10 Most Expensive Watches

By: Amin El-Gazzar

Break Studios Contributing Writer

They aren't really just time pieces, these ten most expensive watches. They instead are stunning works of art and technology. No finer pieces of jewelry have ever graced a human arm or pocket. For those who can afford them, they are well worth the cost. Their value is determined by three factors: expense of materials used, complexity, and scarcity. Their price reflects either the most that one went for at auction or the price currently being asked for by their manufacturers.

201-carat Chopard: $25 million dollars. This stunning time piece features three heart-shaped diamonds: a fifteen-carat pink, a twelve-carat blue and an eleven-carat white. Nearly 700 white and yellow diamonds add 163 additional carats of dazzling beauty. The name of the watch refers to the total carat value of the diamonds in it.
Patek Philippe’s Supercomplication: $11 million. This eighteen-carat-gold pocket watch was finished in 1932 after being in production for four years. Originally made for New York banker Henry Graves, Jr., it sold at auction for the above-mentioned price in 1999. It has two faces and 24 separate complications.
Louis Moinet Meteoris: $4.6 million. This is actually a set of four tourbillion watches with mechanical movements made from pieces of four meteorites. Meteorite hunter Luc Labenne collected these rocks on the Earth but their original homes were the moon, Mars, and an asteroid. In addition, the watch contains a piece of the meteorite named Rosetta Stone, believed to be the oldest rock in the solar system. The space-age work of art is framed by a case which displays a replica of the solar system.
Patek Philippe’s Platinum World Time: $4 million. In 2002, this watch sold at auction for $4 million. It earns its name from both the easy-to-read display of all of the Earth's twenty-four time zones and from the priceless metal from which it is made.
Piaget’s Emperador Temple: $3.3 million. This is an orgy of diamonds that combines two watches in one. The first has a mother-of-pearl dial set with 162 brilliant-cut diamonds and eleven baguette diamonds. The second has 481 brilliant-cut diamonds and 207 baguette cuts. The case features emerald-cut diamonds and the band holds 350 baguette diamonds.
Aeternitas Mega 4, with thirty-six complications: $2.7 million. Only one of the watches has been made so far and it was delivered to its owner, watch collector Michael J. Gould, at a dignitary-filled ceremony in Paris in 2009. Franck Muller and Vartan Sirmakes, the co-founders of Franck Muller Manufacture made the presentation in front of 400 guests. The timepiece, which has 1,483 different parts and took five years to make, has the distinction of being "the world’s most complicated wrist-watch".
Cartier’s phoenix-shaped wristwatch: $2.7 million. This one-of-a-kind watch, which made by the renown French jeweler and watch making company, made its debut in April, 2010. It is made of 18 carat, rhodium-plated white gold. The Cartier company is known as the jeweler of kings.
Vacheron Constantin Tour de l’Ile: $2.5 million. This watch, which has 834 parts takes more than a year to produce. It has two faces, with the back showing the time as well as the front. Only seven of this expensive and complex clock have ever been made.
Patek Philippe Sky Moon Tourbillon: $1.1 million. This complex watch has 688 parts some of which are microscopic. Only two of these watches are made a year. One is made of platinum and the other is rose gold.
The Chopard Super Ice Cube: $1.0 million. This watch, which was appropriately named for its ice-cube appearance, sports gemstones totaling 66 carats.