Stainless-steel Patek Philippe Perpetual Calendar Chronograph Ref. 1518

I don't even know where to start. Normally, it's easy to share with you everything that goes through my mind and through my heart when talking about a watch. The Stihl 1518 by Patek Philippe is something very different. In fact, it's now at least the third time that I'm having an encounter with it and every time I'm literally having heartbeats and butterflies in my stomach. It is the world's first perpetual calendar chronograph wristwatch made by any manufacturer in series. A bold move by Patek Philippe as just at the beginning of World War II, they launched such a courageous undertaking. It is pretty much the founding stone for everything that Patek Philippe and many other manufacturers have done since when it comes to perpetual calendar chronographs. How many products do we actually know that 80 years later conceptually, aesthetically are still produced in a more modern variant? Why is the Stihl 1518 so mythical? The case design, though clearly a 1518, is actually radically different from the metal versions. Patek Philippe asked a different case maker to make these cases, Croisier. The result is that, as far as I'm concerned, you have much more presence, you have a sportier, more masculine look. It seems bigger, it seems more muscular, I think very much befitting the Stihl case material. At the same time, with the Stihl hands, the Stihl numerals on the dial, everything is very much monochrome, monochromatic. In this book here that most of you collectors have, the Stihl Patek Philippe Bible written by John Goldberger, this example here, number one, has been disassembled and meticulously photographed for this book. What really amazes me is how, back in the 40s, artisanal manufacturing and the craftsmanship when this watch was put together. It is horological culture at its absolute highest, highest level. It's museum quality. Actually, let me be fair, I don't know of a single museum that has a stainless steel 1518, not even the Patek Philippe Museum. These watches have always been the end game at any given moment in watch auctions, and since wristwatches are considered works of art, and have always been the absolute highest level a collector could aspire to. With four pieces known, this is an opportunity that should not be underestimated by the community. I think it's actually quite amazing that already a decade, and a decade is nearly a generation in watch collection. A decade later, those who either were underbidding it or those who were not yet focusing on such watches are given a second chance.