The Patek Philippe Ref. 1579 Dial Marked for Five Breaths

The documented details are narrow, and that is part of the story.

Collectability identifies the watch as a vintage Patek Philippe reference 1579 and says the dial carries the inscription “Gradué pour 5 respirations.” It also identifies the scale as an asthmometer scale for doctors timing breathing. The video is titled Nicholas Foulkes joins John Reardon and Max Bernardini in Milan (Part 2), and Collectability posted it on October 17, 2026.

A reference number is the maker’s model designation, shared by watches of that model. It is not a serial number, which identifies one individual watch. The supplied material gives the reference, but it does not give a serial number, case number, movement number, case metal, movement calibre, dimensions, production date, service history, papers or provenance.

It also does not state who examined the watch, whether the dial has been authenticated by Patek Philippe, or whether the scale was part of a special order. Those questions remain outside the record supplied here.

A specialist scale changes the visual hierarchy of a dial. The eye no longer reads only hour markers and hands; it reads a task. In this case, the task is respiration, and the wording gives the user a unit: five breaths.

That makes the inscription unusually direct. Many watch scales rely on the user already knowing the convention: a tachymeter for speed, a pulsometer for pulse, a telemeter for distance by sound. Here, the dial announces the procedure in plain terms. The phrase is not decorative copy. It is operational text.

Because the supplied source gives no case diameter or dial measurement, no claim can be made here about how the watch wears or how large the scale appears in person. The proportion we can discuss is conceptual: a Patek Philippe dial, normally a tightly edited space, has been assigned to a medical reading. The dial is not simply branded and timed; it is labeled for an act of observation.

Patek Philippe’s own history dates Patek, Czapek & Co. to 1839 and places Jean Adrien Philippe’s meeting with Antoine Norbert de Patek at the 1844 Paris exposition. That history matters here only as context: the maker has a long record of complicated and commissioned work, but the supplied material does not prove this particular watch was commissioned by a doctor, hospital or institution.

For collectors, the useful record begins with what can be separated. The reference is 1579. The dial inscription is reported by Collectability. The scale’s medical purpose is identified by Collectability. Anything beyond that — originality, authorship of the dial, production quantity, or whether similar examples are known — would need a named document or examination.

That restraint does not make the detail less interesting. It makes it easier to see. A small French instruction reframes the whole dial from display to instrument.

Collectability posted the Part 2 video on YouTube on October 17, 2026. The supplied channel-feed metric listed 237 views when captured, and the source policy permits embedding with credit.

You can watch Collectability’s Part 2 video on YouTube. The source text says it follows a Part 1 conversation and identifies Nicholas Foulkes as the promised mystery guest, describing him as an author and historian who has written extensively about Patek Philippe.