At its core, Unimatic watches are minimal, unobtrusive and monochromatic. It?s with their collaborative pieces that we get to see Unimatic let their hair down a bit. The vibrant blue dial and bezel on the U1-MLM Massena LAB collaboration comes to mind, or more recently the gun-metal cased green dial with a yellow tipped rally car seconds hand UT4-AA collaborative piece with Automobili Amos, to recall another. Today, Unimatic takes a slight detour from their hallmark black-dial tool watch look with the release of two new special edition brown dial watches. No collaboration was needed here for the refined looking duo as Unimatic taps into their Italian ways, creating a pair of watches inspired by the Italian adoration for coffee with the U1S-MB and U2S-MB.
When it comes to using the right shade of brown, Unimatic hits the mark with the U1S-MB and U2S-MB. When I think about brown dial watches, I associate them with vintage pieces that over time have patinated into that warm chocolatey-colored dial. It symbolizes something that was well-worn, especially in warmer climates closer to the equator where the sun is much stronger, hence the appropriately named term tropical dial. For that reason, brown has always been a tough dial color to properly execute in a new watch. The tone of brown used in the Unimatic U1S-MB and U2S-MB isn?t too dark that it could be mistaken for a black dial, nor is it too light where it seems that there is an over-reach to achieve a patinated effect, i...