A Collector’s Guide To The Perfect Patek Philippe Nautilus 5711 Fake Watches UK
Thierry Stern warned us the end was coming.
“I have to be very tough on the quantity of steel watches. I don’t want steel taking over the lead in the whole collection.” He explained that he’d seen other brands produce too many steel Swiss made replica watches – and once they go down that road, there’s no going back.
“I am limiting the steel versions, mostly the Nautilus,” he added. Stern was insistent that, of the 62,000 high quality fake watches Patek produced annually, no more than 25 to 30 percent be made in steel.
Less than two years after that interview, the Nautilus reference 5711 was officially discontinued in 2021 without announcement or fanfare from Patek – “We don’t retire our best UK replica watches by public announcement; the Nautilus does not deserve a better treatment,” Stern reasoned. It might not have deserved special treatment, but it got something else instead: a victory lap. Patek introduced an olive green dial for the final year of the 5711’s run, and then a final limited-edition Tiffany & Co. blue dial that drove us mad – the “fuck you 5711s,” as one collector I talked to called them. If that wasn’t enough, Phillips auctioned one of those Tiffany Nautiluses for $6.5 million in December 2021.
And with that sale, we reached Peak Nautilus. Since then, secondary market prices have dropped. Toward the end of 2021, a standard blue-dial steel Nautilus might’ve exchanged hands for more than $160,000. Today they’re more like $130,000, but – pulls out calculator – that’s still about 4x their original retail price. So still crazy, but slightly less so.
Steel Patek Philippe Nautilus 5711 Replica Watches
When Patek Philippe introduced the new Nautilus 5711 copy watches for sale in 2006, no one got that excited about it. Sure, it was a cool watch, but it was really just Patek’s way of honoring its history: The 5711 debuted on the 30th anniversary of the original Jumbo 3700.
The 5711 looked mostly the same as the original Nautilus from 1976, with some tweaks. Most notably, it was larger, measuring 40mm across the dial (43mm if you include the “ears”) and 8.3mm thick (compared to the 3700’s specs of 42mm by 7.6mm). It also features a three-part case, compared to the vintage model’s monobloc construction, a sapphire caseback, and a central sweeping seconds hand. Like the original Jumbo, it was stupid expensive for a steel sports watch: $17,000 at release (about $25,000 in today’s dollars).
The case and bracelet exhibit beautiful, varied hand-finishing: a brushed bezel and satin-finished bracelet contrast with polished bevels, edges, and center links. When reviewing the luxury replica Patek Philippe 5711R watches, Ben Clymer wrote that the Nautilus is “one of the best watches to teach a young watch lover about case finishing because you are able to see so many different kinds of casework in one place, all in a well-known and easy to wear package.” It’s a package that’s as much jewelry as it is watchmaking, and I don’t mean that pejoratively. The watch and bracelet together are thin, comfortable, and irresistibly wearable.
Patek Philippe 5711R
Even in 2006, Patek Philippe seemed to consider the Nautilus a little unremarkable by its own lofty standards. In the press release announcing the new Nautilus collection, the brand wrote: “Thirty years is not a venerable age for a Patek Philippe collection. The Calatrava line, for example, is 70 years old, and the Golden Ellipse will soon celebrate its 40th anniversary.”
Yeah, Patek was bringing back the Nautilus replica watches wholesale, but it had no idea – nor did anyone else – that in 15 years, it’d become the most hyped watch in the world, with auction results more than six times its MSRP, while also gracing the wrists of all those one-name celebrities and garnering more headlines way outside the watch press (from the New York Times, Financial Times, Bloomberg, and many, many others). Back then, it was just another Patek model line.
“It was business as usual,” says Reardon, who worked at the Henri Stern Agency (aka, Patek Philippe USA) at the time. The Nautilus was a core part of Swiss movements Patek Philippe super clone watches’ history, but it didn’t define the brand. “I was one of two people responsible for the distribution of the watch in the States. Retailers might get one or two pieces, but it wasn’t an easy sell.” Reardon viewed it as a faithful homage to the 3700, clearly vintage-inspired, but he, and others, didn’t think much else of it.
“The bigger deal was the reference 5712,” Ku adds, referring to the Nautilus model introduced alongside the time-only 5711 that featured a moonphase, date, and power reserve. For collectors like this, introducing complications into the Nautilus was just more exciting.
Patek Philippe ref. 5711/1A (Steel)
Still, the headline of the new Nautilus collection in 2006 was the steel reference 5711/1A. It’s the now-familiar form originally designed by Gérald Genta: slightly octagonal 40mm case inspired by the porthole of a ship; integrated bracelet; gradient blue dial, 120 meters of water resistance, automatic movement.
During its production, the 5711 used three different Patek calibers. Some enterprising auction houses and dealers have begun to use this fact to categorize the 5711 into a First Series, Second Series, and Third Series. Are these distinctions actually important? Not really, according to the folks I talked to.
“Movement and seals haven’t really become a thing,” Al Zeraei says. “Collectors care about case, dial, then movement, in that order.”
“At Patek, they don’t distinguish – a 5711 is a 5711,” Reardon adds. “In 10 or 15 years these differences may become more important – people might differentiate between calibers, between seals as they really start studying the evolutions over the entire 5711 run. But it’ll be up to collectors to decide if they’ll place a premium on these.”
Listen, the best quality Patek Philippe 5711 replica watches was produced for 15 years. Objectively, it’s not a rare watch. It’s kind of fun to look at these variations – and maybe they will mean something over time – but right now, it’s just not what collectors care about. A 5711 is a 5711. But if we do classify these “movement series,” here’s what it’d look like.
First Movement Series (Caliber 315SC), 2006-07
Most 5711s you’ll see use the caliber 324SC. But take another look at that press release from 2006: In it, Patek says that the new 5711 is powered by the caliber 315SC. It’s thought that Patek was getting rid of these 315SC movements (used in the previous white gold 3711G). The caliber 315 can be found in examples from 2006 through early 2007. Given the short production, these First Series examples are seen less often.
Second Movement Series (Caliber 324SC, Further Split Into Geneva Seal And Patek Seal), 2007-2019
The bulk of the 5711’s production run falls in this Second Series, when Patek replaced the 315SC with the caliber 324SC. The 324SC featured a higher beat rate (28,800 compared to 21,600), but otherwise is a pretty similar, unidirectional self-winding caliber. But it’s not quite that simple.
Until 2009, 1:1 Patek Philippe fake watches were all certified with the Geneva Seal (Poinçon de Genève in French), which is placed on movements that meet a long set of quality requirements for calibers produced in the Canton of Geneva. In 2009, Patek abandoned the Geneva Seal for its own Patek Philippe Seal. The difference between the two seals is a conversation for another day, but you’ll notice the different seals on the bridge: The Geneva Seal, which uses the seal for the Canton of Geneva, is replaced by a double P on the bridge.
Third Movement Series (Caliber 26-330 SC), 2019-2021
Until 2019, the movement of the 5711 had a problem, by modern standards: It didn’t have a hacking seconds function to set the time. Okay, there was this “hack” – apply some pressure to the back of the crown and it’d stop the seconds hand from ticking. But that’s not quite the same, is it?
In 2019, AAA China Patek Philiipe replica watches finally updated the 5711 by swapping in the caliber 26-330SC, which featured a hacking seconds function. Patek used this caliber until it discontinued the 5711, in 2021.