Cosmograph Daytona 'Paul Newman John Player Special Cherry', Reference 6264 | A yellow gold chronograph wristwatch with bracelet, Circa 1971
PROPERTY OF AN IMPORTANT ASIAN COLLECTOR
Rolex
Cosmograph Daytona 'Paul Newman John Player Special Cherry', Reference 6264
A yellow gold chronograph wristwatch with bracelet, Circa 1971
Dial: black, exotic
Calibre: cal. 727 mechanical, 17 jewels
Case: 14k yellow gold, screw down case back
Case number: 2’802’702
Closure: 14k yellow gold Rolex Oyster bracelet and folding clasp
Size: 37 mm diameter, bracelet circumference approximately 190 mm
Signed: case, dial and movement
Accessories: none
In the Rolex collecting world, several key terms will instantly get any connoisseurs’ attention. Daytona. Paul Newman. John Player Special. All of these terms are no stranger to the community, nor to the gavel. Indeed, Paul Newman Daytonas have made up the bulk of high-flying Rolex auction lots in recent years, with John Player Special versions flying higher still. However, this was not the case half a century ago when the Daytona was first introduced. As the well known story goes, the original Daytonas were so unpopular that they would sit in retailer shop windows for years without attracting any interested buyers. This was one of the reasons why, a few years after the release of the reference 6239, Rolex began producing a new dial type in order to add variety and hopefully increase appeal in its struggling chronograph model. Their plan failed, but only for the time being. No one knew it at the time, but Rolex had just created their most desirable dial design, ever.
Few manually wound Daytonas were ever made due to their unpopularity at the time, even fewer with exotic dials, and fewer still were cased in gold. Some experts go so far as to estimate that for every Daytona that was cased in gold, ten were cased in stainless steel, with the total amount of gold Daytonas fitted with exotic dials of any colour never exceeding 100 units. It wasn’t until Paul Newman, star of both race track and silver screen was seen wearing an exotic dial 6239 that people began to take notice. The rest, as they say, is history.
Yellow gold Paul Newman dials come in three categories: Champagne, Lemon, and the present John Player Special, which signified a black dial with gold accents, aptly named after the iconic Lotus Formula One team which shared the same colour scheme. Champagne examples are the most common, while JPS and Lemon variants are considerably scarcer. Indeed, no more than 20 JPS examples have appeared at auction in the past decade. However, an even scarcer sub-genre of the John Player Special that may be less familiar to the collecting zeitgeist, and indeed has never yet appeared at auction, is the John Player Special ‘Cherry’.
Every single John Player Special dial that has appeared at auction features a gold coloured ‘Daytona’ logo above the 6 o’clock register, with the majority of these belonging to the reference 6241 and serial numbers scattered roughly around the year 1970. However, another small batch of John Player Special dials have surfaced in 6264 cases with serials clustered in 1971. These dials feature a slightly different gold colour tone, deeper and richer compared to standard John Player Specials, prompting some experts to refer to them as ‘Reverse Lemon’ dials. Most importantly, these dials all feature ‘Daytona’ Logo in bright red, earning them the moniker ‘Cherry’.
Believed to have been produced as a final batch of gold Paul Newman dials, the handful of known examples are found within a narrow grouping of case numbers.
Rarely seen publicly, the JPS cherry has only occasionally featured in reference books and online archives. Further research shows that some 20+ years ago a small group of early vintage Rolex collectors were afforded a tour of the Singer factory, and images from that trip included an example of the JPS cherry within Singers own archives.勞力士 Cosmograph Daytona 'Paul Newman John Player Special Cherry' 型號6264 黃金計時鏈帶腕錶，約1971年製 在勞力士收藏領域中，有幾個名稱總能立刻吸引收藏家的目光：Daytona、Paul Newman、John Player Special。這些名詞在收藏圈與拍賣場上都極為知名。事實上，近年許多拍出天價的勞力士腕錶，多屬於 Paul Newman Daytona，而 John Player Special 更是屢屢刷新紀錄。然而，在半個世紀前 Daytona 剛問世時，情況截然不同。眾所皆知，早期的 Daytona 因為銷量欠佳，經常在零售店櫥窗內擺放多年而乏人問津。正因如此，在 6239 推出數年後，勞力士開始研發全新的錶盤設計，希望為這款表現不佳的計時碼錶帶來變化並提升吸引力。這項嘗試當時並未奏效，但在多年後卻成為勞力士最具吸引力的錶盤設計。 由於當年銷量低迷，手動上弦的 Daytona 產量本來就很少，搭配 “Exotic” 錶盤的更為罕見，使用黃金材質的更是寥寥可數。有專家估計當時生產的不鏽鋼與黃金 Daytona 的比例大概是十比一；而搭載任何 “Exotic” 錶盤的黃金 Daytona總量可能從未超過百枚。直到同時活躍於賽道與影壇的 Paul Newman 被拍到佩戴 “Exotic” 錶盤 6239，人們才真正開始注意這款設計。之後的故事就如人們常說的那樣，成為歷史。 黃金款 Paul Newman 錶盤分為三類：Champagne（香檳色）、Lemon（檸檬黃），以及本款的 John Player Special（JPS）。JPS 指的是黑色面盤搭配金色細節，其配色與傳奇一級方程式車隊 Lotus 的代表色完全一致，因此得名。Champagne盤最為常見，而 JPS 與 Lemon 則稀有得多。事實上，過去十年間，在拍賣上出現的數量不超過 20 枚。然而，還有一款更罕見、在收藏界較少人知悉，且從未於拍賣市場亮相的次類型：John Player Special『Cherry』。 過去曾在拍賣市場亮相的所有 John Player Special 錶盤，其 6 點鐘小錶盤上方的 Daytona 字樣皆為金色，其中多數屬於 6241 型號，序號大致集中在 1970 年前後。然而，另一小批 John Player Special 錶盤則出現在 6264 型號中，序號集中於 1971 年。這些錶盤的金色調略深、色澤更飽和，與一般的 John Player Special 稍有不同，因此部分專家稱之為 Reverse Lemon。這些錶盤的 Daytona 字樣皆為亮紅色，因此被暱稱為 Cherry 。 據說這批錶盤是為金殼 Paul Newman 打造的最後一批，已知的少數例子皆集中於一個狹窄的錶殼號段之內。 此款 JPS Cherry 於公開場合中極為罕見，僅偶爾出現在參考書籍與網上資料庫中。進一步的研究顯示，大約二十多年前，一小群勞力士古董收藏家曾獲安排參觀 Singer 工廠，而當時該行程所拍攝的照片中，便包含了 Singer 自家檔案裡的一枚 JPS Cherry。
