Grand Prix d’Horlogerie de Genève (GPHG) 2023 award winners.
Grand Prix d’Horlogerie de Genève (GPHG), the much-anticipated awards event often dubbed the Oscars of watchmaking by industry stakeholders and watchmaking enthusiasts alike, was another memorable affair this year with winners announced at a glittering ceremony held at the Théâtre du Léman in Geneva.
GPHG honours contemporary watchmaking excellence and creativity annually. This year, 84 nominated timepieces competed for 19 prizes at the awards chaired by Nick Foulkes, the 2023 jury and the 847-member GPHG Academy.
The year’s top prize – the highly coveted Aiguille d’Or – went to Audemars Piguet’s Code 11.59 Ultra-Complication Universelle RD#4.
Special Jury Prize recipients Calabrese (left) and Andersen.
This incarnation of the Code 11.59 is the most complicated ever made in the series, taking over seven years to create and consolidating 40 functions and 23 complications into a sleek 42mm case.
Its many features include a minute repeater, perpetual calendar, Grande Sonnerie Supersonnerie, flying tourbillon, and split-second flyback chronograph.
François-Henry Bennahmias, outgoing CEO of Audemars Piguet, with the Aiguille d’Or award for the Code 11.59 Ultra-Complication Universelle RD#4.
he Iconic Watch Prize, meanwhile, went to Ulysse Nardin’s Freak One. The series first made its premiere in 2001 as a revolutionary timepiece free of any dial, hands or crown.
The Freak One includes an oversized and highly complex, aerodynamic, and inertia-optimised balance wheel crafted entirely from one piece of silicon with a lever escapement made from proprietary DIAMonSIL, a patented diamond-coated silicon.
Special Jury Prize, which awards an outstanding personality or institution in the watchmaking world, was handed to Svend Andersen and Vincent Calabrese for the creation of the AHCI. The Académie Horlogère des Créateurs Indépendants was set up to perpetuate the art of independent watch- and clockmaking.
GPHG 2023 winners:
“Aiguille d’Or” Grand Prix:
Audemars Piguet, Code 11.59 by Audemars Piguet Ultra-Complication Universelle RD#4
Innovation: Hautlence, Sphere Series 1
Audacity: Maison Alcée, Persée Azur
Chronometry: Ferdinand Berthoud, Chronomètre FB 3SPC
Horological Revelation: Simon Brette, Chronomètre Artisans
Patrick Pruniaux, CEO of Ulysse Nardin, at the awards receiving the Iconic Watch Prize 2023 for the Freak One.
Ladies’ Watch: Piaget, Hidden Treasures
Ladies’ Complication Watch: Dior Montres, Grand Soir Automate Étoile de Monsieur Dior
Men’s Complication Watch: Voutilainen, World Timer
Iconic: Ulysse Nardin, Freak One
Tourbillon: Laurent Ferrier, Grand Sport Tourbillon Pursuit
Calendar and Astronomy: Bovet 1822, Récital 20 Astérium
Chronograph: Petermann Bédat, Chronographe rattrapante
Sports: Tudor, Pelagos 39
Jewellery Watch: Bulgari, Serpenti Cleopatra
Artistic Crafts: Piaget, Altiplano Métiers d’Art - Undulata
“Petite Aiguille”: Christopher Ward London, C1 Bel Canto
Challenge Watch:
Raymond Weil, Millésime automatic small seconds
Mechanical Clock: L’Epée 1839, Time Fast II Chrome
Special Jury Prize: Svend Andersen and Vincent Calabrese
