PATEK PHILIPPE 2597 HS HEURES SAUTANTES TWO TIME ZONE 18K CALATRAVA 1960

This watch is one of my favorite Pateks. I love rare watches that distinguish themselves in quiet, subtle ways. For example, only 90 reference 2597s were ever made. Clearly, this rare model is Patek’s first traveller’s watch.

First series production had only the normal hour and minutes hands (and subsidiary seconds hand of course) yet had the two buttons on the case side to advance the hour hand in one hour increments, up and down. The second series production has the second, blued hour hand, and now the buttons advance this hand which serves as the traveller’s local timezone while the home timezone is monitored with the regular golden dauphine hand. Patek received the Swiss patent for this modification to the movement which allows the hour hand to be moved by push button in 1959 under the name of “Time Zone Watch”. The watchmaker Louis Cottier is credited with this innovation, on behalf of Patek, and his system also serves in Patek’s later reference 5034 travel watch.

Original oversized 18k gold case is 36mm in diameter with three-part construction, domed acrylic crystal and snap-on case back. Case buttons on 9 o’clock side are for advancing the blued hour hand.

Original fully indelible silvered dial with applied golden hour markers, embossed minutes and seconds chapter, subsidiary seconds and golden dauphine hands. As mentioned, the blued hour hand is the one settable via the case buttons. The print on the dial (signature and hour markers) is enamel.

Original manual winding Patek Philippe Caliber 12-400 HS has 18 jewels and is stamped with the Geneva Seal.

To complete the history of these interesting watches: Patek allowed owners of the first series watches (without the second hours hand) to return their watch to the factory to have the second blue hours hand added. Despite the fact that production of the 2597 was decades earlier, Patek was still receiving 2597s for this modification until 1999.