Placing hands on a Nomos Minimatik
New Nomos Orion midnight blue models, in two sizes.
NOMOS TANGENTE MARKS A CENTURY OF BAUHAU S
By Michael Thompson
TO HELP MARK THE 100TH ANNIVERSARY OF THE famed German-
based minimalist design movement known as Bauhaus, Nomos
Glashütte has created a nine-part special edition Tangente, with each
model limited to 100 pieces.
Probably the best-known Nomos model, Tangente has been in
production longer than any of the brand’s other collections. Fittingly, it
is often called the first Nomos Bauhaus watch, as its design focuses
the eye strictly on essential timekeeping elements. The Tangente’s
hands follow a color ring to simply and intuitively illustrate time as it
moves in a circle. To explain, Nomos quotes Bauhaus artist Paul Klee,
whose sketches inspired these newest Tangente models. Klee once
said: “Art makes things visible.”
These limited edition Tangente watches come in three case sizes
in steel—33mm, 35mm, and 38mm, for men and women, and each
one comes in every primary color: a sketch paper colored dial, black
numerals and hands, encircled by a ring of red, yellow, or blue.
"Not only this special edition, but all watches from this brand based
in the famous heritage town of Glashütte are timepieces that members
of the Bauhaus movement would design and wear today,” says Nomos
CEO Uwe Ahrendt. “After all, they went about their work then the same
way that we do now when it comes to designing our watches and the
R&D that goes into the calibers: By concentrating on the essentials,
leaving the superfluous to one side, and being incredibly demanding
when it comes to the details that remain.”
The models of this special edition Tangente each feature the
Nomos Alpha, a thin manual-wind caliber with stop-seconds, Glashütte
stopwork and traditional three-quarter plate design, tempered blue
screws, rhodium-plated surfaces, Glashütte ribbing and Nomos perlage
ratchet and crown wheel with the Glashütte sunburst decoration.
Each also arrives on a Horween Cordovan black strap. With a ‘100th
anniversary discount,’ according to Nomos, these Tangente watches are
priced at $1,660 (33mm), $1,800 (35mm) and $1,930 (38mm).
WINTER 2019 | INTERNATIONAL WATCH | 93