Jaeger-LeCoultre

A recent little trip - 1: An unexpected Find & A First for a Lady

 

Recently on a little trip, half private, half professional , a surprising encounter had crossed my way:

1/ The Prelude:

A while ago, Nicolas had shared his lovely post about the SHOM and its Ref 159, with the caliber 478.

- Already at that time, I had been intrigued by the appeal and convincing purity of this reported piece, but also the significance it had for the histoire of JLC. For me - still pretty much a novice in the vintage terroir to confess, this timeless case and dial have been quite special .

- Would I see one, this type would be a vintage to be liked, I felt.

2/ The encounter:

- So far the intro - well, in the first city, on a pretty rainy morning start , my wife and I were coicindentally looking in a window of a small vintage watch store, just across our breakfast café.

There was this piece:

I first was thinking : well , quite ok - a very clear dial with radium hands and radium numbers, so legible, a central second, drilled lugs. - AND a lovely plexi ! - Something rang a bell !

- Could this be a relative (of the SHOM), here possibly a lesser lady, but at least with some l'air de familie ??

- No matter, after looking at it , more seriously, with a very pleasant salesman, it in fact turned out to be a Caliber P478, from 1946, no Ref was available.

- ( my head was clicking : to my knowledge the P478 was somewhere between 1945 and begin 60ies, and many were made, so this would match ..) -- very nice sword hands, a slight greenish tone ( Why not brown, as usual ?

- I don't know). All still with a weak and nice glow, when we later checked ..

3/ Big or Small caveats (?):

- in the macros &near shots , the numbers seem to "crumble" somehow, not sharp anymore - age effect or something done with them - hope not

(because then the whole piece might be questionable .. - well, we will take the risk..)

- also the colors of the numbers - more green, than brown (?) - AND , I am not completely sure about the authentity of the crown ( too small ?), but nice it looked.

Oh, BTW: There is no signature on the back of the case, ( no SHOM) , just the case serial no; the case appears to have a snap / no screw. Next to the proportions, the appeal of this pleasant dial, almost immediately did it for us, wonderful hands and nice numbers, and also a pretty nice strap to complement it ..

Already here we fell somehow in love, both of us, in fact.

- my wife tested its looks vs her bag - not bad, ehh ?

- funny thing, the 34mm just very ok, (as well for her, but also on my wrist, I guess), and also I appreciated this clean look..

4/ The decision :

Well , to make it short now: - we both felt, this was a pretty nice one , though quite unexpected - and some caveats, but we took the chance - a souveneer as well

and since I had been rewarded with several nice pieces recently,

( and I expected some more soon..), I got it (for her).

This way now, as her first vintage JLC piece, following her long standing companion, a steel/ YG Reverso.

Here a wrist shot, I think a nice one . - Don' t you think ?

A final little question to the experts:

Maybe, you might help us a bit - is this a Ref 159 ( as mentioned in one of Nicolas' posts) ?

- I do not have a movement pic made, will try to do so soon.

- hopefully we did not get some too mediocre piece, but even if - it looks really pretty nice ..

So, to finalize the little story - hope you may have liked our unexected find a bit as well.

- We stand by this unexpected pick-up ..

Best, hs