The Piaget Polo 79 And The Not So Unpleasant Matter Of The Bill

The price is all right.

The Piaget Polo is in its own way, something very pure. It does not ask to be understood as a great piece of intricate metiers d’art craftsmanship or as a deeply meaningful cultural object, nor does it propose to you that it is a work of art on any level, or an icon of design which in its own way sums up the full depth of spirit of the Zeitgeist of a particular era. It came along in 1979, which is not a year that anyone who was there remembers as a particularly fantastic one for art, design, moral certitude, or any sense that society as a whole was motivated by a yearning for some higher ethical compass by which to steer the ship of state and the smaller vessel, and often profoundly leaky, vessel of personal integrity. (The various ships of state seem increasingly likely to founder on the rocks of history these days but hey, you’re here for watches, not for politics or metaphors being beating to within an inch of their lives.)

It was instead a year of absolute devotion to decadence in whatever form you could afford, and in which the absolute zenith of cool was to be able to get into Studio 54, which was patronized by everyone from Bella Abzug to David Bowie to Truman Capote, to Karl Lagerfeld, to Diana Ross (and more names than you can shake a stick at, many of whom were Absolutely Fabulous then and are Absolutely Forgotten now). And, bien sûr, it was a time during which proscribed pharmaceuticals of every stripe became, if not openly endorsed, certainly tacitly accepted. Not for nothing does Cocaine Bear take place in 1985, just a few years later. Michael Jackson had just released Don’t Stop ‘Till You Get Enough, The Village People released YMCA, Debbie Harry ruled Manhattan nightlife, and Disco was peaking, albeit under the dark shadow of punk rock’s anarchic allure.

I mention all this by way of saying that when you talk about releasing a luxury watch in 1979, this is the sort of world it was released into. The Polo was the tip of the spear of unapologetic decadence and of course it was an insanely expensive watch – adjusted for inflation it was roughly as expensive back then as the Polo 79 that dropped in Gstaad is now.

What then are we to make of the current version of the Polo 79? The first thing anybody says about it is usually some sort of comment on the price, which, let’s face it, is exorbitant, at $73,000; this is the sort of thing that produces social revolutions if it goes on too long (you would think, although in reality it seems to produce more aspiration than rebellion. Whether or not that is a good or a bad thing is anyone’s guess). However context is everything, even in matters of luxury, and there is exorbitant and there is exorbitant, and while my own first reaction to the price of the Polo 79 was a gasp of disbelief mingled with an incoherent rush of thoughts about late capitalism and the foundations of civil unrest and social revolutions, I eventually realized that I don’t spend all that much time familiarizing myself with the cost of luxury gold watches on matching gold bracelets, and that the price of the Polo 79 might bear some investigating in terms of what the competition charges.

We can start with the nearest notable competitor, the Vacheron 222 – right now list for the 222 is $74,000. You might want to argue that the 222 is justifiably more expensive thanks to Vacheron’s status as one of the historical Big Three or thanks to the fineness of the movement and construction but while there are certainly differentiating points between the two we can say at least that the Polo 79 seems roughly comparable in terms of craft, and that the micro-rotor caliber 1200P deserves some respect for its merits as a movement as well – it’s a 2.35mm thick, which compares favorably with the 2.46mm thick full rotor AP 2120.

What about Audemars Piguet? A 39mm Jumbo with the caliber 7121 – certainly a handsome and impressive watch – is $78,300 at current list price. However, depending on who and where you are, and how deep you are into watches, a solid gold gadroon-o-thon may feel more exclusive and interesting.

We can next look at Patek Philippe. Patek doesn’t currently have a men’s integrated bracelet gold, time-only sports watch although a rose gold Aquanaut on a strap will run you $45,720, and a ladies’ 7118/1R at 35.2mm in diameter will cost $58,330 (bearing in mind that the original “Jumbo” 3700 was a 42mm watch). The closest in a full sized Nautilus to a time-only gold on gold watch in the current collection is the 5712-1R, with a small seconds display plus a moonphase and power reserve and that, unsurprisingly, edges out both the Piaget and the Vacheron, at $83,310. (Nothing in yellow gold, by the way, at least not yet this year).

What else have we got out there? Lange & Söhne does not have a gold-on-gold watch in any of its collections although one wonders about an Odysseus in gold, with a gold bracelet (or heck, a Lange 1 on a gold Milanese, for that matter. And it’s not like Lange has never done a Lange 1 in gold-on-gold. For all I know they still do). Jaeger-LeCoultre has a Reverso Duetto in pink gold, although it’s billed as a ladies’ watch, at 34.2mm x 21mm (although as with the 7118/1R I can’t see any reason a gent disposed to wear one shouldn’t). A Louis Vuitton Tambour Automatic in yellow gold is a relatively gentle $52,000. No gold-on-gold at Grand Seiko, either, although the year is young. Girard-Perregaux does do a Laureato, pink gold-on-gold, for $54,300 although at 42mm, I feel this would be a more graceful time-and-date watch in a smaller size, which is something I feel about a lot of the Laureato watches (somewhere in the 36mm-38mm range would feel more on point).

F. P. Journe launched a Linesport automatic with power reserve in 2019 and the price at launch was €60,000 (about $64,300 at the current exchange rate) but that watch is no longer in the catalogue and a cursory glance around seems to indicate that the street price has gone up to at least Patek/Vacheron/Piaget territory.

A Cartier Santos, gold on gold, medium, is what seems like a great deal for this genre, at $32,200 (I mean a Cartier classic that’s been around since 1908 in one form or another for that price … sign me up.) Speaking of classics, a classic Day-Date in a classic 36mm case with a classic champagne dial and classic stick markers and a classic fluted bezel on a classic Presidential bracelet is $35,000 which I think sort of means we all should just go out and buy one right now.

Speaking of 36mm, you know what’s a freaking cool gold-on-gold watch? The recently announced Victoria Beckham for Breitling 36mm Chronomat automatic, that’s what’s a freaking cool watch. The bracelet is great, the bezel is great, the rider tabs are great and the price is great, at $29,500. Would I like to have a Day-Date instead? Yeeeessss, but I would also like to have an extra $5,500 of my favorite dollars. Some people are mad about the movement, but honestly at this price I don’t particularly care myself, especially not with how hard a fancy fine watchmaking movement kicks the price upstairs. At this price I don’t care that it says Victoria Beckham on the case and bracelet either, and why should I at any price? I wouldn’t care if a gold Royal Oak said Gerald Genta on it (or at least, I wouldn’t except if I disliked the idea of designers signing their work in general).

And if you want something really crazy different, 2019 was also the year Casio released the G-D5000-9. It was a 35 piece limited edition, and although it was originally announced as JDM-only when I covered it on release, two were sold in the US market for $70,000, although as far as I can tell street price went up to over 6 figures at one point.

So where does that leave us? First of all unless for some reason you think that Piaget doesn’t have the right to charge Patek/Vacheron/AP/Journe prices for the Polo 79, the price is not actually out of line for what a design-forward high craft vintage inflected gold-on-gold watch goes for. You could make an argument that Piaget shouldn’t price itself at the same level as the traditional Big Three but honestly I don’t think there is a strong argument to be made and let’s be frank, the gap between the caliber 1200P and some of its competitor’s movements at that price range is not as noticeable as it used to be.

The second point worth noticing is that gold-on-gold, vintage inflected watches (in either rose or pink gold; I didn’t start looking around to see what the variation was like for white gold or platinum) come in a kind of surprising price range. You can still get one, starting with Breitling, for under $30,000 and the scale goes all the way up to – well, a G-Shock, at a six-figure street price, albeit hey, that’s a perpetual calendar split seconds alarm countdown timer.

And the third point goes all the way back to 1979. The Polo then was unapologetically a luxury watch. It had a quartz movement but in 1979 that just meant it was au courant with the state of the art of watch technology.

And the steep price was steep for a reason. This sort of thing is supposed to be expensive, it’s supposed to be exclusive, and to cavil and gripe about the price is to miss the fact that the high price is part of the value proposition – it’s one of the things that makes the watch interesting to the very, very wealthy folks who are going to be able to buy one. It is in short, a feature, not a bug. And you know what, I’m not the only one who thinks “quiet luxury” is a synonym for “risk-averse and unimaginative.” Oh sure you can not consume conspicuously but what fun is that?

A solid gold G-Shock is certainly a baller move but it is also a watch that you would probably have to explain to other people in the club, or on a yacht in Monaco (or wherever) was actually solid gold. Conspicuous consumption that requires an explanation is a tough sell and there is a fine line between insider-flex and obscure. If the price of the Polo 79 were not gasp inducing the watch would not be fulfilling one of its primary – maybe its absolutely primary – functions, which is to instantly convey that not only can you get into the VIP room, you may actually own the VIP room, if not the club and the building the club is housed in. The pleasure of a gold-on-gold, vintage-inflected watch can be had for a lot less than $73,000 but at a less exclusive price point it would just not be the shock-and-awe inducing luxury play that it is. I can’t help but think that everyone from Bella Abzug to David Bowie to Truman Capote, to Karl Lagerfeld, to Diana Ross, would approve.