Jay-Z's Patek Philippe Watches - From his Tiffany Blue Nautilus 5711 to his Grandmaster Chime

After the Tiffany Blue and Tiffany stamped stainless steel Patek Philippe Nautilus Ref. 5711/1A-018 sold at auction recently for $6.5 million USD (including auction fees), a lot of conjecture on social media turned to which celebrity would be spotted first wearing the extremely rare and divisively expensive watch. Only 170 were made so not every celeb watch collector would be able to get one. People speculated that watch collectors such as John Mayer, Ed Sheeran, Mark Wahlberg or Sylvester Stallone would be first. Except for a photoshop by one of the large Instagram watch influencers (not me!) showing Mark Wahlberg wearing the watch, none of the guesses was true. It reality, Jay-Z was the first celebrity flexing the Tiffany Blue Nautilus, and it turns out that it makes sense that he is. It turns out that both Jay-Z and his wife Beyonce are Tiffany ambassadors and who better to be seen first wearing a Patek Philippe watch exclusively available (to 170 people) at Tiffany boutiques than one of their ambassadors. Additionally, Jay-Z is a noted watch collector, who has an impressive Patek Philippe collection. In this article, I will go through the Patek Philippes Jay-Z has been spotted wearing, including and beyond the Tiffany Blue Nautilus (you can check our article about the auction here. You can also listen to Travis and my discussions on the subject in The Windup Merchants podcast).

The Tiffany Blue Nautilus is not the first Nautilus that Jay has been spotted wearing. Jay-Z also has a rose gold Patek Philippe Nautilus Chronograph Ref. 5980R-001 on rubber strap. This piece has not been immune to the spiking prices in the watch market. You can currently pick one up on the secondary market for between $130,000-$170,000 USD.

While not as popular as the Nautilus, the Patek Philippe Aquanaut has achieved much greater prominence in the watch collecting community as prices of the Nautilus have increased. Indeed, an Aquanaut is almost as difficult to buy from an Authorized Dealer as a Nautilus. So expect to wait years for your piece (or forever if you don’t have any buying history. Jay-Z, however, has an Aquanaut of his own. He has the fairly new white gold Patek Philippe Aquanaut Ref. 5968G Chronograph with blue dial and blue rubber strap (the blue dial definitely adds value to the piece). While the piece retails for $73,500, you can buy it on the grey market for over $200,000 USD.

Jay-Z’s taste in Patek Philippes extends to high complication pieces as well. Jay-Z has been seen wearing the white gold Patek Philippe Ref. 5230G-010 with world time complication. In addition to the standard hours and minutes this piece also boasts 24-hour and day/night indicators for 24 different time zones. This particular watch with the blue dial is the “New York” limited edition and is currently available on the secondary market for around $80,000 USD.

Some of Jay-Z’s Patek Philippes even contain “out of this world” complications. During Super Bowl LIV in Miami, Jay-Z was wearing a Patek Philippe Sky Moon Celestial Ref. 6102P. The Sky Moon Celestial was first released in 2015. The piece boasts a decorated blue sapphire-crystal dial with a rotating chart of the heavenly bodies which provides an image of the night sky in the northern hemisphere on any given day. The Sky Moon Celestial is currently available for sale on the secondary market for over $400,000 USD.

The final Patek Philippe owned by Jay-Z that I will highlight is the most complicated, and my view the most magnificent. Jay-Z has been pictured wearing a Patek Philippe Grandmaster Chime Ref. 6300G. This is an application piece, meaning there is a process by which you must apply and be approved by Patek Philippe to own this timepiece (questions include things such as “What is your greatest accomplishment while wearing a Patek Philippe?”). When it was first released in 2016, the Grandmaster Chime retailed for about $2.2 million USD. The piece includes 20 complications, including the Grande Sonnerie (a chime every quarter-hour), a moon phase, and the ability to keep the exact date until the year 2100. This watch is so rare, and so expensive, it is rarely up for sale and a market price is hard to come by (though it will be very expensive). Indeed a one of one variation of the Grandmaster Chime sold at the charity auction Only Watch in 2019 for a cool $31 million USD. While Jay-Z’s would not fetch that number, it is highly likely that his piece command more than the $6.5 million the Tiffany Blue Nautilus sold for just a week ago.