History has just been made at Phillips New York with the sale of the very first Patek Philippe Tiffany & Co. 5711/1A-018 Nautilus.
As officially the first one made available to the market, the watch quickly broke its humble estimate of “excess of $50,000 USD” when the bidding started off at $20,000 USD, where it proceeded to jump to its retail price of $50,000 USD before blasting off into the six digits — jumping $100,000 USD with each bid. The impressive $3.5 million USD price kept increasing until the hammer dropped at $5.35 million USD to a buyer in New York.
Factoring the auction premium, the final price tag for this watch is a staggering $6.5 million USD, with all proceeds going to the Nature Conservancy. Hate it or love it, this sale marks another milestone for the luxury watch industry.
