Highlights: Phillips Geneva Online Auction Fall 2024
The fall auction season kicks off with online auctions, before the primary live sales that take place in November. Phillips in Geneva just opened its online auction with a 70-lot offering of the familiar and mainstream (think Aquanaut, Royal Oak, and Nautilus), but also the esoteric and independent, ranging from an Alain Silberstein perpetual calendar made by Svend Andersen to a Seiko Izul “bullhead” chronograph. We round up a few highlights from the sale, which runs from September 5-12, 2024, with the catalogue and bidding available online. Lot 9 – Alain Silberstein Marine Perpetual Calendar by Svend Andersen Part of Alain Silberstein’s Marine series of dive watches, the Marine Perpetual is a COSC-certified perpetual calendar in a case rated to 200 m. It’s equipped with a clever, double-sided perpetual calendar movement developed by Svend Andersen. Built on an ETA 2892, the perpetual calendar has a minimalist display with only the date on the dial that’s decorated in Silberstein’s trademark style with geometric shapes, primary colours, along with a starfish, crescent, and sun. On the reverse is the months and leap year in a single register that is mounted on the periphery of the movement, allowing the rotor to travel below the indicator. The Marine Perpetual was a limited edition of 100 watches, though it is likely fewer were made, since they are rarely encountered. It was one of several collaborations that Alain Silberstein in the 1990s with prominent in...