A current public sale introduced up a bit of horological historical past: the Heuer Monaco racing watch Steve McQueen wore within the film Le Mans. While the public sale home, referred to as Phillips, claims that is “a very powerful Heuer wristwatch of all time, and one of the celebrated timepieces of the twentieth century,” I wouldn’t go that far. That stated, it’s a reasonably iconic piece.
The watch marks the rise of the metal sports activities watch and an enormous departure from the standard gold Rolexen discovered on the wrists of Sixties advert males. It was a “cool” watch in an period of decidedly uncool watches and marked the start of a brand new period in design and daring makes use of of coloration.
From the discharge:
The Heuer Monaco, positioned at Lot 20 was one of many stars of the public sale, live-streamed from New York City with report on-line attendance. The watch, which was initially listed as “estimate on request”, opened with a bid of $200,000. After a 7-minute bidding battle, the watch finally bought to a web based bidder for $1,800,000 earlier than purchaser’s premium, marking a brand new report value for a Heuer at public sale, and changing into the costliest Heuer wristwatch ever bought. Watch fanatics from around the globe adopted this historic second on-line and over the telephone.
The watch was gifted to the movie’s Chief Mechanic and McQueen’s private mechanic, Haig Alltounian, by Steve McQueen on the finish of filming. Consigned immediately by Alltounian, the watch’s case again options the engraving “TO HAIG Le MANS 1970”, devoted to him by McQueen.
