Hong Kong, May 2026, Two Patek Philippes for Collectors Gallery

In May I travelled to Hong Kong for the first time. I was there for three days to photograph and film two very special Patek Philippe watches for Collectors Gallery and Amsterdam Vintage Watches, but with around 17 hours of travelling each way and a stopover, the whole trip ended up taking closer to five days.

Getting There

I've travelled to more than 45 countries over the years, both privately and for work, so arriving somewhere completely new isn't unusual for me. Still, Hong Kong felt very different from the moment I landed.

Two black suitcases in the terminal queue, one lying flat, seen from above with his trainers in frame

Inflight seat-back screen showing the flight map across Asia on the way to Hong Kong

Two cases in the terminal and a seat-back map. Seventeen hours each way, with a stopover in the middle.

Sunday into Monday

Landing in Hong Kong

I had expected something closer to Singapore, but the city felt much more Chinese than I had imagined, although I'm saying that as someone who still hasn't been to mainland China. The buildings, the streets, the people and the general pace of everything felt unfamiliar in a way I don't experience that often anymore. Thankfully, English was never really a problem and getting through the airport couldn't have been easier.

Passport control was probably the fastest I've experienced anywhere, despite being handled by an actual person rather than a machine. My luggage was already there when I came through, information was easy to find and I barely had time to start looking for a taxi before someone noticed and pointed me in the right direction. Everything felt extremely organised.

Dense Hong Kong street seen from above, packed traffic, red taxis and Chinese shop signs between tall residential blocks

View from the back seat of a Hong Kong taxi, a braided wheel and the driver's arm resting low, a wet windscreen and the city beyond

A hand holding a printed Hong Kong taxi information card with route and fare details

Out of the airport and into a taxi. Grey, warm and wet, and the fare card handed over up front.

Monday evening

First Table

I landed in grey, slightly rainy weather at around 25 degrees, but the humidity was something else. Almost tropical, and I don't think my forehead was completely dry for the entire three days. The taxi ride into the city also gave me my first introduction to Hong Kong. Very efficient, very straightforward and not necessarily a lot of small talk.

A stone counter set with serving slabs under a curved wooden slat ceiling, three people seated behind it

Two men at a restaurant table in Hong Kong, wine glasses and small plates between them, wood-slat ceiling above

A wooden ceiling in waves and the first dinner a few hours after landing.

Monday evening

The Office Above the Harbour

Our friend Johnson looked after us while we were there and was kind enough to lend us his office for the shoot. Having a quiet space where I could set up properly was perfect, because the two watches waiting for us deserved some time.

Glossy white sculpture of a rounded figure lying back on a sphere with limbs in the air, in a lobby with gold vertical blinds

Looking down through glass into a circular multi-level atrium with lounge seating, Hong Kong buildings behind

The shoot in progress in an office above Victoria Harbour, a round table, a laptop, a lighting stand and four people working, floor-to-ceiling windows onto the water

Four men standing and talking by the office window, the Kowloon skyline hazy across the water

A man in a blue windowpane jacket and glasses looking at his phone by the window, the harbour behind him

A Glide Gear teleprompter and microphone on a tripod, script text on the screen, a man pulling on headphones behind it, harbour windows beyond

Up through the lobby to an office borrowed for the day, quiet enough to work and high enough that the harbour does the talking.

Tuesday morning

Two Pateks

One was a Patek Philippe World Time reference 2523 prototype, and the other was a platinum 3970EP-038 with a salmon dial and applied Breguet numerals. I'm not going to turn this into a technical breakdown of either watch because they both deserve their own stories, but the 3970 is one of only four known examples in this configuration, while the 2523 belongs to a reference that sits at a completely different level within vintage Patek collecting.

Patek Philippe World Time 2523

Patek Philippe's two-crown world time, and the reference collectors treat as the centre of the brand's world-time history, and this example is a prototype. The full story of the piece is on its Collectors Gallery page.

Patek Philippe World Time reference 2523 in yellow gold, salmon guilloche centre, silvered city ring and black alligator strap, photographed on blue fabric beneath a Patek Philippe Geneve sign

The yellow-gold Patek Philippe 2523 held in hand, salmon guilloche centre and silvered city ring facing the camera, black alligator strap across the fingers

The Patek Philippe 2523 worn on the wrist below a ribbed cream sweater cuff, world-time dial catching the daylight

Video: the yellow-gold Patek Philippe 2523 lying on the pages of an open book, then picked up and worn on the wrist

Its story didn't end in Hong Kong, the rest of it happened in Geneva.

Tuesday midday

Patek Philippe 3970EP-038

Platinum, a salmon dial, applied Breguet numerals and matching hands. One of only four known examples in this configuration, made around the end of the reference's production and the opening of Patek Philippe's new Geneva Salon. This one is on its Collectors Gallery page as well.

The platinum piece, worn for the camera.

Tuesday midday

The Rest of the Table

I spend so much of my time photographing watches that this has become one of the ways I learn about them. I'm never going to be the person who remembers every reference number and production detail, but when you have something this important under your lights for several hours, you start seeing details that are difficult to understand from photographs or books. I came away knowing considerably more about both watches than I did when I arrived.

Yellow-gold Rolex with a textured gold dial and diamond hour markers, on a heavily tattooed wrist, blue knit cuff pushed back

A man in a brown suit with a gold bracelet watch, head bowed, holding a loupe to his eye

A bearded man in a blue windowpane jacket examining a watch through a loupe by the window, another man in the foreground

Video: hands unwrapping a padded parcel at a wooden table, a watch box beside it

What else came out while the lights were still up, and the loupes that went round the table after it.

Tuesday morning

Hong Kong After Dark

Outside of the shoot, Johnson made sure we got a proper introduction to Hong Kong as well. One evening he arranged what I believe was a classic Chinese dinner, together with some incredible wines and quite a few things on the table that I had genuinely never seen before. I couldn't tell you the names of half of what we ate, but I tried everything and the food was incredible.

More importantly, there was an enormous amount of experience sitting around that table. I got to listen to people who have spent years operating in parts of the watch industry that I'm still relatively new to, ask questions and learn about sides of the business that I haven't had much exposure to yet. I've become part of this industry quite quickly over the last year, and evenings like that remind me how much there still is to learn from people who have been doing it for decades.

Rutger and Ramon on rattan chairs under a yellow parasol at night, one pulling a face at the camera

A dark hotel bar in Hong Kong with backlit shelves of bottles above the counter and low red stools

A group around a large round dining table in Hong Kong, dishes and teacups covering the lazy Susan

Two bottles of Château Mouton Rothschild 1989 on a marble counter against dark wood, a cork and a folded red napkin beside them

Silhouettes of four people walking down a narrow Hong Kong alley at night, lit yellow signage on both sides

The evening out, from the first bar to the walk back.

Tuesday night

Last Morning

Three days in Hong Kong obviously isn't enough to understand the city, especially when most of my time was spent working, but it was enough to make me want to come back. It's intense, incredibly organised, ridiculously humid and unlike most places I've travelled to before.

There wasn't much time to process the trip either. From Hong Kong we flew directly to Geneva for Auction Week, so the two trips ended up running back to back. After spending three days with these two Pateks in Hong Kong, what was waiting for us in Geneva made the timing particularly interesting.

Hotel room in low light, an unmade bed in the foreground and a grey, overcast Hong Kong skyline through the window

A corridor of lit glass wine cabinets reflected in a polished marble floor, a cafe sign at the far end

Grey and still through the window, and one more corridor of glass on the way out of the building.

Wednesday

The Last Table

A big thank you to Johnson for taking care of us, lending us his office and sharing his city with us, and to Collectors Gallery and Amsterdam Vintage Watches for trusting me with another two extraordinary pieces.

The photographs from both Pateks will get their own space eventually. And as for what happened with the 2523 when we arrived in Geneva, that's another story entirely. You can read that one in Geneva Auction Week.

See you again, Hong Kong.