Last November, in the misty Prior to Times when people could still share physical space with one another, a ballroom in an exclusive midtown Manhattan resort welcomed 110 apex watch enthusiasts from 13 nations for mixed drinks, lunch and a “sexpile”.
Prior to your head fills with Bret Easton Ellis images of affluent debauchery, be aware that the “sexpile” is made up not of human bodies yet of watches: hundreds of countless bucks' worth of classic Rolexes, stacked atop each other like mating crabs. In a room disguised as a “Real Estate Investors' Convention”, unusual Submariners as well as Cosmographs, Day-Dates and also Milgausses, Oysters and also Daytonas littered the tables, ostentatiously jewelled, simply understated or– as fanatics enjoy them best– weathered as well as faded to a “tropicalisation” unique to each piece, a natural procedure which mentions traveling, extremes of temperature and also unimaginable stories.
This was America's initial Rolliefest, an $850-a-ticket, invitation-only celebration of some of the world's most significant watch collectors, an event which grew out of an exclusive online area of Rolex-worshippers. Among the items on show was a solid gold Daytona previously possessed by the Sultan of Oman and also called the “Red Sultan”, and also a 1958 Rolex GMT-Master Ref 6542 whose original radium lume still signed up a dangerous 99.9 microSieverts (yes, one Rolliefest guest brought along a Geiger counter).
As well as the centrepiece was the “sexpile”: some of the globe's rarest and also most valuable watches[get the look] scattered haphazardly along an 18ft table for Rolliefest attendees to take care of, examine and wear. With an approximated $50m–$ 100m well worth of wrist watches in the room, this totals up to either an exceptional display of faith in the code of the Rolex-lover, or a nerve-shredding invitation for something to go missing out on. Perhaps the armed guards on the door provided an air of self-confidence.
” The thing concerning the Rolliefest,” Dutch watch business owner and also participant Bernhard Bulang will tell me later, “is that it's not concerning money. It's about fulfilling individuals as well as being influenced. This is a neighborhood.” Then again, the opportunity to take a look at exquisitely uncommon grail sees up close is not to be sniffed at. “You know, you can not utilize a loupe on Instagram …”.
