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Patek Philippe Henry Graves Supercomplication

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The Patek Philippe Henry Graves Supercomplication (no. 198.385) is one of the most complicated mechanical pocket watches ever created. The 18-karat gold watch has 24 complications and was assembled by Patek Philippe . It was named after banker Henry Graves Jr. who supposedly commissioned it out of his desire to outdo the Grande Complication pocketwatch of American automaker James Ward Packard . The two were both at the top of the watch collecting world, regularly commissioning innovative new timepieces.

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27-568: Patek Philippe produced its first grand complication pocket watch in 1898 (no. 97.912); it had previously been believed the firm's first grand complication had been produced in 1910, and the second was delivered to Packard in 1916. The rivalry between Packard and Graves, who both commissioned timepieces from Patek Philippe, included two singular grand complication watches for Packard, one delivered in 1916 with sixteen complications ( foudroyante , no. 174.129), and another in 1927 with ten complications (the "Packard Sky Chart", no. 198.023) and two for Graves,

54-408: A celestial chart for the nighttime sky of New York City at 40 degrees 41.0 minutes North latitude . Its diameter is 74 millimetres (2.9 in); thickness of case with glass 36 millimetres (1.4 in); and weight 536 grams (18.9 oz). The case alone weighs 250 grams (8.8 oz) and was manufactured by Luc Rochat of L'Abbaye. Other credited watchmakers include: The Supercomplication features

81-504: A multitude of media productions including a British comedy film, titled Calendar Girls in 2003, a West End show in 2009, and a musical production in 2012, titled The Girls. Tricia Stewart, one of the original calendar girls, also known as Miss October, even went on to publish her own autobiography, Calendar Girl, in which she retells the initial creation of the publicity stunt and how it changed their lives forever. Westminster chimes The Westminster Quarters , from its use at

108-672: A perpetual calendar, sunrise and sunset times, and a celestial map of New York as seen from the Graves's apartment at 834 Fifth Avenue .  The record was bested in 1989 when Patek Philippe released the Patek Philippe Calibre 89 , but the Supercomplication remains the most complicated mechanical watch built without the assistance of computers. Henry Graves spent 60,000  Swiss francs ( US$ 15,000) when he commissioned it in 1925. Adjusting for inflation,

135-434: A tiny scale. The timepiece is a gold, double-dialled and double-openfaced, minute repeating clockwatch with Westminster chimes , grande and petite sonnerie, split seconds chronograph, registers for 60-minutes and 12-hours, perpetual calendar accurate to the year 2100, moon-phases, equation of time, dual power reserve for striking and going trains, mean and sidereal time, central alarm, indications for times of sunrise/sunset and

162-464: Is some doubt over exactly who composed it: Joseph Jowett , Regius Professor of Civil Law , was given the job, but he was probably assisted by either John Randall (1715–1799), who was the Professor of Music from 1755, or his undergraduate pupil, William Crotch (1775–1847). This chime is traditionally, though without substantiation, believed to be a set of variations on the four notes that make up

189-528: The Leroy 01 (1904, twenty complications) and the Breguet No. 160 "Marie Antoinette" (1827).  It took three years to design, and another five years to manufacture the watch, which was delivered to Henry Graves on January 19, 1933. The Supercomplication was the world's most complicated mechanical timepiece for more than 50 years, with a total of 24 different functions. These included Westminster chimes,

216-775: The Palace of Westminster , is a melody used by a set of four quarter bells to mark each quarter-hour. It is also known as the Westminster Chimes , Cambridge Quarters , or Cambridge Chimes , from its place of origin, the Church of St Mary the Great, Cambridge . The Westminster Quarters are sounded by four quarter bells hung next to Big Ben in the Elizabeth Tower belfry in the Palace of Westminster . These are: The quarters consist of five changes, combinations of

243-469: The Palace of Westminster , where the bell Big Ben hangs. From there its fame spread. It is now one of the most commonly used chimes for striking clocks . According to the church records of Trinity Episcopal Church (Williamsport, Pennsylvania) , this chime sequence was incorporated into a tower clock mechanism by E. Howard & Co. , Boston, Massachusetts. The clock and chime in Trinity's steeple base

270-474: The "Grand Complication" (1926, no. 198.052) and "Supercomplication" (1932, no. 198.385). However, the rivalry story is apocryphal, and it is not clear that Packard and Graves ever met; the rivalry may have been fabricated in the early 1990s as a publicity stunt by Alan Banbery, a former director of Patek Philippe, for the unveiling of the Calibre 89 . Other complicated watches that Graves sought to excel included

297-732: The Supercomplication was exhibited at the Patek Philippe Museum in Geneva. The new owner was later revealed to be a member of the Qatari Royal Family , Sheikh Saud bin Muhammed Al Thani . Prince Sheikh Saud died on 9 November 2014, and the watch was sent again for auction. On 10 July 2014, Sotheby's announced that in November 2014, the pocket watch would once again be auctioned. On 11 November 2014,

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324-537: The actual sounds of the bells and that the pitch of the Big Ben clip is closer to F than E in modern concert pitch . An actual recording may be heard in the summary section above. The prayer inscribed on a plaque in the Big Ben clock room reads: All through this hour Lord be my guide That by Thy power No foot shall slide. The conventional prayer is: O Lord our God Be Thou our guide That by Thy help No foot may slide. An alternative prayer changes

351-529: The fifth and sixth bars of " I know that my Redeemer liveth " from Handel 's Messiah . This is why the chime is also played by the bells of the so-called Red Tower in Halle , the native town of Handel. In 1851, the chime was adopted by Edmund Beckett Denison (an amateur horologist , and graduate of Trinity College, Cambridge , who was familiar with the Great St Mary's chime) for the new clock at

378-703: The following 24 functions. Other supercomplicated pocket watches include: Publicity stunt In marketing , a publicity stunt is a planned event designed to attract the public's attention to the event's organizers or their cause. Publicity stunts can be professionally organized, or set up by amateurs. Such events are frequently utilized by advertisers and celebrities , many of whom are athletes and politicians. Stunts employing humour and pranks have been regularly used by protest movements to promote their ideas and campaigns as well as challenge opponents. Organizations sometimes seek publicity by staging newsworthy events that attract media coverage. They can be in

405-494: The form of groundbreakings , world record attempts, dedications, press conferences , or organized protests . By staging and managing these types of events, the organizations attempt to gain some form of control over what is reported in the media. Successful publicity stunts have news value, offer photo , video , and sound bite opportunities, and are arranged primarily for media coverage. It can be difficult for organizations to design successful publicity stunts that highlight

432-442: The four pitches provided by these quarter bells ( G ♯ 4 , F ♯ 4 , E 4 , B 3 ) in the key E major . This generates five unique changes as follows: Each of the five changes is played as three crotchets (quarter note) and a minim (half note) and are always played in the sequence 1, 2, 3, 4, 5. This sequence of five changes is used twice every hour as follows: The number of changes used matches

459-432: The message instead of burying it. The importance of publicity stunts is for generating news interest and awareness for the concept, product, or service being marketed. In 1933, J.P. Morgan Jr. was summoned to appear before Senate Banking and Currency Committee due to their suspicions of his previous banking activity throughout the financial crash. During the congressional hearings, U.S. Senator Carter Glass remarked that

486-420: The number of quarter hours passed. Because the five changes are used twice, and in the same sequence, the mechanism that trips the hammers needs to be programmed with only five changes instead of ten, reducing its complexity. Both the third quarter and the full hour require the fourth quarter bell, B 3 , to be rung twice in quick succession (changes 4,5,1 and 2,3,4,5); too quick for the hammer to draw back for

513-399: The proceedings had turned into a circus as things had begun to appear out of hand. The Ringling Brothers as well as Barnum & Bailey Circus were both in D.C. at the time of the hearing. Thus, they interpreted Senator Glass' remarks as an invitation and asked their press agent to place a female circus dwarf named Lya Graf, on Morgan Jr.'s lap during one of the hearings. While the addition of

540-603: The sale of the Patek Philippe Grandmaster Chime at the Only Watch charity auction at Christie's in Geneva in 2019. Henry Graves Jr. died in 1953. His daughter Gwendolen inherited the Supercomplication and in 1960 passed it to her son, Reginald 'Pete' Fullerton. In 1969, Fullerton sold the piece to Seth G. Atwood , founder of the " Time Museum " and an American industrialist, for US$ 200,000 (equivalent to $ 1,700,000 in 2023). After that,

567-486: The second strike. To address this, the fourth quarter bell is equipped with two hammers on opposite sides and becomes, effectively, a fifth bell for the mechanism to play. The first and third quarters finish on the dominant , B, while the half and full hours finish on the tonic , E, producing the satisfying musical effect that has contributed to the popularity of the chimes. The following sounds have been recreated as electronic, MIDI files and do not necessarily represent

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594-603: The small lady surprised Morgan and infuriated Glass, it also gained significant publicity for Ringling Brothers Circus. In 1999, a group of 11 women from the Women's Institute (in Yorkshire, UK) stripped for a calendar to raise money for the Leukaemia Research Fund . Setting a goal of $ 5,000, the group of Women's Institute women feared that they would struggle to sell even a 1,000 copies. The calendar released

621-627: The sum is roughly equivalent to $ 219,000 in 2019. When he took delivery, he did not want to be known as the owner of "the world's most complicated watch", fearing the threat to his family based on the notoriety of the Lindbergh kidnapping . When it was most recently sold in 2014, the Supercomplication established a new record for the most expensive watch ever sold at auction , with a final price of 24 million US dollars (23,237,000 CHF ) sold in Geneva on 11 November 2014; that has since been exceeded by

648-659: The third line: O Lord our God Be Thou our guide So by Thy power No foot shall slide. A variation on this, to the same tune, is prayed at the end of Brownie meetings in the UK and Canada: O Lord our God Thy children call Grant us Thy peace And bless us all. Amen. The Westminster Quarters were originally written in 1793 for a new clock in Great St Mary's , the University Church in Cambridge . There

675-766: The watch was displayed in the Time Museum in Rockford, Illinois , US, a horological museum, until it closed in March 1999. From January 2001 to February 2004, some of the Time Museum collection was displayed at Chicago's Museum of Science and Industry , then sold. However, the Supercomplication was auctioned in December 1999. The watch was sold at Sotheby's for a record-breaking $ 11,002,500 to an anonymous bidder in New York City on 2 December 1999. From 2001 to 2005,

702-439: The watch was sold in Geneva, Switzerland. The final price, bid by Aurel Bacs serving as proxy for an anonymous entity, reached 23,237,000 Swiss Francs, equivalent to US$ 24 million at the time. The sum established a new highest price for a timepiece, including both pocket watches and wristwatches. The timepiece contains 920 individual parts, with 430 screws, 110 wheels, 120 removable parts, and 70 jewels, all of them handcrafted on

729-455: Was eventually released on April 12, 1999, and featured all 11 women posing nude – obscured by baked goods, flower arrangements, sewing adornments, teapots, song sheets, and even a grand piano. Despite leaving people of this time stunned, over 800,000 copies of the calendar were sold worldwide. After its initial release in 1999, the calendar raised over 5 million euros or over 4.8 million U.S dollars. This publicity stunt eventually went on to inspire

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