Hands-On: Two Wild Dials From Ming, With The "Peepshow" and J.N. Shapiro Collaboration "Lightning"

You could easily argue that Ming is a materials and manufacturing incubator masquerading as a watch company. Lume that glows white. The lightest ever mechanical watch. The world's first 3D-printed titanium bracelet-strap hybrid. All of these are associated with pretty incredible products, but, to some extent, I think it's fair to say the watches themselves are vehicles for showcasing cool innovation. That's not to say the watches are anything but great. But on occasion they're solutions looking for a problem. I kind of love the brand for it. That kind of innovation also extends to dial making, where Ming has recently released two really interesting dial-making exercises in their collaboration with J.N. Shapiro for the 37.06 "Lightning" and standalone 29.06 "Peepshow."

I recently had the chance to go hands-on with a few novelties from Ming. The brand, of course, had a great coup when the 37.09 "Bluefin" beat Tudor and a few others for the best sports watch at GPHG in 2024. They followed up with the 37.09 Uni, which I would say is their most practical release of late. The 56.00 "Starfield" is pretty wild but not to my taste, so I gravitated toward covering the two more dial-focused releases of this year (and their LW01 lightweight watch, which will get a future story on its own).

It seemed fitting to start with the Ming x J.N. Shapiro 37.06 "Lightning," since I was actually photographing Shapiro's most recent release the same day. And boy, is the watch stunning in person. The dials start with grade-2 titanium blanks, which are hand-guillochéd in Los Angeles by J.N. Shapiro's team. This means engine-turning on a traditional rose-engine lathe to create a pattern called "Lightning guilloché." The dials are then shipped to Kuala Lumpur, where Ming Thein himself uses a torch to heat the dial. Variations in heat across sections create different coloration, and each dial is unique due to its handmade nature.

My former Hodinkee co-worker Logan Baker now works for Ming, and he showed me pictures of dial variations that trend from blues and purples to bright orange, depending on how Thein does the heat treatment with the butane torch. One in three dials works out, for a variety of reasons, and titanium makes sense for these dials because it's more heat-resistant and less likely to warp.

The dial is the focus, obviously, but the case measures 38mm by 10.9mm, with a 44.5mm lug-to-lug, in 316L stainless steel. It features the brand's signature flared lugs and a slightly domed crystal, with the dial indices engraved into the crystal and filled with HyCeram luminous indices to avoid marring the interesting dial. Inside is probably the most attractive Sellita movement on the market: the manually-wound MING Cal. SW210.M1, with bridges reworked and anthracite-finished, with a 42-hour power reserve. All of this is protected by 100m of water resistance.

The 29.06 "Peepshow" takes a different approach to a creative dial design. The underlying dial itself is guilloché with a multiphase color-shifting coating (like on the 57.04 "Iris") that mostly throws off shades of blue. The crystal is similarly done to the "Lightning." The trick itself comes from the hands, which aren't hands at all. If you've ever used a polarizing filter on a camera, you'll get how this works. Instead of actual hands, they're two pieces of linearly polarized sapphire. 

When lined up appropriately (directly over or opposite each other), the polarizer lets light through, and you can see guilloché. As they get to a more acute angle (closer and closer to 90º), the dial blacks out. It's subtle, because in real time, 15 minutes takes... well, 15 minutes to pass. This effect could be more impactful if it were on a second hand, for instance, but it's quite creative nonetheless. The case, this time, is grade 2 titanium and measures 40mm by 11.8mm.

Inside is the Schwarz-Etienne for MING Cal. ASE 200.M1, which contributes to the higher price of this watch compared to the other (prices which I'll tackle in a little bit). It's an 86-hour power-reserve movement with a tungsten microrotor and additional work to skeletonize it. It's definitely a higher-grade movement with a variable-inertia balance, and it's really nice to look at, but I'm not sure why the brand chooses a high-grade movement for one watch and not for the other, especially since the handwork on the "Lightning" suggests a higher-priced watch.

So yes, let's talk price. The "Lightning," in all its vibrant glory, is priced at CHF 6,250, but currently has a waitlist. A couple of thoughts on this. It's a lot for a Sellita movement, though it's far from bog-standard. But the amount of time and effort to ship dials back and forth and hand-do all the treatments adds significantly to the price. My only qualm would be that I think the case could have been made of titanium to match the dial material. Otherwise, the wearing experience is quite nice, and the Blue Barenia calfskin strap with Alcantara lining (from Jean Rousseau) is also a great touch.

The 29.06 "Peepshow" has an unusual tension of maximalist movement and a captivating dial, but in the most practical and wearable format. The watch does convey a bit of extra thickness despite the lighter-weight material, though part of that might have been due to the rubber strap, which has a bit of added bulk. I'm not sure how much the movement or the polarized dial effect actually costs the brand, but CHF 22,000 is a pretty substantial price by comparison. The watch is, however, sold out, so it seems there were plenty of takers for the 50-piece limited edition.

I'm curious where Ming takes these concepts. It's possible this isn't the last time we see Ming use this effect in a watch, but that's one of the interesting things about the brand. Sometimes, it seems, it's enough to do something once, just to say you did.

For more on the MING x J.N. Shapiro 37.06 Lightning and MING 29.06 "Peepshow," visit the brand's website.

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