It's mine, all mine.
I was searching for the right super sub sea for more than a year and I finally found it in the Watches of Knightsbridge catalog. I was looking for the best example you could find, since they rarely age well.
@watchknut 's super sub sea was the only one I saw that has aged perfectly, it had the right hands, nicely aged subdials, ghost bezel, but was on the wrong continent.
There’s some confusion about how the watch was passed during the auction, but registered as sold in the auction report, so let me try to explain:
The short version:
I got on the online auction very late and didn’t have time to test the bidding process before the lot 161, the Super Sub Sea. As things go my bid didn’t go through on the Movado just before it reached its reserve price - 4000GBP. It was passed. Immediately I contacted the Auction house, explained the problems that I had while bidding, and offerer the minimum estimate (that was probably the reserve price). The auction house accepted my offer and that’s how the watch got sold. It’s in transit now.
The long (boring) version:
The plan was to watch the auction from the start and bid on only 2 watches. Half an hour before the auction I was in the park preparing to go home and get ready for the auction. I strapped my by baby boy in the child seat on the passenger's side and just as I started driving smoke started pouring in the cabin from the car's front vents.
I parked the car immediately and got my son out of the car. Thankfully the car stopped smoking as soon as I turned it of. While holding my son in one hand I somehow managed to disconnect the battery. My wife came to pick up my son, I didn’t tell her that my car caught fire, just that it didn’t run correctly and I didn’t want to drive it that way. Getting stuck by the side of the road happens frequently to me, so she really didn't doubt me.
My mechanic arrived half an hour latter to diagnose the problem, the same time the auction started. It turned out that the front heater motor got stuck and melted itself, the fuse didn’t blow cause the previous owner rerouted some of the fuses in the back of the fuse box. I had the car for two months and got it back in shape in that time, but didn’t notice the extra wiring behind the second fusebox in the trunk of the car.
My mechanic disconnected the direct line at the back of the fuse box and the line to the heater. We drove for a bit to check for any other issues. There were none so I finally headed home to catch the lot 161. I got home 5 or 6 lots before the SSS. Noticed that the platform was off, no video, choppy sound. Disconnected, reconnected again, didn’t fix the problem. While I was playing with the auction platform, the auction got to lot 160, one more and it’s the SSS.
The bidding was furious for the watch until it reached 3600, then it stopped. I can’t remember correctly what was the last bid, I think 3800 . I tried to bid that amount, or tried to bid 4000 can’t really be sure, but the bid didn’t go through. Got really pissed cause I was searching for the right Sub Sea for more than a year and when I finally found it I couldn't get it because of glitchy lame auction platform.
Who knows how long before a perfect Sub Sea is for sale again. Then I realized that the watch was passed, since the reserve was 4000, the same as the lowest estimate and the last bid was a little lower than that.
I contacted the auction house immediately, told them about my problem and offered 4000GBP for the SSS. The auctioneer accepted my offer, and also waived the online fee.
It should have it on my wrist next week. It arrived at Charles De Gaulle an hour ago.
I sold all my photography equipment (except for a set of old Leica lenses) some time ago, but I’ll definitely borrow a camera and photograph the SSS as soon as it arrives.
