Patek Philippe

patrick_y
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Love is difficult to describe.

How does one describe an emotion without using another emotion in the description. In other words, emotions are not something that is tangible, quantifiable, nor even describable (without using another emotion).

My first "love" with wristwatches started when I was very young with Jaeger-LeCoultre in 1997. I was in Germany and I was looking at a Jaeger-LeCoultre advertisement. The advertisement depicted a Jaeger-LeCoultre Reverso with both faces displayed, I mistook this photo as a display photo and I literally assumed that the watch looked like a book and had two faces. This misunderstanding prevented me from being able to accurately describe the watch.

For nearly a decade, my love with Jaeger-LeCoultre would not subside, particularly my love for the Reverso Duo and the Grande Reverso GMT.

While I was in love with Jaeger-LeCoultre, I was primarily focused on square watches from the Reverso collection. Because I identified Jaeger-LeCoultre as a square watch company, I focused slightly less attention to the Master (round watches) line. This left an area exposed, an itch that could be scratched; I was very fortunate that my current love came to scratch that itch.

I collected fountain pens and my fountain pen dealer (which happened to sell wristwatches) had a particular round wristwatch lying upside down one day. It was the 240 caliber, and immediately I was impressed with how well finished the movement was, the technical sophistication of the movement, and the thinness of the movement. Immediately, I started a love affair with my mistress Patek Philippe.

It is important to note for the record; during my love with Jaeger-LeCoultre and before my "official" affair with Patek Philippe; I did have a special diversion with Audemars Piguet. This was a very meaningful relationship, but not one that took away from my love with Jaeger-LeCoultre. With Audemars Piguet, I had a very thorough relationship with the Royal Oak line and other complicated wristwatches. This relationship was terminated when I learned that Audemars Piguet was going be changing the Royal Oak, the new Royal Oak was to have a clear crystal back and a lower price. I saw this as Audemars Piguet being unloyal to their previous clients (by lowering the price) and I wasn't certain if I agreed with this. Thus, my relationship with Audemars Piguet never fully blossomed, and slowlywaned; the relationship started just prior to Audemar Piguet's launch of the "Who is behind an Audemars Piguet" ad campaign and ended a year after the new Royal Oak wristwatches arrived to the United States.

Approximately after ten years in love with Jaeger-LeCoultre, I declared Patek Philippe to be my new lover. The model that I was in love with at Patek Philippe had to have the 240 caliber, hours, minutes, small seconds (preferably), and the date (since I don't always remember the date). Instantly, I was attuned towards the 6000G.

Despite my love with the Patek Philippe 6000G, nobody shared my enthusiasm for this very strange piece. The 6000G was considered by many to be the "black sheep" or "oddball" of the Patek Philippe family (not because the dial was black, but...) because the eccentric display of the date cluttered the dial and made the watch dial appear "busy" and cluttered. This didn't disturb me, since the watch met my requirements and I was overall very much attracted to the watch - especially the 240 caliber movement.

Today; my favorite Patek Philippe watches are; 5146G slate dial, 6000G, 5712/1A, 5140J, 5070P, 5970G, 5078P, 3939HP, and the 5074P. It is also important that I give credit to Patek Philippe for starting my love of automatic movements with micro-rotors; it's an automatic that doesn't have half of the movement covered with a weight.

Today; my love for wristwatches has truly blossomed and reached completely different corners of the market; after seeing and meeting timepieces from some very unique independent manufactures, I now favor many small independents.

And I still continue to love Patek Philippe and Jaeger-LeCoultre.

That's my current love story!
This message has been edited by patrick_y on 2010-02-21 19:53:00