News · MING

MING gives the 57.05 Comet a one-click answer to daylight saving

The ninth-anniversary worldtimer separates daylight-saving cities onto a movable bezel, then wraps the mechanism around a shifting blue raster dial.

Hen & Mills Editorial · 4 min read · 27 August 2026

• MING's 57.05 Comet separates daylight-saving cities onto a bezel that advances them one hour without disturbing places remaining on standard time.
• Its 40 mm steel case surrounds a layered blue raster dial, colour-coded world-time lume and an automatic 50-hour Sellita-based calibre.
• The 200-piece edition opens for orders on 27 August at CHF 6,950 on leather or CHF 7,950 on titanium Polymesh.

Worldtimers are wonderfully good at pretending every city keeps sensible time. Then summer arrives, half the ring moves by an hour and the other half stays put, leaving the owner to remember which side of the seasonal argument each place occupies. MING has treated that nuisance as a mechanical design problem rather than fine print in a manual. Its ninth-anniversary watch splits the cities into two groups and lets one of them move independently, creating the MING 57.05 Comet worldtimer.

The cities that keep standard time throughout the year sit on a fixed inner bezel, while those observing daylight saving time occupy a separate outer ring. Rotate that outer bezel one 15-degree click and only the relevant names advance by an hour against the 24-hour scale. A spring-loaded ball locks it into one of two positions, and an aperture between eight and nine o'clock changes from silver to red when DST is engaged. It is an unusually direct answer to a complication that normally leaves the correction to its wearer.

Australia makes the distinction especially easy to understand. Brisbane appears on the fixed ring because Queensland stays on standard time, while Melbourne sits on the movable ring because Victoria changes its clocks. In summer, shifting the outside bezel puts the two cities one hour apart without moving the central time or disturbing Brisbane. In winter, clicking it back brings them together again. That small domestic example explains the entire system more cleanly than a diagram of arrows ever could.

A moving map around a moving dial

The red marker is not the only part of the display that changes. At the centre, overlapping blue raster layers create an interference pattern MING calls the Comet Tail, with small differences in alignment producing a much larger apparent movement across the dial. It is the sort of effect that should be seen rather than described as a fixed colour. The concentric 24-hour ring adds another layer, blue lume marking daytime hours and orange picking out the night, while the ordinary handset glows blue.

Above all of that sits a box-shaped sapphire crystal with the main 12-hour markers laser-engraved and filled with MING Polar White luminous material. The indices therefore appear to float over the moving pattern instead of competing with it on the same plane. Even the DST aperture gets red-emission lume. There is a lot happening, but the hierarchy remains clear: local time at the centre, the global 24-hour display around it and the seasonal correction at the outer edge.

Nine pieces of lug, one restrained steel case

MING uses its fifth-generation case architecture, measuring 40 mm across, 10.33 mm thick and 47.8 mm from lug to lug. The 316L steel case has triple-stepped lugs, with nine individual components required for that structure alone, allowing brushed and polished surfaces to meet along sharp boundaries. At 100 metres water resistant, it remains more practical than the dial suggests. The 20 mm lug width also leaves room for a conventional strap even though both factory options are tailored closely to the case.

Behind the sapphire back is the automatic Sellita for MING 330.M2, a 25-jewel calibre running at 28,800 vibrations per hour with approximately 50 hours of power reserve. Its skeletonised bridges are brushed and anthracite coated over a matching baseplate, so the movement carries the same dark, layered approach as the dial without trying to reproduce its colour. Fifty hours is enough to leave the Comet aside for a day and return without resetting the local and world-time displays, though a full weekend may ask for the crown.

The cobalt-blue goat leather strap comes from Jean Rousseau Paris and uses curved quick-release bars with MING's flying-blade tuck buckle. The other choice is Polymesh, a curved titanium bracelet. I keep going back and forth on which one belongs here. Leather gives the busy dial a quiet edge, while the mesh makes the whole watch look like the piece of early jet-age equipment its name is meant to evoke. Both feel more considered than a generic steel bracelet.

MING 57.05 Comet pricing and availability

MING will make 200 examples of the 57.05 Comet. The goat-leather version is CHF 6,950 excluding taxes, while the titanium Polymesh version is CHF 7,950 excluding taxes. Orders open through the two product pages at 1:00 pm GMT on 27 August 2026, which is 11:00 pm AEST, and delivery is estimated at six to 12 weeks. The price difference is substantial, but the core idea does not change: one click moves only the cities that have moved in the real world.