Chapter 1/6 - Birth in Turbulent Times
The year is 1976 and the mood is bad in the watch-producing regions of Switzerland. The oil crisis is hitting businesses hard across the board and horology is not escaping that gloom either. Even Patek Philippe, a long-standing reference of high watchmaking, is impacted. Back then, the brand is a much smaller outfit than it is today. It relies on a lot of suppliers and operates from its headquarters in Rue du Rhône, where the Geneva Salon sits today. The year marks a time of transition, as Henri Stern begins handing over the reins of the maison to his son, Philippe. He already has a say in product development, an absolute prerogative of the family that owns and has led the brand since the 1930s.
Philippe Stern is the heir to the Geneva dynasty, but he's not just inheriting his position. He has been working towards it his whole life. Dynamic and resourceful, he is an accomplished skier and, above all, a passionate sailor, particularly fond of racing on Lake Geneva. Tasked with finding a way to breathe new life into the company's sales, he comes up with a plan in the shape of a new watch, one that breaks with everything Patek had been doing up until then. And he sells his father on it.
Still heavily into pocket watches, always producing high complications, Patek mostly does classic watches, made of gold, with clean dials and a flair for shapes. In 1968, they had released the Golden Ellipse, jumping on the Swinging Sixties’ oddly-shaped watch trend that rejuvenated watch design. The 1970s are leisure-oriented, sports-oriented and have a blaring need of activity-driven timepieces for those other than racing cars or diving deep underwater. Stern capitalizes on that history, his tastes, the zeitgeist, and comes up with a new concept.
He tasks watch designer Gérald Genta to work on the project, with a brief that is way off the Patek style. This new watch would be made of steel, on a steel bracelet. It would be for men, assertive, without complications, slim and able to withstand the hardships a modern man would have it endure. It would have to be water resistant and sturdy, all the while remaining classy and chic like a Patek should be.
Genta comes up with a design which is not quite round nor square, with a softly angular bezel. It is centered on a porthole-shaped bezel, and at 40 mm (even 42 counting the so-called ears), it is quite large for the epoch's taste. Retrospectively, that unusual size was responsible for reference's 3700 nickname : Jumbo. The bracelet is integrated with the case – a specialty of Genta – with a wide link articulated with the help of another, smaller and rounded one in the middle, and tapered.
A little-known fact, Genta revolutionizes the typical construction of a watch case. Instead of a baseband caught in the middle of a bezel and caseback, he creates a two-part case. The two halves slide into each other like a clamp, with a hinge on one side and outgrowths on the other, just like a large ship's porthole has. The dial is ribbed with a heavy blue pattern, and houses just a pair of hands and a date window. It's called Nautilus after Captain Nemo's submarine, probably the most famous vessel ever named, and with depth capabilities at that. One last point: the Nautilus is expensive, a point the advertisement campaigns of the time do not shy away from. It's even a selling point. Also, this first version doesn't have a seconds hand, but that wouldn't last.
Along with the initial ref 3700 1/A reference, Nautilus was also available in gold and platinum, another little-known fact. And another overlooked aspect, Philippe Stern came up with a flurry of...ladies references. Smaller, narrower, they came in gold, set with gems, sometimes lavishly so, while the men's Nautilus was offered in steel or gold, and that's it. Patek Philippe's catalog offered many options of precious, unusually-shaped, set timepieces for women, and Nautilus was also just that.
From the outset, Nautilus had the makings of an outlier, and not the absolutely worshiped timepiece it is today. Philippe Stern almost bet the house on it despite the fact that it remained a minor line for some time. Yes, it did open a new client segment for Patek, and it helped with sales, image, diversification, and to make a general point of Patek Philippe being modern. But it wasn't an overwhelming success that redefined the brand, or singlehandedly saved it from the difficulties of the 1970s. Nor from the subsequent decade's hardships of a different kind, that were no less challenging. However, it did open a new client segment for Patek, and it helped with sales, image, diversification and to make a general point of Patek Philippe being modern.
