After lots of fanfarePhillips made $6.6 million in its Imperial Patek Philippe direct sale in Hong Kong, tmost of which comes from the star lot, a historic Patek Philippe reference 96 Quantieme Lune wristwatch that belonged to Aisin-Gioro Puyi, the last emperor of the Qing dynasty in China.
The unique timepiece, thought to be lost until it resurfaced recently, sold for $6.2 million to an unidentified Asian collector based in Hong Kong. The buyer placed the winning bid over the phone after “six minutes of heated bidding”, according to a Phillips spokesperson.
The watch was a feat of horological engineering when it was designed by the Swiss watchmaker in 1937, combining a draft movement mechanism, moon phase indicator and three-date calendar into a single ultra- thin “Roulette”.
Organized with Bacs & Russo, the Geneva auction house specializing in fine watchmaking and jewelry, the evening sale took place at Phillips’ new Asian headquarters in Hong Kong’s West Kowloon cultural district. According to a spokesperson, the participating collectors came from 56 countries and were between 25 and 60 years old.
Patek Philippe by Aisin-Gioro Puyi and a watercolor by his brother-in-law Gobulo Runqi. Copyright: Phillips/Jess Hoffman. Courtesy of Philips.
Puyi’s notable life and times are dramatized in Bernardo Bertolucci the last emperor. The 1987 biopic was the first Western production authorized by the People’s Republic of China to shoot in Beijing’s Forbidden City, where Puyi ascended the throne at the age of two. The Xinhai Revolution forced his abdication only four years later, in 1912.
Puyi was expelled from the Forbidden City in 1924. Ten years later, he was declared Emperor of Manchukuo, a Japanese puppet state on mainland China. With the fall of Japan in 1945, Puyi was captured by the Soviets and imprisoned for five years before his extradition to China, where he was eventually allowed to reenter Chinese society.
Although it is unclear how Puyi came to own the watch, its exceptional provenance as the personal possession of an emperor helped Phillips set three records at the sale: the highest amount paid for a reference Patek Philippe 96, the highest amount paid for a wristwatch previously owned by an emperor, and the most valuable of all lots sold by Phillips Watches in Asia.
Installation view of Puyi’s red paper fan (left) and his notebook with that of Confucius Analects before the sale in Hong Kong. Courtesy of Philips.
“We also saw many collectors from different categories such as Chinese paintings, ceramics and antiques that are new to Phillips vying for the works offered in today’s sale,” said Thomas Perazzi, Head of Watches. from Phillips for Asia. “I am delighted with this groundbreaking sale for the international collecting community.”
The sale also yielded outstanding results for other artifacts belonging to Puyi during his five-year detention in a Russian prison. The notebook he kept, as well as a leather-bound edition of the book of Confucius Analects, sold for nearly $122,000, nearly five times its pre-sale estimate. Additionally, a red paper fan he inscribed and gifted to the Russian interpreter who assisted him sold for $77,846, six times its pre-sale estimate.
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