Philippe Stern, Patek Philippe’s Honorary President, Dies at 88

by · WWD
Philippe Stern in 2004.South China Morning Post via Getty

Philippe Stern, the watchmaking executive who guided Patek Philippe through the quartz crisis and was the third generation at the helm of the family-owned company, died Sunday at age 88.

The company revealed his death on Monday.

Born in 1938, Stern was a grandson of Charles Stern, who acquired Patek Philippe with his brother Jean Stern in 1932 after being long-term dial suppliers of the watchmaker, and the son of Henri Stern, who developed the company’s international distribution, and particularly the U.S. market.

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He spent his entire career at the family-owned firm, first in New York where he joined, after studying economics and commerce, its Henri Stern Watch Agency subsidiary in 1963.

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Returning to Geneva in 1966, he spent the next decade working his way through the company, including overseeing the launch of the Nautilus sports watch, which remains a reference in watchmaking.

Stern became the company’s managing director in 1977, as the Swiss watchmaking industry faced the quartz crisis. A staunch believer in mechanical watchmaking, he embraced craftsmanship and pursued ambitious projects such as the nine-year-long development of the Calibre 89 with 33 complications.

In 1993, Stern became president of the company. Under his leadership, the company pursued a strategy of vertical integration, culminating with the state-of-the-art Plan-les-Ouates manufacturing site in 1996.

After passing the baton to his son Thierry Stern in 2009, he remained as honorary president and member of its management committee.

A keen collector, Stern also amassed a rich collection that spanned examples of the brand’s timepieces but also pieces that retrace the history of watchmaking since the 16th century. They became the basis for the Patek Philippe Museum in Geneva, which he inaugurated in 2001.