While an adoring fan of Citizen’s Campanola line of watches, I must pay attention to the bread and butter of Citizen, which their more mainstream line of watches. During the last few years, they are been evolving the application of their Eco-Drive (light powered) movements by placing them into a classy watches suitable for everyday wear. Not everyone wants a sports watch to wear to formal events, and does not want to shell out thousands for a formal watch. This leaves a large market open for nice, but sub $1000 (sub $500 in this case) watches.

The Citizen Calibre line is a good idea. Citizen takes design cues and complications from popular luxury watches and mixes them in a no-hassle attractive design. The result has been a steam of attractively conservative watches that require no battery and are easy to live with. I fact, Citizen watches are much like Toyota cars (Toyota Sussex), both Japanese, and both something you can live with everyday. They might not exude passion or stand out as much as other watches, but you’ll never complain and you cannot beat the price. Then again, moving upmarket, Campanola is to Citizen as Lexus is to Toyota.

The Citizen Calibre 3100 line has a few notable features making it very easy to live with. First, Citizen puts in a perpetual calendar. You might notice the omission of a month or day indicator, but that is not how this watch works. The important information is displayed on the prominent big date window. When setting the watch you use the 12 hour markers to represent the months, and set the date accordingly. This tells the watch when to have 31, 30, or 28 day months. Otherwise you would have to adjust the date manually on non 31 day months. It is possible that by pushing one of the pushers on the side of the watch, it will reorient the hands of the watch to show you the full date. Further, it is possible that movement is able to adjust for leap years when there will be a 29 day February.

In addition to the Eco-Drive movement and perpetual calendar. The Calibre 3100 displays a second time zone. A nice feature to have when traveling. The classy uncluttered display is easy to read, and the hands have luminant for night reading. Citizen knows how to make a classy looking watch that is still practical. There are black and white faced versions in either steel or gold tone, and with metal or alligator straps. For way under $500 these watches are a great deal, as are all of the Citizen Calibre models. The 3100 stands out because of its attractive and simple design, as some of the Calibre models verge on the avant garde.

See Citizen Calibre 3100 watch models on eBay here.

See all Citizen Calibre watches on eBay here.