With highly appealing and very unusual grey-coloured dial, this yellow gold reference 5050J-023 is one of the ultra-exclusive ‘London Edition’ series that were created in 2015 at the request of Philippe Stern using new old stock cases and movements. It is thought that a maximum of five pieces were made with a grey dial and were only available to those collectors who were personally known to Mr. Stern. To the best of our knowledge, the present watch is only the third example known publicly. Furthermore, it is preserved in like new condition and is accompanied by the full set of accessories.

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Such ‘out of series’ late production watches are fascinating to collectors and are among the rarest pieces of the reference. The standard production 5050 — automatic perpetual calendar with retrograde date, was introduced in 1993 and discontinued in 2002. The case of the present watch dates from 1994 and its movement, caliber 315-136 dates from 2004. Therefore the case is from the first two years of reference 5050 production and the movement from towards the end of the 5050s successor reference 5059s production (which used the same caliber) and was discontinued in 2006.

Reference 5050
Reference 5050, Patek Philippe’s first perpetual calendar wristwatch featuring a retrograde date made in series, was introduced at the Basel Fair in 1993, cased in yellow gold only. As of 1995, it was also available in pink gold, white gold and platinum but still exclusively with the silvered dial, applied Roman numerals, aperture for the moon phases, the very first examples with outer railway minute divisions. Following substantial demand from clients, Patek Philippe introduced a second version featuring applied baton indexes, a modified moon phases display now in form of a circular subsidiary dial, outer beady minute divisions and the addition of the designation ‘Automatic’. It was discontinued in 2002.