New: Patek Philippe Calatrava 24-Hour Display Travel Time Ref. 5224R-001

Patek Philippe presents a new Calatrava model featuring an original, 24-hour, central display of local and home time. The Ref. 5224R-001 is driven by the Calibre31-260 PS FUS 24H which comes with three patents.

Press Release details with commentary in italics.

Patek Philippe Calatrava 24-Hour Display Travel Time Ref. 5224R-001

The Patek Philippe Calatrava 24-Hour Display Travel Time Ref. 5224R-001 is a regular production timepiece, with a retail price of USD57,370.

Commentary

The Calatrava is the prototypical Swiss round dresswatch. It is elegance and tradition incarnate, and is synonymous with the Patek Philippe brand. In recent years, however, there has been a shift towards bringing the Calatrava into the 21st century, to be more in sync with the trends of today. Patek Philippe has never been afraid of change. The brand knows that evolution is needed to remain relevant. The most recent example of Patek Philippe’s effort in modernising the Calatrava collection can be seen here in the new Ref. 5224R-001 (and also fellow Watches and Wonders 2023 debutant, the Ref. 6007G).

The Ref. 5224R isn’t what you’d typically imagine when you think of a classic Calatrava. It has a blue dial, a 42 mm case, a sporty font for numerals, a time display in an atypical 24-hour format, and a matching blue calfskin strap with nubuck finish. That said, these seemingly contemporary design elements are tempered by traditional high craftsmanship that continues to define Patek Philippe. The case for example, while on the larger side for a Calatrava, has a refined look and is entirely polished. And while having the main time display in 24-hour format is appears novel, it’s actually inspired by the Patek Philippe No. P-527 pocket watch produced for Brazilian retailer Gondolo & Labouriau over a century ago. Then, when you flip the watch over, you find a mechanical movement with traditional architecture and finish.

All in all, the Ref. 5224R manages to strike a delicate balance between the old and the new world, all while keeping things fresh with an unorthodox 24-hour time display.

Release Details

Patek Philippe is broadening this vast selection of Travel Time dual time zone watches with a new Calatrava model featuring an original display of local time and home time by two center hands turning on a 24-hour circle. The manufacture has already used 24-hour displays in the past, notably on the Chronometro Gondolo watches produced in the early twentieth century for the Brazilian retailer Gondolo & Labouriau. One of these, a pocket watch made in 1905, is now exhibited in the Patek Philippe Museum (No. P-527). For the new Reference 5224R-001, the designers have reinterpreted this type of indication in a resolutely modern spirit. They have also chosen to place noon at 12 o’clock,
rather than at 6 o’clock as is usually the case, thereby ensuring excellent legibility throughout the daytime hours.

To provide these functions, Patek Philippe’s engineers took the 31-260 ultra-thin self-winding base caliber and added a 24-hour mechanism and a Travel Time mechanism. This movement, launched in 2011 in the Annual Calendar Regulator Reference 5235 (caliber 31-260 REG QA) was entirely reworked in 2021 for the In-Line Perpetual Calendar Reference 5236P-001 (caliber 31-260 PS QL). It was given an operating frequency of 4 Hz (28, 800 semi-oscillations per hour), a 20 per cent increase in barrel-spring torque, a mini-rotor in platinum (heavier than gold) boosting the winding power and a reduction wheel that uncouples the self-winding mechanism when the watch is being manually wound and thus reduces wear. In 2022, Patek Philippe reworked this movement again for the Annual Calendar Travel Time Reference 5326G-001 (caliber 31-260 PS QA LU FUS 24H) and developed several innovations, leading to eight patent applications. The new caliber 31-260 PS FUS 24H movement housed in Reference 5224R-001 benefits from three of those patents, aimed at optimizing efficiency, rate accuracy, durability, safety and ease of use.

Visible through a transparent sapphire-crystal back, the new self-winding caliber 31-260 PS FUS 24H movement with mini-rotor in platinum makes it possible to provide a case whose elegant finesse (9.85 m high) is perfectly suited to a Calatrava model. To preserve the sleek lines, Patek Philippe also replaced the traditional correction pushers for local time on the left-hand flank of the case with a patented correction system using the crown pulled out to the intermediate position (backwards and forwards adjustment in one-hour steps). This device is modeled on the one used in 2022 in Reference 5326G-001. The fully polished rose-gold case, 42 mm in diameter, was inspired by that of the
Calatrava Weekly Calendar Reference 5212A-001 launched in 2019 and is distinguished by its curved two-tier lugs.

The navy-blue dial shines by its elegance and legibility, enhanced by a double railway-track scale for the hours and minutes. The 24-hour display, with its alternating Arabic numerals and hour markers and its cabochon 5-minute markers, represents a total of 44 rose-gold appliques – polished together to obtain the same brilliance and applied individually by hand. The Travel Time dual time zone is displayed by three syringe-shaped hands in rose gold, with a luminescent coating for the local hour hand and the minute hand and a pierced center for the home hour hand. Refined finishing touches create beautiful plays of light on the dial: a circular striated center, a circular satin-finished hour circle and a snailed small-seconds counter with a rose-gilt outline. A navy-blue calfskin strap with a nubuck finish and contrasting cream stitching echoes the color of the dial. It is secured by a prong buckle in rose gold.

Several Patek Philippe patents are applied again in this new caliber, including –for the time zone component –three patents from the caliber 31-260 PS QA LU FUS 24H (Reference 5326G-001):
• Time setting with three crown positions (Swiss patent CH 716383 B1 published 29.07.2022)
This time-setting system has a lever with three positions that can deactivate certain wheels as long as they are not performing any correction. This reduces energy consumption and wear of the respective wheels. The result is a gain for the balance amplitude (rate accuracy) and for reliability.
• Linear time-zones spring (European patent EP 3650953 B1)
This system consists of a star-wheel and a jumper spring. It allows a strong torque increase between the local-time hour wheel and the home-time hour wheel –thus providing the user with more precise information.
• Inertial delta (European patent application EP 3822711 A1)
This mechanism offsets the inertia difference between a heavier and a lighter wheel. When the time zone is being corrected in either direction, it prevents an unintended forward or backward misalignment of the time displays (home time, local time, minutes). This increases the accuracy of the displays.

Patek Philippe Calatrava 24-Hour Display Travel Time Ref. 5224R-001 Specifications

Movement	Caliber 31-260 PS FUS 24H Self-winding mechanical movement. Travel Time dual time zone with local time and home time on a 24-hour display Small seconds
Diameter	31.74 mm
Height	3.7 mm
Number of parts	240
Number of jewels	44
Power reserve	48 h
Winding rotor	Mini-rotor in platinum, unidirectional winding
Frequency	28,800 semi-oscillations per hour (4 Hz)
Balance	Gyromax®
Balance spring	Spiromax ® (in Silinvar ® )
Balance spring stud	Adjustable
Functions	3-position crown: • Pushed home: manual winding • Pulled to middle position: setting of local time in either direction in one-hour steps • Pulled out all the way: simultaneous setting of home time, local time and the minute with “stop seconds” function
Displays	With hands: • Local time on a 24-hour scale and minutes from the center • Home time (second time zone) on a 24-hour scale from the center • Small seconds at 6 o’clock
Hallmark	Patek Philippe Seal
Case	18K rose gold Sapphire-crystal case back Water-resistant to 30 m
Case dimensions	Diameter: 42 mm Height (from crystal to display back): 9.85 mm Total height: 10.2 mm Width between lugs: 21 mm
Dial	Navy-blue with contrasting finishes (center with circular striation, hour circle with circular satin finish, small seconds counter finely snailed with rose-gilt outline) • Applied Arabic numerals, baton-style markers, and cabochon 5-minute markers, in 18K rose gold with a luminescent coating • Syringe-shaped local hour hand and minute hand, in 18K rose gold with a luminescent coating • Pierced syringe-shaped home hour hand (second time zone) in 18K rose gold • Sword-style small-seconds hand in white gold coated with white varnish
Strap	Navy-blue calfskin with a nubuck finish, contrasting cream hand stitching and a prong buckle in rose gold