Geneva, Austin, Singapore, and Hong Kong; where a watch is tried on, judged, and sold again.
Be prepared for a full active watch lover November for at 2 p.m. on Saturday, Nov. 7, an auctioneer at Geneva’s Hotel President Wilson calls the first of 221 lots. The same day, in a former pumping station built in the middle of the Rhône, a jury names the year’s best new watches. And at noon in Austin, Texas, the doors open on a room of brand owners ready to strap their watches onto visitors’ wrists. That one Saturday epitomizes November for this level of activity just continues on in Singapore and Hong Kong.
Geneva: The Jury and the Auction Room Share a Weekend.
From Saturday to Monday Geneva fits its watch prize and four major auctions into about 72 hours. Fortunately most of the viewings before the auctions are available for those who are able to attend them.
Grand Prix d’Horlogerie de Genève
Ceremony Nov. 7 | Bâtiment des Forces Motrices | Livestreamed at gphg.org Exhibition Oct. 30–Nov. 15 | Musée d’Art et d’Histoire | Pay what you like
Highlights from the 2025 ceremony, the prize’s 25th edition.
The GPHG, often called the Oscars of watchmaking, hands out 19 prizes chosen from 84 finalists, which were narrowed from 320 watches entered by 194 brands. A jury chaired by Wei Koh, founder of Revolution magazine, examines every finalist in person, behind closed doors, and under a notary’s supervision. This year the women’s and men’s categories have been replaced by ones built around what a watch does: Essential, Complication and Gemset.
You don’t need an invitation to see the finalists. All 84 are on show at Geneva’s Musée d’Art et d’Histoire until Nov. 15, and the museum lets visitors pay what they like at the door, with CHF 5 to 20 (about $6 to $25) suggested.
Phillips: The Geneva Watch Auction XXIV
Nov. 7–8 | Hotel President Wilson, Quai Wilson 47 | Viewing Nov. 4–8
The Ref. 1436 rests on its Patek Philippe archive extract, which records how the watch left the factory.
Phillips, a London auction house founded in 1796, sells 221 lots over two afternoons. The headliner belongs to a 1945 Patek Philippe Ref. 1436 in steel, a split-seconds chronograph that can time two events at once, at CHF 2 million to 4 million (about US $2.4 million to $4.9 million).
The catalogue also carries unique pieces by independents, among them Roger W. Smith. When the British watchmaker George Daniels died in 2011, he left his entire workshop to Smith.
The viewing is open to the public, but handling the most valuable lots takes paperwork. Phillips asks for government ID and a recent proof of address, and a senior specialist stays at the table. The same rooms also preview highlights from the house’s Hong Kong and New York sales, weeks before either one.
Antiquorum: Important Modern & Vintage Timepieces
Nov. 7–8 | Viewing Nov. 4–8 at Antiquorum’s Geneva office
The Neisser snuffbox hides both a watch and a musical movement inside its gold-and-enamel case.
Antiquorum, a Geneva auction house that has sold watches since 1974, offers watch pieces created before the wristwatch. This sale offers a Rolex chronograph known as the “Jean-Claude Killy,” after the French ski champion, and a gold-and-enamel musical snuffbox made in Geneva by Henri Neisser.
Sotheby’s: Important Watches
Nov. 8–9 | Exhibition Nov. 5–7, Mandarin Oriental, Quai Turrettini 1
The Millennium is offered with its original box and papers, some of them handwritten by the watchmaker’s workshop.
Sotheby’s spreads 188 lots across Sunday and Monday mornings, and the one to look for is a yellow-gold Millennium wristwatch by George Daniels, widely ranked among the greatest watchmakers of the 20th century. Roger W. Smith helped him build the series and Sotheby’s estimates this one at CHF 300,000 to 600,000 (about US $370,000 to $730,000).
Christie’s: Rare Watches Including Watches for ELA
Nov. 9 | Four Seasons Hôtel des Bergues | Preview Nov. 5–8, open to all
An F.P. Journe Tourbillon Souverain from 2001. Estimate: CHF 650,000 to 1.4 million (about $820,000 to $1.8 million).
Christie’s closes the week with 218 lots, 39 of them by independent makers including seven unique pieces. Inside the sale sits Watches for ELA, a charity section of watches donated by brands to fund research into leukodystrophies, a group of rare, mostly inherited disorders, and to support the families they affect.
Austin: Same Saturday, Smaller Rooms
Seven hours behind Geneva, the same Saturday looks nothing like an auction. Austin’s two shows are built for trying watches on and engaging the people who make them.
Intersect Austin
Nov. 6–7 | 800 Congress Ave. | Free with RSVP, Saturday noon–5 p.m.
Visitors try on watches at Intersect Los Angeles in 2025.
Intersect started in Los Angeles in 2021 as a show for independent watch brands only, and this is its third year in Austin, with more than 30 brands on the roster so far.
Public hours cost nothing with an RSVP. The $65 early-access ticket, capped at 150 people, buys two hours before the public arrives and as we always encourage in the show’s own words, “one-on-one chat time with brand owners.”
Minutes + Hours Austin
Nov. 7–8 | The Petrol Lounge | Free tickets, noon–5 p.m. both days
Collectors crowd a table at Minutes + Hours Chicago, one of the store’s other shows.
Minutes + Hours is a watch store in Manhattan Beach, California, that also runs shows in Los Angeles, Chicago and Austin. In Austin it lays out what it counts as thousands of watches from more than 80 brands, alongside Ferraris, Ford GTs and Porsches. Among them is Pinion, a British independent that designs, assembles and tests each of its mechanical watches by hand in England.
Singapore: A Retailer Hands the Room to the Makers
A week later, the selling stops and the makers take over.
IAMWATCH
Nov. 12–15, public days Nov. 13–15, 11 a.m.–8 p.m. | The Singapore EDITION, 38 Cuscaden Rd. | Free, registration required
After Singapore, both Space Travellers moved to Phillips in London for the exhibition’s next stop in February 2027.
IAMWATCH is run by The Hour Glass, the Singapore watch retailer, and its second edition brings about 45 independent makers and friends of the retailer. The seminars get specific: one panel asks whether Morteau, the French watchmaking town that trained a wave of young independents can produce another generation like them.
The dress code includes asking guests to wear a watch on each wrist and one Friday-morning session invites collectors to bring watches from home.
The centerpiece marks George Daniels’ centenary. Phillips and The Hour Glass are showing 22 of his watches, under the same roof as the independents who came after him. His Space Traveller I and II, two pocket watches that keep both solar and star time, appear side by side for the first time.
Hong Kong: Asia Has the Last Word
The month closes back in the auction room, this time for Asia’s bidders.
Phillips: The Hong Kong Watch Auction XXIII
Nov. 21–22 | Public preview Nov. 16–22, WKCDA Tower, West Kowloon
Numbered 14 of 20, the HK 2000 mixes Chinese numerals with Roman and Arabic ones on its dial.
Phillips brings 329 lots and puts independent watchmaking up front. One of them is a local story: an HK 2000 in white gold by Hong Kong watchmaker Kiu Tai Yu, one of four known in that metal. Anyone who went to the Geneva viewing will already have seen the highlights two weeks earlier.
Christie’s: Iconic 40 Watches Evening Sale and Important Watches
Nov. 25–26 | Hong Kong Luxury Week
The front of the Ref. 6002, with its perpetual calendar and a case engraved entirely by hand.
Christie’s marks 40 years in Asia with two sales led by Kronos: Titans of Time, a single-owner collection. For the first time, both versions of Patek Philippe’s Sky Moon Tourbillon, a double-sided grand complication with a sky chart on its back, appear in the same auction: the Ref. 5002 and its successor, the Ref. 6002. Christie’s puts the two sales’ combined low estimate above HK$330 million (about $42 million), which it calls the highest seasonal estimate ever set for watches in Asia.
Images courtesy of the GPHG, Phillips, Sotheby’s, Christie’s, Intersect and Minutes + Hours. All rights remain with their respective owners.
