Xmas Event Shanghai / Hong Kong 2011
part 5: Blum collection auctionSo we met in the lobby of our hotel in order to take the bus (again!). A great chandelier...
Click on the picture to see an overview of the
Blum collection!
Patiently, Reto Stöckli took his time to
explain some details about the watches, answering questions, telling
stories from the "good old days", ... I managed to spot a
(minor) error in the exhibition, maybe you can find it as well in the
gallery.
Many collectors registered for the auction,
and later in the evening, it became clear that this was a good idea
:-) We all received an auction catalogue (super heavy, super
nice) and the registered bidders received a bidding paddle.
Around noon, it was time again for lunch. Swatch had reserved a room in one of Hong Kong's nicest traditional chinese restaurants: City Hall Maxim's Palace. It showcases the best of Cantonese cuisine and dim sum, and is an exciting restaurant with an amazing view of the Victoria Harbour. Finally, some real chinese food!
And we had some fun with the turntable :-)
Then, we had a few hours off. Time
for a walk through the city...
Victoria Park
Finally, the great moment had come and we
left with the buses for the auction at the Four Seasons hotel.
Everybody had dressed up nicely, some with brand new clothing!
Lots of champaign was served (in order to enable a "spending" mood?
:-)
The auction stage in the greatball room was
decorated in style, and the about 350 invited guests slowly filled the
room.
And then, the auction began. Tense
atmosphere, lots of bids from the room, on the telephone, and on the
internet.
An overview
of the lots (including results!) can be found at the Phillips de
Pury & Company website.
Here are some video snippets from the
auction preview and the auction itself. You will get an idea how
quickly the auction passed by...
Two other lots went to Swatch The Club members: Lot #5 (Special Edition Phillips de Pury & Company watch, #008/100) went to a Dutch collector for $4,160 US:
And lot #7 (My Swatch, a new Swatch watch produced in a limited edition of 100 pieces after the design ideas of the auction winner) went to an European consortium of Swatch collectors ($35,200 US).
So the auction was a huge success: for
Linda Blum (she had patiently, and very friendly, signed autographs
for collectors in the morning preview), for the Swatch collectors, and
for Swatch of course as well.
Here
is another video from the preview and the actual auction.
A few hours later, the ballroom looked a
bit different. Time to collect a few thrown-away catalogues :-)
This essentially marked the end of the
event!
We had one extra day in Hong Kong, so we
took the ferry to Kowloon...
We took the usual touristic trail (Nathan
Road, Electronics Market, Sports Market, ...). A completely
different shopping experience to the our well known western shopping
streets. We did not buy much there, though. The afternoon
coffee (yes, it should have been tea) at the Peninsula Hotel was
relaxing...
our ferry back to HK central
apple store HK, always welcome due to free Wifi :-)
