philippe? So he changed the marketing and he bought in products that were exactly what the public wanted and what retailers could sell easily. I think that's those are critical ch |
| Tony Traina | anges that happened at that time. Well let's talk about the product first. I think it's funny, it's an era that I think collectors have come to appreciate more in the past few years, this whole neo-vintage era, if you will. But can you talk about maybe from your perspective, what Philippe Stern did at the time to really revive uh paddock on the product side or on the watch side |
| Tanya Edwards | . Yeah. So um at this time there was there was two levels of Patek. There was the time only, which was just under $10,000 for a strap piece. And then the there was what we now call grand complications, which would be a perpetual calendar, a chronograph. And they were in the 40,000, 50,000 price range. So you had this huge gap in between. And um there just wasn't anything in between. And Philippe Stern uh came up with a genius idea of introducing a whole new category, which at the time he called small complications or useful complications. And the first one that was launched in 1996 was the annual calendar, 5035. And when, and I remember distinctly when we were showed it to retail tailors for the first time in Basel, they were thrilled because here was a price point, it was thousand five hundred for that first annual calendar. They could sell that because they didn't need clients who could jump up so hugely in a price point. And there were the clients that you'd nurtured who had who had the time only, who wanted to move up, but as I said, couldn't take that big leap. So um it was a thrilling new category for the retailers. Now, so that was an important bridge there, and then we came out with 1999, which was um the ladies 24. And for decades, way before I started, Patek in the US was begging Patek in Geneva to come out with a really distinctive ladies' timepiece. And at that time, really it was Cartier that was known as the ladies' watchmaker. It wasn't Patek for sure, even though Patek made beautiful ladies' watches. And so the 24 did that it w immediately was appreciated as this is the watch. And again, going back to the retailers, we needed them on our side to get it going. And I can remember that Basel. Four women in Patek were given a 24 and I was privileged to be one of them. And every time I left the Pat um the Patek booth at Basel, I literally would be attacked by people. Show me your watch, show me your watch, show me your watch. Um, because it was so thrilling to see this beautiful patek. It was a stainless steel watch, it was a bracelet watch with um with diamonds, and it was under $10,000. And I think it was $7,900. It was, I mean it was, it was, it was artificially priced to help get aware gain awareness for it. And it worked. And of course that was all coupled with a new ad campaign. So um it was in that respect very exciting, but I've missed one other important watch in between that because of course I had to talk about the 24th because I loved that so much. But there was a very important watch in between the annual calendar and the 24, and that was the Aquinaut, which was a cousin of the Nautilus. And it was another example of Patek coming in with a sports watch that was to try and attract a younger intro-level person to the brand. And again, it was priced very fairly under $10,000. Still a huge amount of money, but at that time for it was a great price, I think what they go for now. And um it succeeded and it didn't succeed. It succeeded because it was an immediately a huge success, but it didn't succeed because the people that it was meant for, i.e., first-time buyers into PatTech, attracting that younger audience, didn't stand a chance. Because it was bought by um existing Patek Philippe owners who loved it and wanted that weekend sporty watch. So um it it uh it it exceeded at every le |
| Tony Traina | vel, let's put it that way. Some things don't change. And we're gonna get into a little bit more new collection releases from from Paddock ob,viously with the cubitus, but you mentioned their the new marketing campaign that had to come with this sort of product revival, because as you said in the beginning of the 1990s, uh there was still a somewhat of a lack of awareness. So can you talk a little bit a little bit about the new ad campaign that that you all worked on in the nineties and what became perhaps the most legendary tagline in in all of watches, uh if I may say? I |
| Tanya Edwards | mentioned how frustrating it was to be the marketing director of a brand that nobody's heard of. I mean, you should drive me insane. And the advertising that we had at that time was um was was started in 1985 and it featured the Calatrava 3919, which is the hobnail design calatrava, and it had two hands presenting it like this and with copy, lots of copy. And I just felt it was very old-fashioned. I felt it wasn't working anymore. And I every time I saw Philippe Stern, and I just want to reiterate that this is the 90s, this is when we worked very closely with him. It was a much smaller company, you had immediate access to him. It was a great privilege. Um, and I kept complaining about the advertising and and one day he got so fed up. He said, All right, Mrs. Edwards, so he called me, if you think you can do better, go and do it. So I said, Thank you very much, I will. So um being British, I felt strongly that um the the British ad agent uh ad industry had a had a had a really good grasp on an international campaign because we had to be international. We had to have a message that transcended every culture in the world because that patek was sold all over the world. And to do that, you had to have somebody who really understood that. So it's not going to be the Swiss, because the Swiss think about the Switzerland and that's it. Unfortunately, it couldn't be the Americans because the Americans have this massive country that it can think about. So we we went off to London and cut a long story short, uh we were presented this campaign by League Stelane who to this day are still um producing Patek Philippe's advertising. And what they did was they the reason that they won the business is because they really dived into what is it? Why is it that somebody will buy a Patek Philippe? What differentiates it from any other watch? And they quickly understood that it's a very personal experience buying owning a patek and it becomes such an intrinsic part of somebody for many reasons. One, it's normally bought we pateks are often bought as a celebration. I was made CEO, I was made a partner of my law firm, um uh the birth of a child, um, a marriage. So they they always have significant reasons why somebody bought a pat egg and then that was passed on because with it came that emotion of owning it and you know whoever was lucky enough to inherit a pateg had the memories of that person who who who wore it beforehand. So they c caught on to that because they did research all over the world and everybody said the same thing. This this is the most precious thing I own. I'm going to pass it on to my daughter, my son, whoever. And that's where the tagline came from. You never actually own a Patek Philippe, you merely and you started off with look after it for the next generation. Um, and we might talk about this. I changed it to take care of it for the next generation, um, because that's how um important the the watches were. And that line also it it's brilliant because it it tells you this must be a quality product. It's gonna last for generations. So that said everything in one grow. There was the emotion of owning one and there was the quality of owning one. So I think that's why it it was such a brilliant line |
| Tony Traina | . You mentioned the two slight distinctions uh in the ad. Can you just talk |
| Tanya Edwards | a little bit about about that? Yeah, so it's funny because, you know, this was what, twenty eight years ago that we that we did this campaign and um for the US, which was where I was at the time head of, um, I preferred the the the phrase: you never actually own a PATEC, you merely take care of it for the next generation, because I thought take care had more meaning than look after. You know, you have to care for it, you have to be careful. So that's so that's why that tagline was used in the US and not anywhere else in the world. And then, as we all saw recently, uh the world saw the American tagline for the first time and found it confusing. So they thought it was fake. Some people thought it was fake, huh? It just makes me laugh so much because you know that was an awful long time ago when that decision was made. And um I I think it's rather it it's it's rather ironic and funny that that that it it's it's got to light now so so m so much so long after |
| Tony Traina | . We've talked about a few of these threads that came together in the nineteen nineties, the product development and these simple complications, small complications as you called it, the marketing campaign. We could talk about consolidating uh production facilities, the museum, the even the paddock magazine, which I know, which I know was an initiative of yours, but can you just talk about how these all came together in the 1990s and how you saw the perception of the brand sort of start to change or evolve? Well, I think the key thing is that |
| Tanya Edwards | Philippe Stern, even though he wasn't quite president of the company then his. His fa father absolutely was delighted to let him drive the company. And consolidating all the workshops was really the first huge project that he did. Um, because at that time there were at least thirteen workshops around Geneva. Um, and it was tough because you know, you you'd met you'd finished part of a movement, then that had to go somewhere else down the road to another um uh workshop. And so consolidating them was a was a huge deal. I mean that that that was the start of changing the industry as a whole. I mean now in that area of plan le wat, there are lots of other manufacturers including Rolex. Um and but at the time and I remember going to visit the site with Philippe Stern before anything had happened. So we needed to go there because he needed a big enough site and the concrete had been laid upon which the building would have been built. And I can remember standing on that concrete with him in fields. What looked like fields at the time. Doesn't look like that now. Um and he's saying, I'm this is where I'm going to build the future of Patek Ville. I mean it it still to this day it gives me goosebumps, but but he had such foresight and realized that that that was the way to really it you know, preserve the company for the future was to bring everything together. And then also concurrently at the same time, because it meant that one of the workshops, um, and in this instance Atelier Reunie, where the cases were made became empty. He had a very big building that was empty and it he could quickly fill it by turning it into his own museum for Patek for watches. So it sort of was like this perfect store And he was controlling it all, and um i everything had his personal touch on it. So the museum was a dream come true. Bringing all the workshops together was a dream come true. Bringing in new timepieces that served a wider audience was a dream come true. He was making things happen. And as I said, that was the creation of the foundation of w how we see Patek Philippe tod |
| Tony Traina | ay. When did you before we start to talk about sort of everything since then, when did you leave leave Patek to pursue new career opportunities? Uh two thousand and four. Gotcha. Okay. So a while a while. Yeah. So I wanted to fast forward a little bit and maybe you can talk uh, you know, from an insider perspective to observing the brand still in the industry, but how you've seen Paddock evolve since uh the nineteen nineties, we're talking about, you know, through the two thousands and twenty tens, what you've what you've seen and observed, uh how the brand has evolved through transitions in leadership throughout throughout the family and and what you've seen in that that area. Well, I think |
| Tanya Edwards | I mean the the way it's evolved has been exponential. It i it it's it's I I really don't think that at the time I was working there in the nineties, if anyone could have predicted the growth of Patek Felice. I even Philip Steer, who who, let's face it, was doing everything to propel its growth. Um it's so I think that that's the biggest difference. It's not the same company. But it's a different time. And now now it's not the retailers that are that are driving the business. It's the it's the customers that are driving the business. And uh that's a big shift, a very big shift. And um and yet and with all these new facilities, Patek has continued to do what it's always done, which is innovate. So things like advanced research that that came in in 2005. Extraordinary advances. You know, you think, okay, you've invented everything. I mean, yes, you're going to continue to improve the way you make something, but to come out with completely new innovations that that change the world of urology is mind-blowing. So it it it's it's evolving and continuing to do what it has always done, which is innovate, be a leader, and master perfection as best it can. So I've seen, I've seen it, in other words, I'm saying it's more of the same, it's just much, |
| Tony Traina | much bigger. You mentioned it a couple of times now, uh, the difference between being basically a retailer-driven company or a company that serves its retailers across the world versus one that is able to connect more directly with its customers or clients. Can you just talk from your perspective what you think the the sort of implications of of that are for for the brand and and everything around it? I think it' |
| Tanya Edwards | s you know it's a change that will every single company in the world, irrelevant of what product they're making, has had to change with. And ultimately it's social media that the world is now one place, one marketplace, and everything is available immediately. And our knowledge comes from immediate information. We don't have to wait for the publication of a magazine to come out to see I'm going to say sorry a bit by Ronnie to see a new ad campaign or um or see a new product launch um we can see it on our phone straight away and um so people are much better informed than ever before and there is so much information that it's just changed the landscape of how we make decisions, how we purchase. You know, we don't just have to go to one particular retailer in our town to buy something the world is we can buy from the world now and we can buy in different not just brick and mortar stores we can we can buy online we can buy. So that whole process of purchasing as well as information has changed. That's the biggest difference. And that's what shifted |
| Tony Traina | from the retailer to the to the client. You hinted at it there a little bit. Uh you know, social media has obviously been abuzz with with one thing in the world of paddock over the past few weeks now. Uh, and that's the cubitus. I'm gonna ask you specifically about the about your thoughts on the watch here in a second, but before we get to that, I'm wondering as someone who worked at the brand and has been quite familiar with the brand for for thirty or thirty five years at this point, if there's anything you could say to sort of situated in the historical context of the brand that people might not um have fully thought of that that you might have special sort of special POV |
| Tanya Edwards | on well that's a very interesting question. I'm glad you put it into the context of the history of the brand because I think that's really important. Um it's very unusual for Patek to come out with a new, a completely new series. And as we all know, it's been 25 years since the last time it did that, which was the 24 in 1999. And so it's not a decision that's made lightly for Patek Philippe. It's something that um they spend uh many, many years designing and researching and um to make a new case, to make a new bracelet, to what what whatever it is, let alone a new movement. And we saw of course the cubitus does have a new movement with the the the 5822p with the instantaneous grand date. But that's many, many years ago, they decided to do that. And I think that that's the important thing to put it into context. It's not something that suddenly appeared because there was a trend for a certain look at the moment. And um if we look back at history, whenever these new pieces came out, we can start really, I guess, in 1932 with the reference to 96, the Calatrava, that we know so well, i.e. a roundwatch. I mean at the time watches were new, wristwatches were new, and it might seem very obvious to us to have a round watch, but at the time it wasn't. And so that that was the start. And then um in 1968 there was the ellipse the elliptical shape watch which at the time is totally revolutionary i mean here is a completely different shape watch um that's still in the collection um and then in 1976 the watch that everybody knows about, the Nautilus came out. Um, and that was not as well received as it is today. It was a shock for a lot of people. This isn't patek. What are they thinking? Why did they come up with this really chunky steel sports watch. That's not what Patek Philippe is all about. Um, and you know, there's been that and then we get into the 90s and um the 24 and the Neptune, which got a little bit hidden, I think, with other things happening in the year it came out, such as the annual calendar. But it's they're very slow to do something new like that. So I think that's important to to recognize when looking at a new watch |
| Tony Traina | . You were around in the nineteen nineties and saw the collection saw the release of a few collections that we've talked about. You talked about the success of the 24, the Aquanaut, the Neptune, not so successful, I suppose, given that they don't have it now. But anything around those releases that you remember? And uh if so, how it compares to the initial reaction we've seen on the Cupidus over the past few weeks now? That's a really good question. |
| Tanya Edwards | So again, I'm just gonna harp back to the fact that in the 90s, it was still the retailers that mattered. It was their opinion that mattered. And the challenge was selling to retailers was getting them to accept a new watch that they're going to have to put into their watch cases. It's going to cost them money. Will it sell or not? Nobody knew. And so for them to see a timepiece that they knew they could sell, that was a big C change because there was it, you know, we weren't having to keep pushing and saying, I promise you this is gonna do great, you don't enough to worry. They knew it would sell. And so that was an immediately positive reaction, which was so exciting. And um, you know, we just it it again, I'm just it was a different media marketplace. The general public could not weigh in. There wasn't a way for the general public to weigh in because they couldn't comment until they saw it in a store. And that's a lead lag that's a lag, that's a lead type. Now everything is immediate. So to be cle |
| Tony Traina | ar, people people comment on it without having seen it in the store, right? W |
| Tanya Edwards | ell exactly. And I and I have to just say, what's if you you and I'm sure you're going to ask me what's my personal opinion? And I'm going to give you a very honest answer here, Tony. I haven't seen it in real life. And I cannot comment on a patek Philippe that I have not seen in real life because holding it, feeling it, looking at it, understanding it is a completely different thing to looking at a picture of something. And that that that that's fundamental to everything that we do at collectability is you've got to hold the watch and look at it and understand it before truly giving a comment on something. So that that's my personal opinion, but that's because I work in the industry and I have to see it |
| Tony Traina | first. It's fair enough, but I have to I have to press you on giving some sort of opinion on the watch. Perhaps not the watch itself or or what it looks like in person, but just the release of the qubitus and seeing it as a square take on the Nautilus and releasing it in um steel, two-tone, and then the new complicated version, as you mentioned. What are your thoughts, sort of just generally speaking, on the release of the Cubitus collection? Gener |
| Tanya Edwards | ally speaking, I think it's exciting. I think it's always exciting if Patek does something new. And it whether whether the whether the response is good, bad or ugly, it it's it's a conversation, isn't it? People are talking about it. So um, you know, nobody can deny it's caused a huge um amount of um conversation, and that's great. And um whether or not we we think it was inspired by the Nautilus, and I can totally understand why people would think that, of course, I can understand that. Um because I know the what how Patek works and how it will introduce a new piece. I uh I know for them they weren't thinking that. They were thinking differently at the time, you know, to design a square watch. And then they and then you know they've got this huge history and DNA to look back at well what what what what did people what what what's what what's worked what do people like what what you know how how can we incorporate aspects of a watch into something but I wasn't involved with the design of that watch so I can't comment on it truly but I think I can't wait I can't wait to see it. |
| Tony Traina | Let me put it that way. I can't wait to see it. One of the primary criticisms that I think we are seeing is that it's uh expected uh if not lazy because the bracelet is basically from the Nautilus more or less, the dial is something we are quite familiar with, the movement except for the big date version is is something that's been in the catalog for a little bit. Uh I'm wondering what you make of of those criticisms |
| Tanya Edwards | . Um I think that it's easy to summarize what you think about something and um I can totally understand why people would would make those comments, but again I think we and I I and I have to put it into a historical context. I mean whenever not not not all New Watches, but certainly some new watches, like the Nautilus itself when it first came out, was just just not appreciated, not accepted. The Neptune, which we sort of skipped over, was another very good example of a watch that people looked at and said, what is this? It's not it's not a nautilus, but it's meant to be a sports watch and it's not some this and it looks like someone else's watch. It doesn't look like Patek's watch and uh it takes time to uh accept change it takes time to absorb change and we're all human and and uh w it it's it's it's something that we're we we do instantly is give our opinion on something |
| Tony Traina | . Okay. I want to get into talking a little bit about collectability, more of the vintage market, which you all obviously focus on quite a bit. But before that, I wrote down a few rapid fire questions because I just want to get uh a little bit of a flavor for sort of your your favorite paddock references. Uh if that's okay with you. Okay. We'll start with this. Okay. F |
| Tanya Edwards | avorite Calatrava reference. I'm going to say a forty eight sixty, which is the ladies calatrava, and it and I'm saying that because it was the first Patek Philippe that I ever bought. And it's a little round calaver with a white dial and black bregae numerals. It is the classic officers type watch. And it I bought it because when I first told you that story when I was a teenager and I went into the into the Rue de Rhone Salon in Geneva and looked at Patek for the first time, it was a design I saw then that I just loved its simplicity. So that's why. |
| Tony Traina | I'm Googling it now because I wasn't familiar with it, but it's like the 26 millimeter version of there's a larger, more of like 34 or 35mm version as well. Yeah, right. Yes. |
| Tanya Edwards | And also um that the the um the officers three reference thirty nine sixty, which came out in nineteen eighty-nine, that's the the men's version of it, which I just loved. So for me, I wasn't able to get the limited edition, but I was able to get the ladies. Okay, favorite chronograph reference. So again, I'm a I'm a vintage girl, so I'm gonna say the 130, which um was Pat X Philippe's first chronograph that was in um general production. And um it started making them in 1934, which is very early, for um a series, a watch produced in series, and here was a complicated watch produced in series. Um, and it was made with the Valjou caliber 13 movement that Patek um itself then modified for its own watch, but that's that's that's the iconic movement that's in a 1518 or 2499. So um I just love the history of that and I love the design and its size. It's perfect for w aoman to wear. It's just a simple beauty. Okay, favorite calendar reference? I'm gonna say 3940, and that is for the simple reason. When I first met Philippe Stern in 1989, he was wearing a 3940. And that was a watch he mostly wore, actually. And I remember thinking, what an elegant man wearing what an elegant watch. And it just stuck in my head as being the perfect watch. And um that's a simple answer. Do you have a particular metal series, anything like that, or anything like that? Well, I'd like I I don't I I would like it in Rose Gold myself. But you know, it's like chasing a snowball down a h down a very steep hill getting 3940. Because they keep going up, up, up. And I can't afford one up. So um ye |
| Tony Traina | ah. Anyway, so that's that. Uh okay, moving up a little bit. Favorite grand complic |
| Tanya Edwards | ation You know, I'd like to say my favorite grand complication is the calibrating nine because that w was can you imagine being in your twenties, in your early twenties, and that your introduction to Patek Philippe is the calibre eighty nine. That that's that's what you have to understand in watchmaking. I mean that it it is was mind blowing and I learnt a lot from just understanding what the calibre eighty nine was all about. But um I would say that in terms of a watch to wear, that would be my absolute dream, it's very easy. A minute repeater. Any minute repeater will do. Any minute repeater will do, but when the 7000 came out, which is the lady's first minute repeater in Rose Gold, that melted my heart. And that would be my dream grand complication. A perfect simple watch |
| Tony Traina | . Okay, I think I've caught a glimpse of it, but what paddle is on your wrist today? What what's on the wrist tod |
| Tanya Edwards | ay? Um I'm wearing um a 3848 ellipse. And um what's interesting about this particular ellipse is its uh bracelet, which was made by Kepler and Kearns, who are a um uh a jeweller in Zurich and um they made the bracelet for this watch. I was it was originally on a um a strap. I still have the strap, the original strap that came with it. But I just love this bracelet. I think it's really funky |
| Tony Traina | . Yeah, it's beautiful for those listening. It's kind of a bangle style bracelet. It's like a bangle style, yes. Yeah, it's beautiful. Great in the summer when it's hot |
| Tanya Edwards | . Hey, it might be time to change it back to the strap then, huh? Yeah, exactly. But I just love it. So John Ridden, the founder of Collectibility, and myself, we are passionately in love with um ellipses. So um you'll you'll you'll you'll you'll see you'll you'll usually find one of us wearing an ellipse. But I'm wearing another watch as well. Actually, this is a watch. This is this is this is this is a pendant watch, which I know you can't see because it's too far away. But if I turn it over, it's it's got a little dial there. |
| Tony Traina | Oh so for those listening, it's it's Tanya's necklace and on the back side it's a it's a paddock uh pending watch. |
| Tanya Edwards | And it was made in nineteen twelve and um it's uh which was the end of the um art um not it's just before Art Deco, but um Art Nouveau period and it is made out of platinum and blue enamel and it it's called Geeland is the is the style of it because it's um it it's got a lattice work of design which is made out of um tiny little strips of um platinum with diamonds in set into it, and that overlays a blue enamel guillet case cover. It's absolutely exquisite. And um if anyone who's visited the Path Philippe Museum may remember that there is a whole case of um Guillaume style pendant watches because Philippe Stern absolutely loves them and he's collected quite a few beautiful pieces. So whenever we see one, it's a special treat for us. So I had to we |
| Tony Traina | ar this. That's beautiful. Hey, we appreciate it. Two watches. Uh two sounds like someone knew someone knew she was coming on Hodiky Radio today. So we exact. Exactly. You mentioned your love for the ellipse, both of you at collectibility. Can you explain that a little bit more for those who maybe don't appreciate the ellipse. Uh talk a little bit more about why it's so enticing for you all. I think it |
| Tanya Edwards | 's um uh uh uh uh two reasons. One it it's a unique shape for a for a watch. It's the elliptical shape which is um based on the the golden circle, which is a really a perfect shape for us as human beings. It's a face, it's it's with where the eyes cut a face, and um it's where uh if you look at a branch, wherever a bud or it is is placed at on a branch is this perfect, um one to one point six, which is what an ellipse is. Um and so it's very aesthetically pleasing for us to look at an um an ellipse-shaped watch. And then the blue-gold dial is something that really distinguishes an ellipse. And Patek patented that ability to literally make blued gold and what it is is it's cobalt that is um basically blasted onto the gold You're talking about the dial, the blue dial. I'm talking about the blue dial. Yeah. And it just shimmers and has this most hypnotic look. So I mean I can spend hours just looking at my watch, but you know, that's me. I like looking at beautiful things |
| Tony Traina | . Surely that's everyone who's listening to a watch podcast. Uh you would think so too. Yes. Yes. When you when we were going through some of your favorite references, something that stuck out was you mentioned a few ladies' references, the 4860, the 7000. I wonder if you could I wonder if you could talk a little bit more about um collecting vintage collecting vintage paddock or collecting ladies watches in particular what um just unpacking that area of paddock and paddock references a little bit more for people who are more interested in smaller watches, may they be a man or a woman since this is so hot right now. Just something that people could understand about this segment of of the paddock catalog and the paddock back catalog that they may not |
| Tanya Edwards | . Well, I think um you heard me say earlier on that um the 24 was so important because it at last was a signature ladies' timepiece for Patek Philippe. Um that we uh everybody felt the brand was missing. But um Patek has always made ladies' watches. It's made ladies' watches from the very beginning. In fact, the first known Swiss wristwatch was made for a lady. Um and so it it's um it's always been in their catalogue they love decorat dec decorating so that be it be that in enameling or diam uh or adding precious jewels or um uh Any kind of decoration. So the ladies' watches gave them an opportunity to really excel and show show their skills in decoration. And so they've always made ladies' watches, and there is a huge catalogue of ladies' watches in the vintage market. We don't see them come up for sale often enough because there isn't the demand for them. But I think that once that starts to change, we'll see more and more coming onto the market. And ladies' watches offer ladies' Patek Philippe watches offer real value for money. I mean, look at this exquisite necklace that I'm wearing, um, pendant timepiece. It truly is a piece of jewellery, but it's also happens to be a path Philippe. And um there there but you don't have to wear a necklace to wear a beautiful ladies what patek. And um I think there's enormous untapped opportunity for ladies Patek Philippe's they made so many different designs and um one of my favorite eras for Patek Philippe ladies' watches is the Gilbert Albert era, which is from the late 50s, mid-50s into the early 60s, where he just turned watch design upside down. And some of the funkiest, coolest things ever created were created by him for Patek Philippe in terms of really unusual looking watches and exquisitely decorated pieces of jewellery. And I think that as p now that women uh are becoming really interested in fine time pieces, mechanical timepieces, we'll see demand start to change. We're also seeing it because you alluded to it just yourself then is this interest at last for smaller watches. So um and I say at last because we don't need to wear a huge watch. We what watches are the themselves beautifully balanced pieces. So um and we've seen uh celebrities such as Bad Bunny where ladies Patek Philippe watches from the 1990s. I can't tell you how thrilled and excited I was when I saw him wearing a couple. A Timothy Chamonet wearing a ladies' cartier. There isn't a a men's and a lady's anymore. Everything is unisex. I this is a man's watch. I I I um I have a lot of men's watches. And um so for me it's not whether something is a man's or a lady's watch, but um it it it's I love the very pretty, delicate ladies' watches and I and they are true. You're gonna get into collecting vintage watches, it's a it's a it's a value proposition to buy these time pieces because they're undervalued at the moment |
| Tony Traina | . This episode will be running right before the Geneva auction season, actually. So I'm curious to the extent you've had a chance to flip through the catalogs at at the larger and you know even some of the more smaller midsize auction houses. Anything in particular you're excited about coming up from the world of Patek Philippe |
| Tanya Edwards | ? Well we we're very privileged in that um we will be bidding on um some exceptional timepieces for clients from around the world. But for uh you know what what what what we are always looking at, looking for is the same old thing, is ellipses and pocket watches. We that's the other thing we love at collectibility is pocket watches. So so for us, if we see a pocket watch, we can't resist it and we have to look at it and um especially if it's if it's uh special or unusual, um, then it's got our name on it. So um you know it it's interesting. It's a very interesting time. Um I I we'll all be watching the thirty nine seventies, the perpetual chronographs to see what happens because as uh many of you know and many of your listeners know, um just recently in Hong Kong, one sold for over $400,000, a second series white gold version. So um, you know, that's a sea change. That's a shift. And um it'll be interesting to see if that continues in Geneva. There are some 3970s for sale, so we'll see. Um and it's just i it's it it's always a benchmark, it's always a very good measurement of the market to see what's happening in Geneva. We call it the World C |
| Tony Traina | up of watch options. You mentioned the thirty nine forty a minute ago, sort of the market for that being like uh you know trying to catch a a snowball rolling downhill, the market for the thirty nine seventy as well. Can you just talk a little bit more about those two markets in general, sort of that neo-vintage complicated era, like what we're seeing there and whether you think it's sustainable and all that |
| Tanya Edwards | . I definitely think it's sustainable. And I think it's it's a it's a reaction to the fact that a complicated Patek for Leap today, a modern complicated patek for leap, can be upwards of $100,000. That's an eye-watering amount of money. And these are exceptional complications um that can be bought for often half that amount um the half the amount of a of a of a modern uh complication and so I think that people are really appreciating that, and then that coupled with the fact that people they're not put off by a smaller watch now. You know, they can understand that that looks okay. You don't need a 40 millimeter plus watch to be wearing a watch. And so that's the that I think that shift has helped along with understanding a much better understanding of how incredible these timepieces are, that they're still very relevant as as um uh in important mechanical timepie |
| Tony Traina | ces well we'll we'll keep our fingers crossed that the rose gold 3940 comes your way someday soon thank you you're very sweet to say that before I let you go Tanya anything else in the world of collectibility that the that the people should look for look forward to I'll I'll say I'll give a plug because you'll probably too be too humble to to do it on your own but you and John do an excellent job with the collectibility podcast. I'd say it publishes about monthly, though it's been on a bit of a hiatus for the past couple of months. So I'm crossing my fingers that it'll come back soon, but but what else is cook |
| Tanya Edwards | ing? Well, uh I just just on that. Yes, we've had a bit of a hiatus, but I can assure you that there are there are podcasts in in the can, as they say, technically. Um and they will be coming out shortly. And um we're really excited for one of them in particular. So so um there is stuff coming, but thank you for that kind um compliment there, Tony. Um listen, we we're we're gonna keep keep doing what we're doing. We're Patek only and we're we're an online business and we're particularly proud that we're only five years old, but we won uh the Watch Pro vintage and pre-owned watch retailer of the year. Da da. So um, you know, we we we we we felt very proud to compete against the big boys there with just one brand. So what we are always constantly doing is how can we improve? How can we find better watches? How can we give better information and because of that John I mean to do that John and I are constantly learning every day and improving our own knowledge and sharing our own knowledge but we hope to um have some fun with retailers and maybe uh we're planning to do some pop-ups so you'll see collectability installs um and we are doing more shows so we will be at Miami in January and then later in the year we will be at the Las Vegas Antique Fair. And um even though we're as I said, we're remaining an an an online business, but we love, love, love meeting people and being out in the real world. So |
| Tony Traina | hopefully we'll do more of that. Well, as you say as well, one of the only ways to truly appreciate a a paddock or or any any watch is to see them in person. So appreciate that. You'll be doing more of that in the next year. 100%. Well, Tanya, with that, thank you so much for taking the time. Of course, follow Collectibility Online on all of their social media channels. And I want to say thank you to everyone for listening. Thanks to Vic Autominelli for editing, and we'll see you again soon for another episode of Hodinky Radio. |