A Million Dollars for a Watch! The Legendary Audemars Piguet Masterpiece Returns After 100 Years

In December, Sotheby's New York auction house will host a true watchmaking legend – the Audemars Piguet "Big Piece", the most complicated pocket watch ever to come into private hands.

The most complicated Audemars Piguet pocket watch ever sold privately will be auctioned at Sotheby's in New York in December. Known as the " Big Piece " (from the French Grosse Piece), the extraordinary timepiece could fetch up to $ 1 million .

The 1914 Audemars Piguet Big Piece returns to the spotlight. Photo: Press materials / Sotheby's

The watch was commissioned in 1914 by the London-based Smith & Sons for a South American client. It took six years to create, with every element handcrafted with a precision that modern machines would envy. The Big Piece has everything a watch enthusiast could dream of: a tourbillon (a mechanism that improves accuracy), a chronograph , a perpetual calendar, moon phase displays, equation of time, sunrise and sunset times, and a striking function.

Most remarkable, however, is its astronomical display— a miniature map of the London night sky , showing 315 stars and 18 constellations. According to the Audemars Piguet heritage department, it's the only known pocket watch in the world with this complication, and the only one from that period to feature a tourbillon . In the world of watchmaking, this is an almost mythical combination.

The 1914 Audemars Piguet Big Piece returns to the spotlight. Photo: Press materials / Sotheby's

In 1970, the watch was purchased by Robert M. Olmsted , one of America's most esteemed collectors . For decades, the Big Piece languished in his private collection . It was first described in 1990, and has not been seen publicly since. Now, more than a century after its premiere at the 1920 Geneva Exhibition, it will once again be on display.

An extraordinary Audemars Piguet from 1914 goes under the hammer at Sotheby's. Photo: Press materials / Sotheby's

As Daryn Schnipper of Sotheby's emphasizes, the opportunity to exhibit such a work is a "rare honor." In addition to the Big Piece, two unique Patek Philippe watches with double movements, also from the Olmsted collection, will also be available for purchase in December. So, if anyone dreams of a unique holiday gift, here they are. All you need is a million dollars and a little courage.