Phillips Watches Presents Le Concours de Complexité – A F.P. Journe Watch Collection

If your new year’s resolution for 2023 is to not buy any more watches, until at least the May auction season, then Phillips could force a mission-abort signal for fans of hot independent watchmaking. Whilst most us will be looking in the mirror and promising that we will hit the gym every day from now on, Phillips is straight out of the traps with a single owner collection sale of F.P. Journe watches. Following the success of the Beauty in Everything sale from December, where The Armoury founder Mark Cho’s eclectic collection of watches was offered as an online and app only sale, Phillip’s is offering a tightly curated collection for one week online. If you have even a passing interest in François-Paul’s watches, you won’t want to miss this.

Phillips is dubbing the sale, Le Concours de Complexité, which translates to competition of complexity. This name represents the journey that Journe has been on as both a brand and a master watchmaker, challenging the status quo and demonstrating its appetite for creating highly desirable and innovative watches. There is little to no arguing that Journe’s creations are outstanding and also that his watches are stand-out performers at auction. I touched on this in my end of year wrap-up of the auction market, with Phillips having sold some outstanding examples from F.P. Journe that secured some very impressive results. The stand outs were a rare platinum Octa Calendrier with brass automatic movement and vibrant yellow gold dial. That hammered above estimate at $264.6k and a 1999 souscription tourbillon, dating to the year the brand was founded and one of six known with pink gold dials that sold for an impressive $1.24 million.

The sale is being managed in Hong Kong by Thomas Perazzi, Head of Watches in Asia, who also oversaw the Cho collection sale. He is confident that the sale will be another success for the house. He says, “We are honoured to be entrusted with the sale of this F.P. Journe collection formed by a visionary collector who has acquired timepieces with the highest quality and rarity over the years of collecting that embodies his vision and passion for horology. François-Paul Journe has long been admired for its innovation and brilliance for the design of his timepieces, since the brand’s inception in 1999 with remarkable pieces such as the Tourbillon Souverain, Chronomètre à Résonance and Octa Reserve that has gained fervent excitement amongst collectors all over the world. We look forward to kicking off 2023 with this tightly curated assemblage of fine and rare F.P. Journe examples.”

The jewel in the crown of the sale is a unique piece, made for the collector to whom this impressive assemblage once belonged. Nothing sends collectors into a tailspin like a one-off watch, especially by a brand like this. The watch is a black-dialled Sonnerie Souverain in stainless steel from 2018, of which only four were made each year over 13 years, meaning only 50 examples exist. This grand strike wristwatch has an active striking instrument that chimes the quarters and hours without manual activation and is unique thanks to its black dial that would normally be reserved for the ultra-exclusive Black Label series. At the time of writing the estimate is $360,000 to $650,000 but I imagine it will do significantly better than that.