I Voted in the GPHG, the Oscars of Watchmaking—Here’s What It Was Like
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In late July, I woke up to an out-of-the-blue text: “Hello Victoria, do you fancy joining the jury of the GPHG this year?”
It was from Nick Foulkes, the influential London-based historian, author, and journalist who has served as president of the Grand Prix d’Horlogerie de Genève jury since 2021. Founded in 2001, the awards are the most prestigious event in all of watchmaking. The list of past winners serves as the industry’s de facto who’s who. That’s another way of saying that bagging a trophy (in the form of a large, and heavy, gilded bronze hand) at the annual ceremony—the 2024 edition took place on Wednesday, Nov. 13, at the Théâtre du Léman in Geneva—is a big deal, even for watchmakers who don’t need the publicity. “Imagine being the best runner in the world, but never winning a race,” William Massena, founder of Massena LAB, whose collab with Sylvain Pinaud took home the Chronograph Prize. “It’s about the clout and the prestige.”
Honored (and daunted) to be asked, I replied to Nick with an enthusiastic “Yes!” But it took another two months for me to fully appreciate the significance of being a jury member. When the list of judges was made public in late September (I would be judging alongside watchmaking legend Philippe Dufour, for god’s sake!), the flood of congratulatory messages that arrived via text, WhatsApp, and DM was enough to make me realize that spending a week in Geneva, as was required of jury members—one day to judge and five days to hang out until the ceremony—was an offer I could never have refused.
I arrived in Switzerland on a Thursday after a fraught journey from my home in Los Angeles. There are no direct flights to Geneva and, due to a delayed departure from LAX (on the gloomy morning after the election, no less), my connection in Dulles was so tight that I had to sprint off the plane and run at full speed across the terminal. When I reached my gate, the agent told me they were holding the plane for me. Huffing and puffing, I could scarcely eek out a thank you.
On the Friday before the gala, at 8:15 a.m., all 30 jury members—an eclectic and global mix of retailers, dealers, collectors, watchmakers, industry representatives, and journalists—were expected to report to the Musée Rath, on the outskirts of Geneva’s Old Town, for a day-long judging session where we’d get hands on with all 90 timepieces nominated across the GPHG’s 15 categories.
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The venue, an art museum in Geneva used exclusively for temporary exhibitions, was imposing, but after throwing back a double espresso and greeting some of my fellow jury members—including Ilaria Resta, chief executive of Audemars Piguet; Chabi Nouri, global chief executive of the international auction house Bonhams; Bart Grönefeld, one half of the “horological brothers” behind the independent brand Grönefeld; Tim Stracke, founder and chairman of the pre-owned platform Chrono24; and Wei Koh, founder of Revolution and The Rake magazines—I took a seat at my assigned table, and waited for Foulkes to make his opening remarks.
Voting objectively was “not the point,” he said. “You vote for what you like for whatever reason you like it.”
This was the advice I needed to hear. Unlike many of my fellow watch editors, I’m not a critic. I don’t borrow watches in order to write “on the wrist” reviews. I’ve never been particularly interested, or fluent, in mechanics. What I brought to the judging table was the perspective of a student who’d spent two decades keenly focused on the business and design trends shaping the world of mechanical watchmaking. I hoped that would be enough.
It certainly helped that Raymond Loretan, president of the GPHG Foundation, the organization that oversees the awards, and GPHG director Carine Maillard have made the judging process impressively clear and straightforward. The rules that govern the voting (which was certified by on-site notaries) are taken extremely seriously. Before the GPHG team began circulating the nominated timepieces, we were asked to raise our hands and take an oath committing ourselves to uphold them.
Then we were off to the races. Half of the jury members were assigned to be “residents” and the other half, including me, to be “nomads.” Residents remained at their original seats, while nomads rotated from table to table as the judging progressed through the different categories. This allowed for most of us to meet and chat with each other, greatly enhancing the judging experience.
We were advised to vote for watches based on how closely they aligned with their category (which each watchmaker entered at their discretion). This year saw the debut of a new category, Time Only, in addition to the 14 standard categories: Ladies, Ladies Complication, Men’s, Men’s Complication, Iconic, Tourbillon, Calendar and Astronomy, Mechanical Exception, Chronograph, Sports, Jewelry, Artistic Crafts, “Petite Auguille”—for watches priced between 3,000 and 10,000 Swiss francs—and Challenge, for watches priced at or under 3,000 francs.
The debate at my first table centered on the nuances distinguishing the time-only pieces and those nominated in the men’s category (I still can’t tell you what the difference is). Wei pointed out that Bernhard Lederer’s triple-certified observatory chronometer, entered in time only, could, in theory, be nominated for the Chronometry Prize (which it ended up winning), one of the six additional prizes awarded at the ceremony, including the big one, the “Auguille d’Or” (essentially, best in show, which went to IWC’s technically impressive Portugieser Eternal Calendar). I kept that valuable tidbit in mind as I assessed the contenders, six pieces across 15 categories. My job was to rank the watches by point value (10 for my favorite in each category and 1 for my least favorite, with 6, 4, 3, and 2 in between).
The conversation between the jury members was spirited and funny. Milan-based vintage watch dealer Max Bernardini, my gregarious tablemate, was especially amusing, partly because he looks Italian (picture a balding fellow in a tweed suit with a matching tweed patch over his right eye) but speaks English like a born-and-bred New Yorker (he spent his formative years in American schools in Liberia and Nigeria).
When the nomads were told to move to the next table, Max and our other tablemate, collector Curtis McDowald, an Olympic fencer from New York, moved with me. As the three of us regrouped at the same tables throughout the day, we started to feel like the Three Musketeers (with our very own d’Artagnan, as Max pointed out). I’m telling you, the camaraderie was instant and real, and, truth be told, quite surprising.
I had expected a sober, quiet day of serious horological contemplation. Instead, I got a mildly raucous, occasionally hilarious, truly fascinating day of debate, provocation, and conviviality filled with lessons big and small.
I learned the value of physically handling and trying on timepieces. Many nominated watches looked different, and almost always much better, on the wrist than in photos. I learned that listening to jury members with deep convictions about the nominated watches, like Wei and watchmaking consultant and instructor Gianfranco Ritschel, was essential to the experience. Not only did their opinions shape some of my own, their passionate arguments for or against certain watches gave me the confidence to speak up about my own.
I also discovered a bunch of tiny but delightful details about my fellow judges. For example, renowned product and industrial designer Marc Newson, of Apple Watch fame, is a vintage car lover (Bugattis, Ferraris, Alfa Romeos—he’s brand agnostic). Philippe Dufour carries his tobacco and pipe to lunch, packing it while immersed in conversation. Ali Mudara, founder and chief executive of PRJKT8, a watch retailer in Bahrain, broke into the business of independent watchmaking around 2012, after being inspired by @watchanish, one of the watch world’s earliest influencers.
I even learned, after only slightly putting my foot in my mouth, that we had a husband and wife on the jury: The celebrated independent watchmaker Raúl Pagès is married to Nathalie Marielloni, vice curator at the International Museum of Horology. (In my defense, they don’t share a last name!)
Best of all, I learned the sly double meaning of the word audacity—aka, the name given to a special discretionary prize, this year awarded to independent Sylvain Berneron for his Mirage watch, that “rewards the best competing timepiece featuring a non-conformist, offbeat approach to watchmaking.” According to the Cambridge Dictionary, audacity is “courage or confidence of a kind that other people find shocking or rude.” Other sources define it as “a willingness to take bold risks” and “rude or disrespectful behavior; impudence.”
The debate over the audacity prize was, to me, the highlight of the jury deliberation day—even more interesting than the heated discussion over which watch should be crowned “Auguille d’Or.” At the crux was a question: What does audacity mean in an industry that rose from its own ashes to become a $27 billion juggernaut in the luxury sphere four decades ago? (The phoenix metaphor has legs—just look to the bejeweled bird that inspired Bulgari’s fever dream of a high-jewelry watch. At 2,774,000 Swiss francs, about $3.16 million, it was the competition’s priciest contender.)
Does audacity mean having the chutzpah to charge stratospheric prices? To conceive of new ways to tell the same old time? To create iconoclastic watches whose looks and functionality are deeply polarizing? To defy the haters? (Speaking of haters, I learned that everyone has an opinion on Patek Philippe’s Cubitus.)
Yes to all of the above. Were it not for the audacity of an industry committed to analog timekeeping in the digital age, there would be no awards, no collectors, no reason to consider timekeeping in anything other than a utilitarian context. While it’s true that the GPHG is, obliquely, about sales (the winners get heaps of publicity), it’s also, in a much bigger sense, about celebrating creativity in all its weird, wild, often unsuccessful forms. If that’s impudence, then consider me a proud rabble-rouser.
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