For more than a century, Rolex has been the most coveted and legendary watch brand in the world. A Rolex stands for many things: the quintessence of luxury watchmaking, a power tool for movers and shakers, the symbol of the transition to adulthood. New brands pop up, styles come and go, but the brand at the top never changes.
As the record holder - Paul Newman's Daytona was auctioned by Phillips in New York in October 2017 for $17.8 million - it is no surprise that Rolex is the most collected watch brand in the world.
Rolex's history is rooted in the visionary spirit of its founder, Hans Wilsdorf. In 1905, the young Wilsdorf founded a company in London to distribute timepieces, but his real dream was to produce wristwatches - then in their infancy and not very precise - that would be technically durable, reliable and super-elegant. The company first concentrated on producing timepieces of the highest quality, and this quest for precision soon led to the world's first wristwatch to receive the Swiss certificate of chronometric precision, awarded by the official watch rating center in Bienne in 1910. Four years later, Kew Observatory in Britain awarded a Rolex watch a Class A certificate, a distinction previously reserved exclusively for marine chronometers.
From that date, the Rolex wristwatch has been synonymous with precision. Over the past 100 years, Rolex's milestones include: the first waterproof watch, the first self-winding mechanism, the first wristwatch that flew over Mount Everest, the first diver's watch that was waterproof to 100 meters, the first watch that could withstand magnetic fields of 1,000 gauss and the first watch that descended into the Mariana Trough.
Each of the exceptional Rolex watch models in this beautifully handcrafted Ultimate Collection, selected by specialist Fabienne Reybaud, showcases the most valuable and technically innovative models produced by the luxury watchmaker, including watches that have never before appeared in print: From the first wristwatch from the early 1900s and the first Oyster Perpetual from 1931, to an Explorer worn during Sir Edmund Hillary's expedition to the summit of Mount Everest in 1953 and the Submariner worn by actor George Lazenby in the James Bond film On Her Majesty's Secret Service, they will amaze collectors around the world.
Specifications
Title: Rolex: The Impossible Collection
Author: Fabienne Reybaud
Publisher: Assouline
Size: 950 x 473 x 75 mm
Size: 194 pages
Weight: 9000 grams
Language: English
Material: Hardcover
ISBN: 9781614287209
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