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Most new watch unveilings take place in lavish surroundings: a bucolic mountainside in Gstaad, say, or inside the VIP lounge at an F1 race, or at least in some fancy hotel or finely appointed convention booth. But I first glimpsed one of my most anticipated releases of the year while holed up in a snug Geneva cafe, hauled out of a nondescript backpack.
Back in April, I met up with Logan Baker, a representative for the high-end maker Ming. After touring me through more typical Ming fare—like the $28,000 Peep Show, which boasts a dial that shifts colors as the hands sweep over it—Baker pulled out a quartet of watches worth far less in retail value, but arguably more in internet clout. Recently, a sleek and whimsical watch has been popping up on the Instagram grids of several Watch Illuminati members, from Stephen Pulviernt to Dimepiece. That watch is from a new Ming spinoff brand called Donut, and under $700, it offers plenty of the mothership’s audacious creative energy at a fraction of the price.
Only the purple-and-gray “Glazed” Donut has been revealed publicly thus far, but that afternoon in Geneva, Baker showed me three forthcoming versions—set to be revealed in mid-October—that are just as tasty. (One of them, in fact, has topped the original flavor as my favorite.) The “Glazed” was produced strictly as a friends-and-family exclusive, but the three new editions will be made available to the public.
I love the constantly revolving pinwheel
”Donut is not a Ming,” says Praneeth Rajsingh, the CEO of both Donut and Ming. But what’s especially exciting about the new model is that it’s also not not a Ming. The first four pieces were designed by Ming founder Ming Thein, who after the drudgery of the pandemic, had an urge to create something “silly and fun,” Rajsingh says. To that end, each watch comes with a small 3D-printed version of the brand’s mascot Snowball, based on a bird that the Ming team encountered on a ski trip. (They all went home with plushie versions so big they required their own airplane seats, Rajsingh jokes.)
The new Donut watches borrow some key visual elements from its parent brand. The most noticeable resemblance is in the lugs, a dead ringer for Ming’s signature “flying blade” design, which always reminds me of a turtle’s legs popping out of its shell. The teardrop-style hands are also a match for the ones you’d find on a real-deal Ming. Other flourishes simply have a particular je ne sais Ming: The pinwheel, which is technically a seconds counter, is the type of “fun visual treat” clients expect from Ming, Rajsingh says. The logo, which is meant to look like two hands holding a donut, is also loosely reminiscent of Ming’s mark.