GPHG Awards 2021

Every year, the GPHG (or Grand Prix d’Horlogerie de Genève), celebrates the watch industry with a series of awards, presented to the best watches released over the course of the previous year, and is often described as the Oscars of the watchmaking world. You may recall that when the shortlist was announced back in September, I picked my own GPHG Awards 2021 winners.

With huge thanks to my partners at The Limited Edition, I was incredibly fortunate to be able to attend the ceremony as a part of a separate trip I had already planned with a friend of mine to Geneva, and so thought it would be interesting to describe the evening to share my experience, and also take a quick look at the GPHG Winners for 2021, and how these compared to my own picks!

An Evening at the GPHG Awards

As soon as I found out that my friend and I would be attending the awards ceremony, I was of course super excited. The whole thing came about with a chance conversation, and a coincidence which saw me unknowingly planning a trip to Geneva with a friend for a few days which happened to align with the GPHG Awards ceremony. I had never attended an awards ceremony on this scale before, and given the last 18 months, one of the biggest concerns I had was whether I would still fit in my suits and formalwear after it had spent this period consigned to the back of the wardrobe! Spoiler alert: just about.

The next biggest concern was – naturally – which watch to wear! Luckily this decision was made a lot easier as the Louis Erard x Vianney Halter Le Régulateur had been shortlisted for the Petite Aiguille award, so I wore mine in support.

Anyway, after we got ready, it was a short ten-minute walk from our hotel to the Théâtre du Léman where the ceremony is held, which is just across the road from the shores of Lake Geneva. There was a gathering outside of the venue, with a big GPHG backdrop, and when we arrived there was also a camera crew filming an interview with various industry folks and this year’s GPHG Jury President, author and historian Nicholas Foulkes (check out his authorised biography of Patek Philippe, and his book on the Jaeger-LeCoultre Reverso – affiliate links).

I found it really quite surreal standing there around the likes of Nicholas Foulkes, Jean-Christophe Babin (the CEO of Bulgari), Wei Koh and others, but it felt amazing to be there. Given I have been interested in watches for about 6 or 7 years, and writing this blog in earnest for about 18 months, I would be lying if I said I didn’t have some feelings of ‘imposter syndrome’, but that soon passed, and in the end I was just trying to soak the experience in.

Before long, it was time to enter the venue ahead of the ceremony and we were each presented with a programme of the awards and the shortlisted candidates to follow along. Inside, the theatre auditorium was pretty big. It was unallocated seating, so it was a case of finding a seat and making yourself comfortable for the two hours ahead.

The ceremony itself was presided over by French actor and writer, Edouard Baer, who was quite entertaining even if we didn’t understand the majority of what was said, given the ceremony and majority of acceptance speeches were of course delivered in French.

We were even treated half-way through to a magnificent piano score from a young, 13-year-old maestro; it was honestly incredible.

Each award was presented by one or two members of the 30-strong GPHG Jury, so it was quite cool to see some of the famous names from the watch world on stage both presenting and collecting awards. At one stage, Max Büsser of MB&F won two awards in succession –  he had to be called back onto the stage from the ongoing photo session for his first award to collect his second, much to his surprise and the amusement of everyone in the auditorium!

For me personally, two speeches stick in mind especially:

First is that of Wei Koh, who presented the Tourbillon award, and started his speech by impressively recounting every Aiguille d’Or winning Tourbillon watch from bygone years, and the year in which they won the award – incredibly impressive, and this alone was met with a round of applause from the audience!

Second was the acceptance speech of Bernhard Lederer, collecting the Innovation award for the Central Impulse Chronometer, something which has taken him and his team ten years of research and development to get to this point. Luckily for us, his speech was delivered in English, and in listening to him speak what really came across to me was just how much the award meant to him, and he was so humble in receiving it. It was a lovely moment to have been able to witness.

The biggest award of the night, the Aiguille d’Or (or golden hand), was won by Bulgari for the Octo Finissimo Perpetual Calendar – the seventh world record thinnest watch from Bulgari in seven years. This was collected by Jean-Christophe Babin, the CEO of Bulgari, who dedicated it to Fabrizio Buonamassa, the Creative Director for Bulgari watches, and even called him up on stage to receive the award as well.

After the ceremony was complete, and all the winners joined each other on stage, it was time for the free champagne reception outside – after this point, it starts to get a little hazy! Suffice it to say we stayed for a while until the crowd had thinned out, before making our way to a nearby pub for some food and calling it a night.

As an experience, this is something I will never forget and shall be eternally grateful for having had the opportunity to attend – all thanks to Pietro at The Limited Edition.

So, I hear you asking, who won the awards? Well, I’ve listed each of the award categories below with the winner on the night, but also with my pick for the winner from my earlier article, just as I thought it would be interesting to see how my own picks fared.

GPHG Awards 2021 – the Winners

To begin with, the main award of the night – the Aiguille d’Or – doesn’t have a shortlist of six entrants as it is the watch from all those shortlisted which the Jury feel deserves to be recognised as the best release from the last year. For the 2021 award, this was presented to Bulgari and their Octo Finissimo Perpetual Calendar – the thinnest perpetual calendar in the world – as described above.

Aiguille d’Or

Winner: Bulgari Octo Finissimo Perpetual Calendar

Moving on to the winners of the 14 categories with six shortlisted candidates:

Ladies’

My winner: Bovet, Miss Audrey Sweet Art

Official winner: Piaget Limelight Gala Precious Rainbow

Ladies’ Complication

My winner: Van Cleef & Arpels Lady Lady Féerie watch

Official winner: Van Cleef & Arpels Lady Lady Féerie watch

Men’s

My winner: Louis Erard x Alain Silberstein La Semaine

Official winner: Grand Seiko SLGH005 Caliber 9SA5 Hi-Beat 36000 80 Hours

Men’s Complication

My winner: MB&F LMX Titanium

Official winner: MB&F LMX Titanium

Iconic

My winner: Grand Seiko’s Recreation of the first Grand Seiko

Official winner: Audemars Piguet Royal Oak 15202PT “Jumbo”

Tourbillon

My winner: Girard-Perregaux, Tourbillon with Three Flying Bridges, Aston Martin edition

Official winner: De Bethune Kind of Two Tourbillon

Calendar and Astronomy

My winner: Arnold & Son Luna Magna

Official winner: Christian Van Der Klaauw CVDK Planetarium Else Elsinga

Mechanical Exception

My winner: Miki Eleta’ Svernir

Official winner: Piaget Altiplano Ultimate Automatic

Chronograph

My winner: Angelus U30 Black Tourbillon, Flyback and Split-Second Chronograph

Official winner: Zenith Chronomaster Sport

Diver’s

My winner: Doxa Sub 300 Carbon COSC Aquamarine

Official winner: Louis Vuitton Tambour Street Diver Skyline Blue

Jewellery

My winner: Piaget Exquisite Moments Watch

Official winner: Chopard Flower Power

Artistic Crafts

My winner: Bulgari Divas’ Dream Peacock Collection

Official winner: MB&F Legacy Machine Special Edition Eddy Jaquet “Le Tour du Monds en 80 Jours”

“Petite Aiguille”

My winner: Tudor Black Bay Ceramic

Official winner: Tudor Black Bay Ceramic

Challenge

My winner: AnOrdain Model 1 – Payne’s Grey Fumé

Official winner: CIGA Design Planète Bleue

In addition to the “standard” 14 awards, there are a series of discretionary awards which can be awarded by the Jury if they deem a competing watch is worthy of, or there is just cause to present, the award. In 2021, these were as follows:

Audacity Prize – this prize recognises the watch which amongst those shortlisted for the other awards takes an unconventional approach to watchmaking.

Winner: Louis Vuitton Tambour Carpe Diem, shortlisted in the Artistic Crafts category.

Innovation Prize – this prize rewards the watch amongst those shortlisted which offers an innovative approach to watchmaking in terms of technique, design, materials, etc.

Winner: Bernhard Lederer Central Impulse Chronometer, shortlisted in the Mechanical Exception category.

Revelation Prize – this prize rewards a young brand less than 10 years old, or a young watchmaking talent, where appropriate.

Winner: Furlan Marri Mr. Grey Ref. 1041-A, shortlisted in the Challenge category.

Special Jury Prize – this prize recognises an individual personality, an institution or even an initiative that has contributed significantly to promoting watchmaking. It cannot be awarded to a watch or a brand.

Winner: Dubai Watch Week

Best Young Student

Winner: Nathan Roux Morand

In Summary

Hopefully this has given you a good insight as to what it was like to attend the GPHG Awards 2021 Ceremony, and of course the results from the evening as well. It was a really great experience that I thoroughly enjoyed, and it was nice to see some of my own picks for the winners were aligned to the GPHG Jury!

Finally, once again, I owe a HUGE HUGE HUGE thank you to my partners at The Limited Edition, without whom this would never have been possible. Be sure to pay them a visit at TheLimitedEdition.co.uk and a follow on The Limited Edition on Instagram.

For more information about the GPHG, check out GPHG.org.

For any questions, please get in touch via our Contact page, or via our Instagram.

You might also be interested in:

• Independent Watchmaking – An Ode to the Indies
• In Conversation with Max Büsser
• GPHG 2021 Awards – My Winners
• Watch Stationery and Gift Ideas
• Watch Books, Watch Boxes and more at the Watch Affinity Shop on Amazon (commissions earned)

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