One of the iconic images of Japanese cities is during the winter when they are coated with snow. The highways and iconic shopping streets of Tokyo and Osaka dusted in falling ice, turning the mixture of traditional and modern architecture into a snow white wonderland. It’s this visual that inspires the new Citizen Series8 Limited Edition collection, based on winter cityscapes.
Citizen Series8 880 Mechanical “Traveller GMT”
The first of the three watches in this series is the Series8 880 Mechanical NB6035-55H, the only GMT watch in the collection. It measures 41mm in diameter with a steel case coated in a dark grey colour for the body and yellow for the bezel. That bezel features a day/night 24-hour scale that allows you to tell the time in multiple time zones used in tandem with the central 24-hour GMT hand.
Where the winter city theme comes into play is the dial. It features a frosty texture with a white to black gradient moving from the centre to the outer edge. It represents fallen snow on the asphalt of a road, with the dark surface of the road visible below the ice. It’s actually a very intricate pattern and does a good job of replicating the visual it’s designed to emulate. Completing the display are gold coloured hour markers and a date window at 3 o’clock.
Below the surface of the dial is housed the Cal.9054 automatic movement with 50-hour power reserve. That’s pretty solid specs for one of Citizen’s mechanical movements and it also operates with a reasonable accuracy of -10/+20 seconds per day. It’s limited to 1,600 pieces worldwide at a price of £1,465. It’s an odd price in that it’s expensive for a Citizen watch but actually offers decent value for what you get.
Price and Specs:
Citizen Series8 890 Mechanical
The next two watches in the three piece series are mirrors of each other. They take the same 42.6mm design but the 890 Mechanical NB6062-52P has gold plating while the 890 Mechanical NB6060-58H is regular steel. Conceptually the steel edition represents the bold skyscrapers of Japan’s cities when viewed during the winter’s day, under a cold light that emphasises their dramatic presence. The gold version then represents the same buildings when seen at night, lit up by the warm glow of the city’s street lights.
As for the dials, they take the pattern used by the Series8 Limited Edition in ice blue from earlier in the year and present them in their signature colours. The fractal pattern once again creating the image of creeping frost. I will admit that it’s perhaps a little too busy for my personal taste but geometric shapes are captivating and almost mesmerising.
Powering these two watches is the Cal.9051, another automatic movement but this time with the much more expected power reserve of 42-hours. Individually each reference is slightly more exclusive than the GMT above at 1,200 pieces each but at the same time they are slightly more accessible at £1,195 for the gold and £1,095 for the steel.
Price and Specs:
More details at Citizen.
