Reference:albino-daytona: Difference between revisions

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Latest revision as of 05:09, 29 September 2026

Silver-dial Rolex Daytona catalogued as an Albino, case 2648447 — A 6263 catalogued as an “Albino” at Sotheby’s in 2025.

“Albino” is a collector and auction-house name for a monochrome silver-dial Daytona, usually discussed in connection with reference 6263. The name describes the dial’s appearance; it does not establish that the watches share a factory dial variant. Three identifiable watches appear in the sources below, but published counts differ and do not settle how many exist.

Core facts

detail	value
term	“Albino,” a collector and auction-catalogue label for monochrome silver-dial Daytonas
host reference	The documented auction examples discussed here were catalogued as ref. 6263
identifying traits	Silvered main dial and silvered subsidiary registers; dial printing and hands vary between examples
movement	Phillips and Sotheby’s list caliber 727 for their auctioned examples
dial origin	Disputed; no Rolex production record or definitive factory explanation is cited in these accounts

Documented examples

The sources identify three watches, but their count of the wider group is inconsistent. Hodinkee wrote in 2013 that three examples were known. Phillips described Clapton’s watch in 2015 as one of four known white-dial Cosmographs. Perezcope later wrote of three known examples, while Sotheby’s called the 2025 watch one of “a handful.” These statements use different dates and wording; they do not provide a verified population count.

watch	identifying record	what the source says
Eric Clapton’s former watch	Case 2,874,334; auctioned by Christie’s in 2003, Sotheby’s in 2008, and Phillips in 2015	Phillips lists ref. 6263, stamped 6262 inside the caseback, and caliber 727. The 2008 Sotheby’s catalogue says the 6262 back was probably a Rolex service replacement.
Watch shown to Hodinkee by Eric Ku	Hodinkee article by Benjamin Clymer, 17 July 2013; no case number published	Ku described it as a production dial on a production watch. The article gives no Rolex document supporting that account and says Ku later sold the watch to a collector.
Sotheby’s Abu Dhabi lot 340	Case 2,648,447; sold 5 December 2025	Sotheby’s lists ref. 6263, caliber 727, 36mm, and a caseback stamped 6239. The lot result is not visible on Sotheby’s page; Perezcope reports USD 952,500 including premium.

What the published sources say about the dial

In 2013, Benjamin Clymer’s Hodinkee article described the second watch brought by Eric Ku as a production dial fitted to a production watch. That is Ku’s account as reported by Clymer; the article cites no Rolex record or factory confirmation. It also records that Ku had sold the watch to a collector.

Sotheby’s 2025 catalogue calls the dial’s origin unknown and says the design was not part of regular commercial production. Its lot details give the caseback stamp as 6239, although the watch is catalogued as a 6263. That marking is relevant to the watch’s history and should not be omitted when describing the case.

In December 2025, Perezcope published a different account based in part on testimony it attributes to dealer Tom Bolt. Perezcope says Bolt told the author he created Clapton’s watch in the late 1990s by fitting a silver dial from a ref. 6238 into a 6263 case, and that Bolt coined the “Albino” name. In a later update, Perezcope says Bolt told Sotheby’s representatives that he had created the first example and that the dials came from 6238 service watches. This is attributed testimony about Clapton’s watch and Bolt’s account of other dials; the article does not supply a Rolex factory record for the full group.

Perezcope also points to the hands and pushers on Sotheby’s 2025 lot as inconsistent with its circa-1971 dating. Those are Perezcope’s comparative observations, not findings published in Sotheby’s lot description. The available sources therefore document competing accounts, not a settled origin for every dial called “Albino.”

Auction record for Clapton’s watch

These are three sales of the same watch, not three separate Albino examples. Prices are reported by the cited sources; currencies and sale dates are shown as catalogued.

sale	result
Christie’s New York, 5 June 2003, lot 178	USD 50,190
Sotheby’s New York, 2008, lot 166	Approximately USD 505,000; Sotheby’s page now hides the result behind login
Phillips Geneva, 10 May 2015, lot 214	CHF 1,325,000

Sotheby’s public auction search records the separate Abu Dhabi lot 340 at USD 952,500 including premium in December 2025; the lot page itself still places the result behind login. Perezcope independently reported the same result.

Relation to reference 6263

The auctioned watches discussed here were catalogued as 6263s, but their dial and case details differ. Phillips records Clapton’s watch as ref. 6263 with a 6262 caseback stamp; Sotheby’s records the 2025 watch as ref. 6263 with a 6239 caseback stamp. See Daytona 6263 for the reference’s standard production configurations. “Albino” alone is not enough to establish that a dial, case or movement is original to a particular watch.

Related references

Sources

@@ Line 1: / Line 1: @@
 {{DISPLAYTITLE:Rolex Albino Daytona}}
 {{#seo:
-|title=Rolex 'Albino' Daytona — Eric Clapton's 6263 &#124; Rolexopedia
+|title=Rolex “Albino” Daytona — documented examples and disputed dial history
-|description=The Albino Rolex Cosmograph Daytona 6263 — a white-on-white monochromatic dial documented on three examples. Eric Clapton's traded three times, last at Phillips in May 2015 for CHF 1,325,000. A separate third example, case 2648447, sold at Sotheby's Abu Dhabi in December 2025 for USD 952,500. The factory-versus-Tom-Bolt-construction dispute between Hodinkee (2013) and Perezcope (2025) remains unresolved in editorial.
+|description=Auction catalogues and watch writers use “Albino” for monochrome silver-dial Daytonas, including three identifiable 6263 examples. Published accounts disagree about the dial origins.
-|keywords=Albino Daytona, Albino 6263, Rolex Albino, Eric Clapton Daytona, Tom Bolt, Perezcope Albino, Phillips Clapton, white dial 6263, Rolex Cosmograph Albino
+|keywords=Albino Daytona, Rolex 6263, Eric Clapton Daytona, Tom Bolt, silver dial, disputed dial origin
 |image=Ref 6263 albino-hero.webp
-|image_alt=Albino Rolex Cosmograph Daytona 6263, case 2648447, Sotheby's Abu Dhabi Lot 340, sold USD 952,500 on 5 December 2025
+|image_alt=Silver-dial Rolex Daytona catalogued as an Albino, case 2648447
 |type=Article
 |og_type=article
-|published_time=2026-04-19T14:50:57Z
+|modified_time=2026-09-23T00:00:00Z
-|modified_time=2026-07-18T14:18:33Z
 |robots=index,follow,max-image-preview:large
 }}
+<small>[[Reference:daytona|Daytona]] → [[Reference:6263|6263]] → Albino</small>
-<small>[[Reference:daytona|Daytona]] -> [[Reference:6263|6263]] -> Albino</small>
+<div class="rp-lead">
+[[File:Ref 6263 albino-hero.webp|thumb|center|640px|alt=Silver-dial Rolex Daytona catalogued as an Albino, case 2648447|A 6263 catalogued as an “Albino” at Sotheby’s in 2025.]]
+</div>
-= Albino Daytona (6263) =
+“Albino” is a collector and auction-house name for a monochrome silver-dial Daytona, usually discussed in connection with reference 6263. The name describes the dial’s appearance; it does not establish that the watches share a factory dial variant. Three identifiable watches appear in the sources below, but published counts differ and do not settle how many exist.
-The Albino is a white-on-white dial fitted to the [[Reference:6263|6263]]: silver sub-dials on a white base, with "Rolex Oyster Cosmograph" at 12 and no Daytona line above 6. Three examples are documented, the best known of them Eric Clapton's. The dial sits at the center of the sharpest authenticity fight in manual-wind Daytona collecting, and that fight is still unresolved.
+==Core facts==
-[[File:Ref 6263 albino-hero.webp|thumb|right|250px|alt=Albino Rolex Cosmograph Daytona 6263, case 2648447, Sotheby's Abu Dhabi Lot 340, 5 December 2025|Albino Rolex Cosmograph Daytona 6263, case 2648447, Sotheby's Abu Dhabi Lot 340, 5 December 2025]]
+{| class="wikitable rp-facts"
+|-
+! detail
+! value
+|-
+| term
+| “Albino,” a collector and auction-catalogue label for monochrome silver-dial Daytonas
+|-
+| host reference
+| The documented auction examples discussed here were catalogued as ref. 6263
+|-
+| identifying traits
+| Silvered main dial and silvered subsidiary registers; dial printing and hands vary between examples
+|-
+| movement
+| Phillips and Sotheby’s list caliber 727 for their auctioned examples
+|-
+| dial origin
+| Disputed; no Rolex production record or definitive factory explanation is cited in these accounts
+|}
-== What the Albino is ==
+==Documented examples==
-A white main dial carries silver sub-dials, with no Daytona line above 6 o'clock and printed hour markers in place of the applied block markers used on standard 6263 production. The known watches all pair the pale dial with a similarly pale bezel.
+The sources identify three watches, but their count of the wider group is inconsistent. Hodinkee wrote in 2013 that three examples were known. Phillips described Clapton’s watch in 2015 as one of four known white-dial Cosmographs. Perezcope later wrote of three known examples, while Sotheby’s called the 2025 watch one of “a handful.” These statements use different dates and wording; they do not provide a verified population count.
-== The three documented examples ==
-Three Albino 6263 examples appear in the English-language auction record.
-=== Eric Clapton's Albino ===
-Clapton's is the most-traded and best-documented of the three, surfacing at three public sales over twelve years:
 {| class="wikitable"
 |-
-! Sale !! Date !! Price !! Notes
+! watch
+! identifying record
+! what the source says
 |-
-| Christie's New York || June 2003 || USD 50,190 || First public sale. Sold out of Clapton's collection into private hands.
+| Eric Clapton’s former watch
+| Case 2,874,334; auctioned by Christie’s in 2003, Sotheby’s in 2008, and Phillips in 2015
+| Phillips lists ref. 6263, stamped 6262 inside the caseback, and caliber 727. The 2008 Sotheby’s catalogue says the 6262 back was probably a Rolex service replacement.
 |-
-| Sotheby's || 2008 || ~USD 505,000 || Second public sale. About ten-fold appreciation over five years.
+| Watch shown to Hodinkee by Eric Ku
+| Hodinkee article by Benjamin Clymer, 17 July 2013; no case number published
+| Ku described it as a production dial on a production watch. The article gives no Rolex document supporting that account and says Ku later sold the watch to a collector.
 |-
-| Phillips, Geneva || May 2015 || CHF 1,325,000 (~USD 1.42M) || Third public sale, and the last recorded result for this watch.
+| Sotheby’s Abu Dhabi lot 340
+| Case 2,648,447; sold 5 December 2025
+| Sotheby’s lists ref. 6263, caliber 727, 36mm, and a caseback stamped 6239. The lot result is not visible on Sotheby’s page; Perezcope reports USD 952,500 including premium.
 |}
-=== The second and third examples ===
+==What the published sources say about the dial==
-A second example appears in the literature attributed to John Goldberger's collection, with thinner public documentation than the Clapton watch carries. The third is case 2648447, a separate watch from Clapton's, which Sotheby's Abu Dhabi sold as Lot 340 on 5 December 2025 for USD 952,500 including premium against a USD 750,000 hammer. Its previous owner was reported to have paid close to USD 3 million.
+In 2013, Benjamin Clymer’s Hodinkee article described the second watch brought by Eric Ku as a production dial fitted to a production watch. That is Ku’s account as reported by Clymer; the article cites no Rolex record or factory confirmation. It also records that Ku had sold the watch to a collector.
-== The three-way authenticity dispute ==
+Sotheby’s 2025 catalogue calls the dial’s origin unknown and says the design was not part of regular commercial production. Its lot details give the caseback stamp as 6239, although the watch is catalogued as a 6263. That marking is relevant to the watch’s history and should not be omitted when describing the case.
-The Albino is the most contested dial in the manual-wind Daytona category. Three positions sit in the published literature, none of them retracted.
+In December 2025, Perezcope published a different account based in part on testimony it attributes to dealer Tom Bolt. Perezcope says Bolt told the author he created Clapton’s watch in the late 1990s by fitting a silver dial from a ref. 6238 into a 6263 case, and that Bolt coined the “Albino” name. In a later update, Perezcope says Bolt told Sotheby’s representatives that he had created the first example and that the dials came from 6238 service watches. This is attributed testimony about Clapton’s watch and Bolt’s account of other dials; the article does not supply a Rolex factory record for the full group.
-=== Hodinkee (Clymer, 2013) — factory Rolex variant ===
+Perezcope also points to the hands and pushers on Sotheby’s 2025 lot as inconsistent with its circa-1971 dating. Those are Perezcope’s comparative observations, not findings published in Sotheby’s lot description. The available sources therefore document competing accounts, not a settled origin for every dial called “Albino.”
-Benjamin Clymer, writing for Hodinkee in 2013, read the Albino as a rare factory Rolex dial, probably Singer-made, fitted to a very small number of 6263 cases. That reading held as the default for about twelve years.
+==Auction record for Clapton’s watch==
-=== Perezcope (December 2025) — Tom Bolt 1990s construction ===
+These are three sales of the same watch, not three separate Albino examples. Prices are reported by the cited sources; currencies and sale dates are shown as catalogued.
-Jose Pereztroika's December 2025 dossier on Perezcope reads the Albino as a late-1990s construction rather than a factory dial, built from a recovered [[Reference:6238|6238]] silver dial transplanted into a 6263 case by the dealer Tom Bolt, whom Pereztroika also credits with coining the Albino name. In that reading, 6238 hands had to be used because standard 6263 hands did not fit the recessed sub-dials correctly.
+{| class="wikitable"
+|-
+! sale
+! result
+|-
+| Christie’s New York, 5 June 2003, lot 178
+| USD 50,190
+|-
+| Sotheby’s New York, 2008, lot 166
+| Approximately USD 505,000; Sotheby’s page now hides the result behind login
+|-
+| Phillips Geneva, 10 May 2015, lot 214
+| CHF 1,325,000
+|}
-Pereztroika also states that Bolt disclosed his role directly to Sotheby's before the sale. Sotheby's still chose the softer catalogue line: origins unknown.
+Sotheby’s public auction search records the separate Abu Dhabi lot 340 at USD 952,500 including premium in December 2025; the lot page itself still places the result behind login. Perezcope independently reported the same result.
-The dossier lists four forensic markers on Sotheby's Lot 340 (case 2648447): discontinued thin-tapered sub-dial hands inconsistent with a 1971 production case, a 30-minute sub-dial hand sitting high against period-correct fitment, plating coming off the screw-down pushers in a pattern that reads as aged fake material rather than original Rolex gold plate, and 6238 donor-dial typography visible under magnification.
+==Relation to reference 6263==
-=== Sotheby's Abu Dhabi (December 2025) — "origins unknown" ===
+The auctioned watches discussed here were catalogued as 6263s, but their dial and case details differ. Phillips records Clapton’s watch as ref. 6263 with a 6262 caseback stamp; Sotheby’s records the 2025 watch as ref. 6263 with a 6239 caseback stamp. See [[Reference:6263|Daytona 6263]] for the reference’s standard production configurations. “Albino” alone is not enough to establish that a dial, case or movement is original to a particular watch.
-The Lot 340 catalogue described the dial as of unknown origin, endorsing neither the factory-variant reading nor the later-construction reading. Pereztroika's dossier had gone up two days before the sale, and Bolt had reportedly briefed the house directly the day before that.
+==Related references==
-== Where the argument stands ==
+* [[Reference:6263|Daytona 6263]]
+* [[Reference:6238|Pre-Daytona 6238]]
+* [[Reference:6265|Daytona 6265]]
+* [[Reference:paul-newman-daytona|Paul Newman Daytona]]
+* [[Reference:big-red-daytona|Big Red Daytona]]
-Factory variant, late construction, and unresolved origins all stay on the record. The literature has not closed the argument, and the market keeps trading the watch anyway. Every new result is a buyer betting on one reading over the other two.
+== Sources ==
-== Relation to other dial variants ==
-The Albino sits in its own category. It carries neither the contrasting sub-dials of a Paul Newman nor the heat-shifted patina of a tropical, and the printed markers and missing Daytona line keep it well outside standard 6263 production. The host watches themselves are conventional: period-correct 6263 cases and cal. 727 movements, so what is contested is the dial alone.
-== Host reference ==
-The Albino is documented exclusively on the [[Reference:6263|6263]] case. No Albino-pattern dials have surfaced on the [[Reference:6265|6265]] (metal-bezel sibling) or any other manual-wind Daytona reference. Every documented Albino carries the acrylic black bezel insert that defines the 6263.
-== Related references ==
-* [[Reference:6263|Daytona 6263]] — the host reference
+* [https://www.hodinkee.com/articles/rolex-albino-daytona-ben-clymer Benjamin Clymer, “A Close Encounter With Just The Third Of Its Kind: Hands-On With The Legendary Albino Daytona,” Hodinkee, 17 July 2013]
-* [[Reference:6238|Reference 6238]] — the alleged donor-dial reference
+* [https://www.phillips.com/detail/rolex/CH080215/214 Phillips, The Watch Auction: ONE, lot 214, Eric Clapton’s former 6263, 2015]
-* [[Reference:paul-newman-daytona|Paul Newman Daytona]] — adjacent exotic-dial category
+* [https://www.sothebys.com/en/auctions/ecatalogue/2008/important-watches-n08433/lot.166.html Sotheby’s, Important Watches, lot 166, 2008]
-* [[Reference:big-red-daytona|Big Red Daytona]] — the other 6263 nickname dial
+* [https://www.sothebys.com/en/buy/auction/2025/watches-jewels-ad2502/daytona-albino-reference-6263-a-stainless-steel Sotheby’s Abu Dhabi, lot 340, 5 December 2025]
-* [[Reference:daytona|Daytona family index]]
+* [https://www.sothebys.com/en/search-results.html?query=6263 Sotheby’s public auction search, closed-lot result for the 2025 Albino]
-* [[Reference:daytona-glossary|Daytona glossary]]
+* [https://perezcope.com/2025/12/03/not-quite-whiter-than-white-the-reality-of-the-rare-rolex-albino-daytona-ref-6263/ Jose Pereztroika, “Not Quite Whiter Than White,” Perezcope, 3 December 2025, updated 8 December 2025]
+* [https://www.hodinkee.com/articles/found-eric-claptons-vintage-rolex-submariner-with-rare-explo Eric Clapton’s former 6263 sale history, Hodinkee]
-== Sources ==
-* [https://www.hodinkee.com/articles/the-first-rolex-daytona-by-benjamin-clymer Historical Perspectives: The Very First Rolex Daytona, Explained] — Benjamin Clymer, Hodinkee, 2013
-* [https://perezcope.com/2025/12/03/not-quite-whiter-than-white-the-reality-of-the-rare-rolex-albino-daytona-ref-6263/ Not Quite Whiter Than White: the reality of the rare Rolex Albino Daytona Ref. 6263] — Jose Pereztroika, Perezcope, 3 December 2025
-* Phillips Geneva, Auction lot catalogue essay, Daytona Ultimatum, May 2018
-* Sotheby's Abu Dhabi, Important Watches sale, Lot 340, 5 December 2025
-* Christie's New York, "Watches by Christie's" sale, June 2003
-* Sotheby's, Clapton collection re-sale, 2008
 [[Category:Daytona]]
 [[Category:Daytona Manual-Wind]]
-[[Category:Paul Newman]]
 [[Category:Disputed variant]]