Nomos gives two Metro watches Ice Blue dials and a long-awaited quick-set date

Nomos Glashütte has introduced two Ice Blue versions of its Metro: the 37mm Metro Date Power Reserve, reference 1121, priced at $4,500, and the 40.5mm Metro neomatik 41 Update, reference 1166, priced at $5,390. Both carry galvanized light-blue metallic dials inspired by contemporary glass-and-steel architecture, the German brand said.

The bigger news is inside the smaller watch. The Metro Date Power Reserve debuts the new hand-wound DUW 4701, a movement that finally adds a quick-set date function after more than a decade of production. The outgoing DUW 4401 required turning the hands repeatedly past midnight to advance the date.

The DUW 4701 keeps the DUW 4401's dimensions at 32.1mm in diameter and 2.8mm thick, so the case stays unchanged at 37mm across and 8mm high. Power reserve rises from 42 to 52 hours, and the calibre is based on the DUW 4601 that debuted in the Tangente 2date.

Nomos is a Glashütte manufacture we rate among the best attainable watch brands, alongside Tudor and Grand Seiko, for the most watch per dollar. The Metro's in-house movement is exactly the kind of value that earns: it drives four displays, including the date and an unconventional power reserve indicator.

What the two Ice Blue dials look like

Both dials shift from cool blue to nearly white as the light changes. The Date Power Reserve keeps its asymmetric layout, with the power reserve indicator between 12 and 1 o'clock and the logo at 9, a position it has held since designer Mark Braun created the Metro family in 2014.

The tri-colour power reserve wheel shows teal for full, light blue for neutral and white for low. Grey Arabic numerals and white dots mark the peripheral minutes track, teal dots mark the hours, and a light-blue hand sits in the recessed, snailed small seconds counter at 6 o'clock, above the date aperture.

Berlin-based product designer Mark Braun built the Metro on metro-map signage and graphics: negative space, color and city chic laid over the Bauhaus geometry Nomos is known for. The original 2014 Date Power Reserve was the first watch to carry the brand's proprietary Swing System escapement.

The Swing System marked Nomos as an in-house movement maker: the escapement and regulating assembly, the balance wheel, spring, escape wheel and pallet fork, are all made in Glashütte. Through the sapphire caseback, the DUW 4701 shows sunray ribbing radiating from that regulating organ, perlage, gold engravings and blued screws.

The caseback also reveals a skeletonized balance cock that lets you see the bright blue Swing System hairspring. The 37mm steel case has wire lugs, a thin bezel and a domed sapphire crystal up front. Water resistance is 5 ATM, and it ships on a black Horween Shell Cordovan strap.

The automatic 41 Update joins in Ice Blue

The Metro neomatik 41 Update, reference 1166, measures 40.5mm across and 9.1mm thick, and it keeps the automatic DUW 6101 with a 48-hour reserve. Its patented ring-date display puts the entire month around the dial perimeter, with two teal markers framing the current date.

The ring-date complication first appeared on the Tangente in 2018 and joined the Metro when the 41 Update launched in 2021, then the largest and most graphic member of the family. Orange date indicators on earlier editions give way here to the cooler teal markers, light-blue minute dots and white hour dots.

The bigger dots at 12, 3 and 9 o'clock anchor the dial, while the recessed and snailed small seconds has blue markings and a light-blue hand. Rhodium-plated needle-thin hands run over the whole arrangement, and a grey woven textile strap reinforces the more technical character Nomos says it was after.

This is not the first blue dial to reach a watch we have covered of late: Longines added blue variants to the Spirit Pilot. But Nomos's Ice Blue is paler and more architectural, leaning toward teal and grey, and it arrives as the brand's design team has pushed bolder color across the Club Sport Worldtimer, Tetra and Tangente 31.

Nomos is not retiring the original look. The original ref. 1101 receives the new calibre and keeps the same reference number. The brand says this ends current production of any reference with the older non-quickset date.

Both are available now through Nomos retailers. Monochrome lists the prices as to be confirmed, but the figures above are for the US market.

The movement also brings the Date Power Reserve up to speed mechanically. Its quick-set date finally matches what buyers at this price expect, and the extra ten hours of reserve, up to 52, make the hand-wound watch easier to live with between wears. The end of the non-quickset date closes a long-standing gap in our coverage of watches jewelry.