7Artisans and Seagull launch limited-edition 35mm Leica M lens
Seagull’s return lands as a $369, 500-piece 35mm M lens, but the real sell is heritage, not bargain hunting.
7Artisans wrapped a Leica M-mount 35mm f/1.7 in Seagull nostalgia and sold it as a collector’s object as much as a tool. The Seagull × 7Artisans M 35mm f/1.7 cost $369 and was capped at just 500 pieces worldwide, with each lens getting an exclusive badge and serial number. That scarcity, more than the spec sheet, is what gave this release its pull for Leica M shooters.
The Seagull name still carries real weight in China’s camera history. The brand began as “Shanghai” under the former Shanghai Camera Factory, adopted the Seagull name in 1968 for export markets, and built a back catalog that ran from the 58-I in the 1950s to the Seagull 4 twin-lens reflex series in the 1960s, Dongfeng and Hongqi cameras in the 1970s, and Seagull DF SLRs in the 1980s. Seagull stopped making complete camera systems in 2004 after producing more than 20 million cameras, then returned through Shanghai Seagull Digital Camera Co., Ltd., established in January 2011, with the CK10 in 2014 and the CM9 in 2016.
That history matters because 7Artisans pitched this lens as the first large-aperture manual-focus lens since Seagull’s revival. The optics are built around 8 elements in 6 groups with 10 aperture blades, a minimum focus distance of 0.7 meter, a 40.5mm filter thread, and an approximate size of 57 x 29 mm at about 145 grams. It is rangefinder-coupled for Leica M bodies, including film and digital M cameras, and can also be used on mirrorless bodies with an adapter. On paper, that makes it a compact fast prime, but also one that leans hard into tactile, manual shooting.
The 35mm focal length still does the heavy lifting here. It is the classic street, documentary, and travel perspective because it keeps enough context in frame without pushing the subject too far away. In that sense, the Seagull badge and the 500-unit cap do not change what the lens is capable of, but they do change how it feels in the hand and in the bag. At a price that sits near other Leica M-mount options from 7Artisans, including a 35mm f/2.8 and 75mm f/1.25 II, this one reads less like a mass-market value play and more like a nostalgia premium aimed squarely at collectors who still want to put a lens on a camera.
This article was produced by Prism’s automated news system from verified source data, official records, and press releases, then run through automated quality and moderation checks before publishing. The system is built and supervised by the people who set the standards it runs under. Read our full AI policy.
Did this article answer your question?
