About this watch

Patek Philippe Nautilus 3800/1A-001 Released 4 years after the OG 3700, the 3800 was the very first mid-sized Nautilus. To the untrained eye it looked like merely a shrunken 'Jumbo', but look closer and you'll find some key differences. Firstly, you'll find a central seconds hand, which was absent on the 3700, and holds the honour of being the first Nautilus with an in-house calibre. The case shape is also subtlety different, with the 'ears' being softened, and along with its case proportions leaves it feeling like a more refined alternative to its big brother. The 3800 was also available with a myriad of dials, with over 20 options being available over the course of its production run across the different metals. The steel version had 4 dial options, the most well known being the dark blue with baton markers, the white with baton markers, and the lesser seen charcoal grey with Arabic numerals and black with applied Roman numerals. The latter is what we have here today. Introduced in circa-1996, it the base is a deep, black lacquer, with white printed railroad minute track, and topped with lumed leaf hands in white gold. The most notable feature of the dial is the numerals, whic…