Patek Philippe 5013R Minute Repeater Perpetual Calendar "Special Order" Review

Minute repeaters tend to be hand-wound, and for good reason. A rotor requires space, adds mass, and sits right where you don't want anything absorbing sound. Patek spent the late 1980s working around these problems, and the reference 5013 arrived in 1992 as a result. It was the first wristwatch to combine automatic winding, a minute repeater, a perpetual calendar, and a retrograde date, staying in production until around 2011. 

This example is the 5013R-001 in rose gold, made in 2008. The tonneau case measures 46.4mm from lug to lug, 36mm across, and 12.8mm thick, and the shape does something no round grand complication quite manages. Rose gold isn't just a color choice here either. Philippe Stern believed that the copper in the alloy gave repeaters the optimum tone, and he reserved rose-gold examples for the maison's most important clients. 

A chocolate brown dial ordered from the factory 

The 5013R typically left Geneva with a silvered dial or, less often, a black one. This watch has neither. Its dial is a deep chocolate brown, factory-fitted as a special order, putting it in the category of pieces where the reference is rare and the specification is effectively unique. Against rose-gold Breguet numerals and pomme hands, the brown does something the silver version never could: it warms the whole face rather than contrasting with the case. 

The layout means reading the time requires some effort, but that's part of the pleasure. The month sits in the aperture at the three o’clock position, the day at nine o’clock, and the leap year at twelve o’clock, with the moonphase and small seconds sharing the subdial at six o’clock. The date runs along a retrograde arc, sweeping from eight o'clock to four, then snapping back to the first at the end of every month, regardless of the month’s length. Driving it is the caliber R 27 PS QR, a Geneva Seal movement with around 515 parts, wound by a 22K gold micro-rotor. 

The set is complete: original Patek box, certificate, and extract both dated 2008, service papers from 2024, setting pin, and the additional caseback. Very few of these were made, and even fewer still look as warm and unique as this one.