Swiss/American 18K gold five-minute repeating lever watch Circa 1887

Gold five-minute repeater by Patek Philippe
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A fine and rare Swiss/American 18 carat gold open faced five-minute repeating keyless lever pocket watch, circa 1887. Sold as a movement only on May 31, 1889, retailed and cased by Tiffany & Co. Nickel ¼ plate movement, 29 jewels, wolf’s tooth winding, counterpoised straight-line lever escapement, cut bimetallic compensation balance, blued steel Breguet balance spring, swan-neck micrometre regulator, repeating on gongs activated by a slide on the band. A hinged gold cuvette. White enamel dial with black Arabic hours, outer minute divisions with red Arabic five-minute numerals, subsidiary seconds at 6 o’clock and blued steel spade hands. The polished case with a concealed hinge. Dial, case and movement numbered and signed Tiffany & Co. Accompanied by an Extract from the Archives.
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Diameter: 48 mm
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Thickness: 12 mm
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Signed: Tiffany & Co
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The Extract from the Archives confirms that the movement of this timepiece was sold without a case on May 31, 1889. This was the normal practice when Patek Philippe supplied movements to Tiffany & Co who preferred to case watches in-house. The dial though undoubtedly of Patek Philippe manufacture and seemingly original is described as having Breguet numerals, not Dauphine and the movement as being 13”’ rather than 17”’ which may be an oversight by the original ledger-clerc.
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Tiffany & Co, colloquially known as Tiffany’s, was founded in 1837 by the jeweller Charles Lewis Tiffany and became famous in the early 20th century under the artistic direction of his son Louis Comfort Tiffany. It is an American luxury jewellery and speciality design house headquartered on Fifth Avenue in Manhattan, New York.
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On May 1st, 1839 the Polish businessman and aristocrat Antoine Norbert Count de Patek and the Polish watchmaker Franciszek Czapek founded a company in Geneva named Patek, Czapek & Cie. Czapek lived in Switzerland since 1832 and changed his name to François Czapek when he became nationalized. The company ran well but each went their own way in 1844 and set up their own company: Czapek & Cie which continued till 1869 and Patek & Cie.

1844 Patek met the French watchmaker Jean-Adrien Philippe at the Paris World’s Fair. Philippe had already enriched the watch’s history with one of its most revolutionary inventions: the crown winding. Since then watches needed no longer to be wound with an additional key, but both the winding and the time adjustment of the hands could now be performed much easier by the crown. On May 15^th, 1845 Jean-Adrien Philippe and Vincent Gostkowski entered the company. In the same year, a patent for a watch with a winding stem and hand adjustment mechanism was applied. They produced the first watch with a minute repeater. On January 1^st, 1851 the company’s name was changed to Patek, Philippe & Cie. In 1881, a patent for a precision adjustment was applied by Philippe.

On February 1^st, 1901 Patek, Philippe & Cie was converted into a stock corporation and renamed Ancienne Manufacture d’Horlogerie Patek, Philippe & Cie S.A. A patent for a double chronograph was applied in 1902. The company continues through significant inventions, which are highly regarded. In 1932, Patek Philippe was taken over by Charles and Jean Stern, after which the company name changed to Patek Philippe S.A. Thierry Stern (fourth generation) took office in 2009 as president. The company has 70 patents and produces the entire clockwork in-house. Their luxurious timepieces are of high quality and therefore often raise record amounts at auctions. A pocket watch produced in 1933 was sold at auction for 11 million euros in 1999. A world record at that time. On November 11^th, 2014, it was auctioned again and this time it was sold for 19 million euros. On the occasion of the 150^th-anniversary celebration in 1989, the legendary Calibre 89 is presented, which took nine years to develop. With 33 complications and 1728 components, this watch is regarded as a pocket watch of superlatives. Both dials together it has 24 hands and 12 dials, in addition, a minute repeater with a large and small carillion, an alarm function, a tourbillon, a perpetual calendar, a split-second chronograph movement and over 20 other complications. The most complicated pocket watch movement at all.

Patek Philippe, together with Audemars Piguet (1875), Vacheron Constantin (1755) and A. Lange und Söhne (1845) is considered to be ‘the big four’ in the watchmaking world. Today it is one of the few still independent watch companies. The company is also the only Geneva manufacturer, whose entire production of mechanical watch movements is awarded with the Geneva Seal (Poinçon de Genève).