Important Collectors Wristwatches, P...
New York - The Fuller Building, Dec 07, 2006
LOT 64
"Grande Complication"
International Watch Co., Schaffhausen, "Grande Complication", No. 16/50, Ref. 3770. Made in a limited edition of
50 examples in 1991.
Very fine and extremely rare, oversized, astronomic, minute-repeating, self-winding, platinum gentleman?s wristwatch with
square button chronograph, registers, secular perpetual calendar, moon phases and a platinum IWC buckle.
USD 60,000 - 80,000
EUR 47,000 - 63,000
Sold: USD 77,880
C. Three-body, solid, polished, case back with 6 screws, inclined bezel, curved straight lugs, screwed-down crown, sapphire crystal. D. White with applied yellow baton gold indexes, subsidiary dials for the seconds, the 12-hour and 30-minute registers, the date, days of the week, and the months, apertures for the four-digit year and the moon phases. Yellow gold ?baton? hands. M. Cal 79091, rhodiumplated, "fausses côtes" decoration, 68 jewels, straight line lever escapement, monometallic balance, shock absorber, self-compensating flat balance spring, repeating on gongs by activating slide on the band. Dial, case and movement signed. Diam. 42 mm. Thickness 16 mm.
| Grading System | |
|---|---|
Grade: |
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Case: 1 |
As new |
Movement: 1 |
As new |
Dial: 1-01 |
As new HANDS Original |
Notes
In the 1870s, American-born Florentine Ariosto Jones, who had been appointed director of the E. Howard & Co. watchmaking factory in Boston at the early age of 27, decided to manufacture high-quality movements and watch parts for the American market using American technology and skilled labor from Switzerland, where wages were comparatively low. However, the skilled workers in the Geneva region and in the remote valleys of the Jura mountains resisted the plans of a man they considered an intruder, and it was not until Jones teamed up with Johann Heinrich Moser from Schaffhausen that his plan could be realized. Moser had built a hydrostation in Schaffhausen powered by water from the Rhine River, which generated low-cost energy. In 1868, Jones settled on the banks of the Rhine, creating the International Watch Company. Schaffhausen had long been a watchmaking town, with a clock-maker's guild existing there since 1583.