Innehållsförteckning för April-May 2009 - Issue 3 från The Rake

“Things only have the value that we give them.”— Molière OBSERVE, IF YOU WILL, the image on this page. You’ll no doubt note that, in contrast to the bald-faced editor’s photo featured last issue, I sport a moustache. The trim whiskers appear in honour of an article running on page 48, celebrating this most maligned and unfairly sidelined facial hair configuration. Opinion is divided on my new look. I reckon it’s rather debonair; the majority of observers hereabouts —not least, my darling wife — would beg to differ. I must confess, however, that the moustache pictured is a sham, a fraud, a Photoshopped fake. Our resorting to such trickery was not necessitated by my unwillingness or inability to grow a mo’ (on the contrary, I’m rather blessed on the lip-follicular…

One look at the catwalk, red carpet or in the wardrobes of the world’s most elegant men, and you’ll see that the double-breasted suit is staging a major comeback. Like journeyman actor Mickey Rourke, the ‘DB’ has paid its dues. During the Sonny Crockett era of the 1980s, it had gone horrifically awry thanks to bizarre two-button incarnations. Now, fortunately, through a realignment with the classic configuration popularised in its glory days in the 1930s, the DB has reasserted its ability to endow any man with gravitas and an aura of unparalleled command. (The all-time master of the DB is Prince Michael of Kent, the man who consistently demonstrates the empowering virility of the double-breasted suit.) To this day, however, the DB remains the subject of controversy and misinformation —…

“If you grow a moustache, I’m leaving you.” So says my wife every time – following a few days of shying from shaving – I broach the topic of trimming my stubble back to what Ned Flanders would refer to as a “soup strainer”. Stern words, but then, such is the power of the mighty mo’. It’s not uncommon for moustaches to stir the sort of extreme, emotional reactions to which my spouse is prone. So much more than the other major forms of facial-hair grooming — the full beard, goatee, ‘soul patch’ or sideburn — the ’stache polarises opinion. And admittedly, most members of contemporary society fall to the naysaying side of that pole. Today, the moustache foments hatred in fairly every female of the species. (“Ooh! Eww! It’s…

Dear Mr. Tim, I wish to attain the gloriously rumpled aspect of a mint-julep-sipping southern attorney, and toward that aim, I’m considering having a bespoke suit made in seersucker. However, I’m a tad hesitant, as the tailoring will cost the same as if I were bespeaking a long-lasting worsted suit, yet the lifespan of seersucker is much shorter — basically, I’m worried I won’t get the longterm value that a bespoke suit generally provides. You understand my dilemma. Would you suggest I rethink going bespoke with seersucker, and instead buy off the rack? I’d love to be all obstreperous confederate, say “frankly m’dear, I don’t give a damn” and just go right ahead with a bespoke seersucker suit, but with the economic climate, prudence seems advisable. Seersucker is such a…

In Plato’s allegory of the cave from The Republic, he described mankind as chained inside a cave and forced to watch the reflections of the world against a wall. There, the shadows cast illusionary traces of a greater reality that lay beyond. But in Timothy Everest’s world, those shadows would transcend reality, and in so doing, gain idealised form. They would strut boldly down the thin precipice between fact and fiction, cocksure in sleek-waisted jackets, featuring overlapping ticket pockets and turn-back cuffs, revealing audacious flashes of sugar-pink linings, louche velvet under collars, and irreverent contrasted piping. Cast on the wall larger than life, these silhouettes would express an idealised masculinity constructed by the square roped shoulder, the high, tight collar, and the jauntily flared skirt. Because it’s the world that…

“Come to Los Angeles! The sun shines bright, the beaches are wide and inviting, and the orange groves stretch as far as the eye can see. There are jobs aplenty, and land is cheap. Every working man can have his own house, and inside every house, a happy, all-American family. You can have all this, and who knows… you could even be discovered, become a movie star… or at least see one. Life is good in Los Angeles… it’s paradise on earth.” Hahaha. That’s what they tell you, anyway… —L.A. Confidential A Curtis Hanson film. Based on the novel by James Ellroy. It’s not rakish to drop names, I well realise. Discretion and subtlety are central values of this publication. Similarly, The Rake eschews the fame-focussed, craven, graven idol-worship common…

Officine Panerai began as a company specialising in highprecision mechanisms with a concurrent side business in the import of high-quality Swiss watches. In the early 20th century, the founder’s grandson, Guido Panerai — in order to improve the performance of precision devices, such as instrument dials and telescopic and sighting devices — developed luminous materials that would enable them to function at night. The first luminous substance created was made from a mixture of radium bromide and zinc sulphide; it was later given the name ‘Radiomir’. With this expertise, it was only natural that with the onset of World War I, the Royal Italian Navy tapped Panerai to supply luminous devices for sighting naval guns at night, timing mechanisms, depth gauges and mechanical calculators to launch torpedoes from high-speed motor…

A few years ago, Bryan Ferry was travelling to Nairobi on a Boeing 747 when a foiled hijack attempt by a Kenyan mental patient caused the aircraft to plummet several thousand feet. Shortly after his close brush with death, Ferry claimed to have sensed before the incident that the assailant was trouble waiting to pounce: “I didn’t like the look of his socks,” said the Roxy Music frontman to a reporter. There was more to this comment than an ice-cool quip in the wake of a crisis. Stylistic pedantry is at the very core of a man who once claimed that, while the rock ‘n’ roll zeitgeist was to trash hotel rooms, his own band, Roxy Music, “just wanted to redecorate them” Tom Ford called the lupine, unflappable Ferry the…

TIMOTHY EVEREST Iconoclastic tailoring virtuoso Timothy Everest learnt the bespoke arts apprenticing with the legendarily eccentric English gent’s clothier, Tommy Nutter, before striking out on his own, becoming a leader of the New Bespoke movement and purveying non pareil suiting from his unconventionally placed base in the East London enclave of Spitalfields. Eschewing the fustiness that condemns certain of his colleagues to an anachronistic rut, Tim is renowned for his willingness to imbue time-honoured tailoring with a colourful, contemporary edge. Both contributor and interviewee this issue, Timothy provides savvy men’s style advice in his ongoing column, Ask Mr. Tim (p 114), art-directs our Get Carter-inspired pictorial (p 142), and submits to an insightful feature interview (p 128). SIMON DE BURTON His focus spanning the luxury sphere — from art and…

The House of BUBEN&ZORWEG is forever changing the landscape of time with expressive distinctive forms. Forms that artfully combine the world’s finest materials with-vital functional and emotional elements that invoke passion in avid collectors of chronological masterpieces. Succumb to your passion. Objet de Temps II – Mozart The Elitist Limited Edition Masterpiece-blends into noble settings • Double-sided precision clock• BUBEN&ZORWEG double tourbillon• 12 kg weight pull• 30 day power reserve• Music mechanism• 16 TIME MOVER®• Latest LED lighting technology• Rotatable pedestal• Large world time displayThe Available at all fine watch retailers • Sole Agent: Citimex International (S) Pte Ltd. For more information, please call at the following: Singapore 3791 Jalan Bukit Merah #09-19/20, E-Centre Singapore 159471 Tel: (65) 6392 1268 Email: enquiry@citimex.com.sg Malaysia Office Suite 19-8-6 Level 8, UOA…

Just as — so the adage goes — good things often come in small packages, so too can robust stuff occasionally be found in a delicate container. Case in point: heritage-rich British tonsorial specialist Geo. F. Trumper’s Extract of Limes aftershave. The product’s packaging would lead one to believe that, beneath the frosted glass, pretty pink label and twee golden crown closure, lies a floral, innocuous liquid — a sweet liqueur, perhaps, something a lady might sip whilst enjoying a snack of glacé fruit and sugared pastries. Not so. With its intense, bracing citrus bouquet and vitalising styptic sting when splashed on the skin post-shave, this solution is the antithesis of nancy. Applying Extract of Limes, the scent and sensation produced provide the perfect morning pick-me-up. What’s more, while the…

You know you’ve made it to the upper echelon of cool when the Italians give you a nickname, let alone two. And so it is that the Rolex Explorer II Ref. 1655, known either as ‘Il Freccione’ (or ‘The Arrow’) for its oversized orange/red 24-hour hand, or as the ‘Steve McQueen Explorer’ — because according to legend, it was his daily watch — is the Fonzie of all sports watches. The first time I saw a 1655 in metal was over a decade ago, worn by an expressionless Japanese businessman in a lift, who upon noticing me approach his treasured timepiece, prepared his fist in a three-knuckled Shotokan death strike. Despite dancing on the precipice between life and death when you come between a Japanese collector and his watch, I…

“Where then? Spain or Sardinia. Spain or Sardinia. Sardinia, which is like nowhere. Sardinia, which has no history, no date, no race, no offering. Let it be Sardinia. They say neither Romans nor Phoenicians, Greeks nor Arabs ever subdued Sardinia. It lies outside; outside the circuit of civilisation. Like the Basque lands. Sure enough, it is Italian now, with its railways and motor-omnibuses. But there is an uncaptured Sardinia still. It lies within the net of this European civilisation, but it isn’t landed yet. And the net is getting old and tattered. A good many fish are slipping through the net of the old European civilisation. Like that great whale of Russia. And probably even Sardinia. Sardinia then. Let it be Sardinia then.”– Sea and Sardinia, D.H. Lawrence There’s still…

The parallels between male skin care and footwear maintenance are many — essentially, both involve a multi-step process that includes scrubbing, scraping, moisturising and buffing. However, in this post-metrosexual age, while most males know full well how to care for their skin, sadly, many of us have lost touch with the art of footwear upkeep. It’s a shame, as a good pair of shoes, treated properly, should last us almost as long as the very skin we’re in — a lifetime. Re-acquainting ourselves with the principles of chaussure conservation, The Rake underwent a polishing master class — detailed here — with Hermès Ginza’s footwear care expert, Takashi Anzai, working on a pair of delicate goatskin shoes (though this process can be applied to most leathers). The shining path to eternal…

HOME Laurent’s home is situated in the 16th District on Paris’ right bank. He grew up in this neighbourhood and his apartment is a mere few blocks away from his parents’. To wind down, or wind up, when the mood strikes, Laurent wails on his 1960s Gibson SG Blue Taylor T5 guitar. On his terrace, Picciotto is always the emperor of all he surveys. To channel old-world bluesman cool, Laurent turns to a suit, shirt, tie and shoes, all by Gérard Sené. He also reveals his penchant for suits and coats lined with vintage silk scarves. GARAGE (ALSO LOCATED IN THE 16TH DISTRICT) Laurent’s garage is home to his collection of vintage motorcycle helmets, his trusty Vespa and his Dodge Challenger. He says, “It’s so difficult to park in Paris,…

“He could walk down your street / And girls could not resist his stare / Pablo Picasso was never called an asshole… Well he was only 5’3” / But girls could not resist his stare / Pablo Picasso never got called an asshole…” “Pablo Picasso”— The Modern Lovers Though poetic, the lyrics to the above-quoted protopunk classic don’t exactly ring true. Learn a little about the life of this artistic giant, and, while it’s clear that many, many “girls could not resist his stare”, a lot of those very same females would probably have eventually referred to Picasso by the ‘A-word’ (or, perhaps, its French equivalent). Picasso once said: “To make oneself hated is more difficult than to make oneself loved.” Being something of a superstar — a near-universally exalted…

Frank Sinatra’s signature look, the style template he laid down in his halcyon days — the era spanning the mid-’50s to the mid-’60s — is a lot like the tunes Ol’ Blue Eyes created in that era: timeless. Again reflecting Frank’s music, the ensemble of minimalist, skinny-lapelled, two-piece single-breasted suit, neatly folded pocket square, slim tie, and basic, block-coloured shirt, may drift in and out of mainstream favour (as we perhaps to a degree now see, with a return of bolder, more muscular lines, following a decade dominated by Hedi Slimane-influenced super-slim suiting). But, in much the same way that connoisseurs of Sinatra’s standards can rest easy in the knowledge that these lushly orchestrated, beautifully crooned and deeply emotional compositions are — trendy or no — the very essence of…

Inspired and inspiring barometer of all things elegant, the Oxford-educated author and celebrity journalist Nick Foulkes is to the world of artisan hand tailoring and haut de gamme horology what Dominick Dunne is to high-society crime — that is to say, he is the authority. A contributing editor to Vanity Fair and a perennial voice in the Financial Times, GQ and Newsweek, Foulkes is also the author of numerous tomes such as Dunhill by Design and Dancing into Battle: A Social History of the Battle of Waterloo. His latest book, High Society, traces the birth and evolution of America’s elite families with aplomb. While Foulkes may have lent his biographical skill to Count d’Orsay in The Last of the Dandies, he is — resplendent in his Terry Haste suit and…

If there were a grand scale that measured the elegance and sophistication of post-war sex icons, with manufactured pop sirens and Big Brother wannabettes sprawled luridly at its base, Catherine Deneuve would be up in the clouds with the immortals. Why this is so is a more elusive question than it sounds. Being attractive, of course, immediately lifts a lady to a high platform on this imaginary scale. And let’s scratch attractive: make that beguilingly, maddeningly gorgeous. And enduringly so. At 65, Deneuve’s bone structure — so perfect that her profile was selected, in 1982, to represent the updated image of “Marianne”, the French national symbol — today still brings to mind Renaissance-era sculpture; her smoky eyes remain hypnotic; her lips are as full and as prone to forming that…

There’s no surprise more pleasant than one that’s totally unexpected, and that’s the kind we got on a recent visit to the manufacture of watchmaker Roger Dubuis, whose gleaming new facilities, located just outside Geneva, look more ‘high-end private think-tank’ than timepiece manufactory. Roger Dubuis proclaims itself a ‘manufacture’, but the extent to which that’s true has always been somewhat obscured by the public face that the company has shown in the recent past, which has tended to emphasise the bold, idiosyncratic designs of its timepieces perhaps at the expense of the technical prowess necessary to create them. The term ‘manufacture’ may have come to refer, in horology, to a watchmaking house that creates its own components as extensively as possible. But the term also implies handcraftsmanship — the sort…

ART-DEALING IN BASEL Two-fold cotton gingham shirt, Paul Smith Piazza San Pietro silk and linen tie, Bulgari Paisley-print pocket square, Etro Santos 100 Squelette watch in palladium, Cartier Derby ray calfskin brogues, Hermès GAMBOLLING IN GENEVA Classic-fit cotton mesh polo, Polo Ralph Lauren RB 3123 gunmetal aviators, Ray-Ban Gansevoort selvedge jeans and crocodile belt, Dunhill Polo FortyFive watch in titanium, Piaget Black sneakers with patent leather detailing, Hogan SEMI-FORMAL IN L.A. Engineered fit cotton shirt, Dunhill Façonné monogram woven silk tie, Hermès Cotton pocket square, Charvet Ballon Bleu de Cartier Flying Tourbillon watch in white gold, Cartier Magistrale brushed leather shoes, Berluti SEASIDE IN SARDINIA Pinpoint cotton oxford shirt, Brooks Brothers Houndstooth-print linen pocket square, Dunhill Flat-front cotton chino trousers, Ermenegildo Zegna Reversible Epsom belt with monogram palladium buckle, Hermès…

A Zen monk, being chased by a bear, runs off a cliff. As he is falling, he grabs a branch. He looks up and sees the bear leaning over the cliff, he looks down to see a lion leaping up, missing his feet only by inches. As he looks at the branch he is clutching, he sees two groundhogs gnawing away at it. As the monk takes a long, deep breath, he notices, next to the branch, a great, red, juicy strawberry. With his one free hand, the Zen monk reaches over, picks the strawberry, puts it in his mouth, chews it slowly and says, “Ah… delicious.”Zen Parable The wisdom of age tells us that it’s the simple things that we remember best and appreciate the most. It was, after…

Hollywood leading man Cary Grant was one of the world’s most discerning shoppers. He never allowed himself to purchase anything at first inspection, always waiting to see if the object of his desire would continue to compel him before plunging in. Grant also used, with admirably equal ease, tailors in London as well as the ‘Far East’. However, for those of you similarly seeking to mine the genius of an Asian tailor, tread carefully. While every street, hotel and shopping centre in Asia is lined with a cornucopia of tailors, the majority of them would be better suited to less skilled labour, such as removing land mines using sharp sticks and a water buffalo. Hong Kong is home to Asia’s upper echelon of tailors such as Gordon Yao and W.…

It reeks of in flagrante delicto. Others of a lesser imagination might find it noisomely reminiscent of dank laundry or worse, a sweaty locker roomful of unwashed armpits. Whatever your perspective, there’s no denying the extremes of impassioned opinion the mere mention of truffles provoke. Its lusty, musky odour — and odour it is, for ‘perfume’ is far too feminine and floral and delicate a word to describe a smell so arousing of our basest animal instincts — is one you either love or hate. And tragically, should you find yourself of the latter persuasion, chances are, if you fancy yourself even remotely a sophisticate, you’ll force yourself to acquire the taste. Confessing otherwise is tantamount to broadcasting to all and sundry the abysmal depths of your ignorance and the…