Innholdsfortegnelse for April 2015 - Issue 39 i The Rake

DURING 2012-2013, the World Health Organization listed average male life expectancy as 68.5 years. It means I have just over twenty-two-and-a-half years to live. Though I shouldn’t complain. If this were the early 1600s in England, I would have been dead now for 11 years, because average male life expectancy was 35 years — which would have really sucked, because by and large I spent the majority of my first three decades demonstrating the veracity of Dean Wormer’s words from the immortal film Animal House: “Son, drunk and stupid is no way to go through life.” The thing is, I hated my teens, disliked my twenties, and was largely apathetic to my thirties. I only began to like my own life and have some marginal affection for myself in my forties. And while I have always admired individuals with the type of self-possession…

“In 1947, when Marlon Brando appeared on stage in a torn, sweaty t-shirt, there was an earthquake,” wrote Gore Vidal of the actor’s Broadway debut as Stanley Kowalski in Tennessee Williams’s A Streetcar Named Desire. “Kowalski changed the shape of sex in America,” Vidal continued. “Before him, no man was considered erotic. A man was essentially a suit, not a body.” In fact, Brando’s performance as the boorish Polack who rapes and destroys the fragile Blanche DuBois — “mercurial, rebellious, rampant”, according to Williams’s biographer John Lahr — was seismic enough to change his profession for ever. “He is the marker,” Martin Scorsese said. “There’s ‘before Brando’ and ‘after Brando’.” Nearly 60 years later, when Brando’s obituary in The New York Times used the word ‘epochal’ to define his impact,…

It’s hard to think of a sentient, carbon-based life form with more derogatory appellations applied to it than the canine with no discernible lineage — from ‘cur’ to ‘tyke’ to ‘mutt’ via my personal favourite, the vaguely surreal ‘Heinz 57’ (a reference to the number of products once manufactured by the Pennsylvanian purveyor of cheap, nonperishable foodstuffs). The most common epithet applied to us, though, is ‘mongrel’, a word that immediately conjures, to the human mind, the notion of irregular, inferior or dubious origins. The fact that the term ‘purebred’ is a misnomer — that these pampered, immunodeficient cushion-perchers are actually the result of years of selective breeding, rather than having any purity of lineage — is something most humans are unaware of. Still, us mongrels are a resilient breed,…

When the 24-year-old Swede Ingrid Bergman arrived in Hollywood in 1939, there were plenty in the biz who were fairly clear on what they wanted to do to her. What they were going to do with her was a different proposition. At almost 1.8m tall and radiating a Scandinavian imperiousness, Bergman was possessed of a fine-boned beauty that was equal parts flint and Swedish symmetry. She makes modern glamour girls look like a Burbank soccer mom who’s on to her third marriage and fourth nose. But it was the matter between her Botticelli-sculpted ears that made Bergman stand out. Where other starlets submitted to the studios’ decreeing everything from their dates to their medication, Bergman responded with a strident “nej”. She’d boarded the plane to California, and as far as…

When Alexander McQueen opened its first menswear flagship store at No. 9 Savile Row in October 2012, the Creative Director, Sarah Burton, told The Times that it felt “special to be back on Savile Row — almost like a homecoming, in a way”. Burton was referring to the fact that the brand’s iconoclastic late founder, Lee Alexander McQueen, spent his formative years as an apprentice tailor on the Row. McQueen was 16 when he was hired by Anderson & Sheppard as an apprentice coatmaker under the master tailor Cornelius O’Callaghan in 1985. After parting company with the Prince of Wales’s tailor (leaving a trail of spurious stories that he’d scrawled graffiti in H.R.H.’s suits), McQueen moved to the workrooms of Gieves & Hawkes below No. 1 Savile Row, where he…

The elegant black man walked up to the edge of the fire. Had this been a screenplay — say, the one written by Quentin Tarantino that he was here, in Telluride, Colorado, to shoot — the description of the character would have read something like this: ‘The BLACK MAN is an older man. A sly, LEE VAN CLEEF type with a bald pate.’ The man observed the rack of plywood slats hand-shaped (by Telluride town manager Greg Clifton) to resemble old skis. Carefully the man selected one and kissed it, before tossing it into the fire. He was enacting the ‘ski burn’, a pagan ritual said to reverse southern Colorado’s snow drought. Apparently, the idea for this real-life scene came when a producer of Tarantino’s new film, The Hateful Eight,…

In its July 1955 issue, the lubricious Hollywood gossip magazine Confidential had some audacious scuttlebutt to impart. “Marlene Dietrich and men are an old story,” it trumpeted. While the diva’s diva was happy to spread rumours of affairs with everyone from John Gilbert to Ernest Hemingway, it continued, these were smokescreens “to cover up some sprightlier capers that would have lifted the nation’s eyebrows all the way up its forehead. Because,” it frothed, approaching a lip-smacking crescendo, “in the millions of words that have been written about Dietrich’s dalliances, you’ve never, until now, read that some of them were not with men!” After a suitably judicious pause, the magazine rammed home its point: “In the game of amour,” it concluded, “she’s not only played both sides of the street, but…

It’s impossible to overstate what an extraordinary gift evolution has given us in the form of sheep’s fleece. It is fire resistant and wrinkle resistant, and it absorbs and releases water vapour in harmony with rises and falls in natural humidity, which is why it keeps the wearer warm even when it gets damp. Even when stretched 70 percent beyond its natural length, it returns to its original length when the tension is released. No wonder it’s been used to make human clothing since the Stone Age, across cultures the world over. And, wool being to The Rake what silicon is to the computer obsessive, it’s with some anticipation that we find ourselves, one brisk winter morning, heading to Huddersfield, West Yorkshire, to witness first-hand the skill, precision and assiduousness…

My father had a suede jacket. I remember it vividly from when I was growing up: three buttons, low lapels, worn elbows and a collar discoloured by grease. It was unkempt and down-at-heel. Like corduroys, slip-ons and cardigans, it was part of a fusty look that has since been rather unfairly attached to geography teachers. Suede has had many negative associations over the centuries, from fuddy-duddy anti chic to the aptly named monstrosities brothel creepers. But it has also played a huge role in the narrative of luxury menswear, and is now reprising that role with a vengeance. Suede was traditionally the reverse of a leather hide. The tanned skin was turned over, milled and then cropped to create a fine, close nap. Today, it is just as commonly a…

Any film director making a biopic about Flavio Briatore would face some pretty agonising choices when the production reached the cutting-room stage. The Italian former Formula One boss and business titan behind the Billionaire brand, which he created in Sardinia in 1998, has led a life that admirably befits the 65-year-old’s richly colourful character. Born to two schoolteachers from Verzuolo, near Turin, Briatore worked as a ski instructor, restaurant manager and a door-to-door insurance salesman before meeting Luciano Benetton, founder of the eponymous clothing company, while working at financial group Finanziaria Generale Italia in Milan. Shortly afterwards he became the group’s principal representative in the United States. In his next role, as commercial director of Benetton’s F1 team, Briatore garnered a reputation as an astute player in the industry, luring…

North American Indians had it right when it came to their cultural attitudes towards tobacco. There was none of the dismissiveness found in modern-day views, when the mention of smoking or tobacco is, more often than not, met with a cold reception to a ‘filthy habit’. No, they were more respectful in their treatment of the dried-out leaf. Far from the ‘Can-you-smoke-that-outside’ philistines of today, they believed in the entheogenic capabilities of tobacco — some believed that tobacco was a gift from the Creator, the smoke lifting their prayers to the heavens. Algonquian people in Canada still frown upon addiction to tobacco, as they believe that if you abuse this sacred plant, it will abuse you. The practice of smoking it, as they did, in a spiritual room where serenity…

In the brotherhood of rakes, the Lothario stands apart. Whereas his cousins — Casanova, Don Juan, James Bond, and other playboys, real or imagined — contain within them the potential for love, tenderness and truth, Lothario will always move on to another town, another girl, another conquest. He is the rake without redemption. Which makes it all the more unfair that he takes his name from a character who was, in many ways, the innocent party. The Lothario as we know him — the clinical and formulaic seducer, heartless cad and irredeemable scoundrel — is the last in a long line of ever-more cruel men. To arrive at his current state he has spent more than 400 years refining his patter, finessing his procedure, and hardening his heart. His aim…

IT IS A RARE THING TO SEE SCORSESE MAKE A MOVIE that is a financial flop. The film I am referring to is The King of Comedy, a dark and eerie pastiche on the cult of celebrity and neurotic fans who want a piece of the action. Robert De Niro stars as the obsessive wannabe comedian called Rupert Pupkin, who has delusions of grandeur — and a well-rehearsed demeanour through which to channel them — that disguise his lack of talent. Turns out that the film, however accidental, was a prescient masterpiece, and an indictment of the poisonous effect of celebrity on modern culture. It might be the most corrosive and infuriating aspect of 21stcentury civilisation — that the Rupert Pupkins of our day, male or female, attain immeasurable levels…

This edition of Rake Commends is delighted to usher in the warmer seasons. Spring has sprung, the darling buds of May shoot forth, perennial favourites fill the flower stalls, and pre-beach toning routines are underway. At The Rake, we have been replenished by an abundance of new releases bearing a colour palette that makes Wes Anderson look bland and unimaginative. If you are suffering a deficit of ideas with which to spring-clean your wardrobe, we’re here to give succour to your dilemma. Ralph Lauren has released a new polo knit Oxford shirt, which is a good place to start, and we recommend it as a solid foundation purchase. The Oxford shirt is a staple of the brand for any man with a laissez-faire bone in his body. There have been…

After spending an afternoon with the effervescent septuagenarian jazz hipcat and all-round bon vivant Dennis E. Armstead, you might be tricked into thinking you’re in the company of the most vivacious of twentysomething epicureans. With his youthful charm, a wardrobe capable of challenging that of our magazine’s dear founder, and possessing a generosity of spirit to match, Mr. Armstead is the embodiment of everything The Rake admires.…

A couple of years ago I wrote a book about the jet set. As a term today it has lost much of its power, but in the middle years of the previous century they were the most evocative six letters in the world: shorthand for a life of plutocratic sophistication that had been liberated by the arrival of jet air travel. Of course, one of the first things I did was track down the etymology of the term, and with it stumbled across one of the most entertaining fraternal double acts, who had seduced and partied their way around the world as if they were characters in a jet-age Balzac novel. Two world wars and sundry revolutions had thrown an entire generation of dethroned royalty and deracinated nobility on to…

For those whose prism is resolutely contemporary, the era before the 20th century seems — in the arts, at least — to have been high-minded, staid, serious and not at all as interesting as the racy and profane era that followed. Yet the arts have always reflected — nay, nurtured — the deeply human erotic instinct that leads to survival and reproduction of the species. In fact, eroticism in art before the 20th century was so pervasive that there is no single specialist at Sotheby’s who deals with it, for it has appeared in whatever form art has taken: paintings, sculpture, drawings, book illustration, even timepieces. Art has always existed to tell a human story, and sex has always been a part of that story. Consider what really drew the…

The first exposure many of us have to the shawl collar is the elegant white dinner jacket worn by Humphrey Bogart in Casablanca. The image of Bogart staring enigmatically across a chess board, cigarette between fingers, is iconic, and, more than 70 years later, still influences men’s evening dress. The shawl collar has since become a classic, but its origins are lost in the mists of time. The word ‘shawl’ is Persian and Sanskrit, and describes a loose piece of cloth worn draped over the shoulders. The shape of the fabric, as it flows uninterrupted down each side of the neck and over the chest, gives the collar its name and simplicity of line. From these oriental origins, men’s dressing gowns developed during the 17th century. Loose, collarless over-garments, they…

Housed in the Louvre since 1884, the Nike, or Winged Victory of Samothrace, is one of the crowning achievements of Hellenistic sculpture, a work of art that renders diaphanous, rippling fabric of extraordinary lightness from marble in a way so powerfully expressive that you do not so much view it as actively participate in the sense of momentum and transcendence it evokes. In January in the year of our Lord two thousand and fifteen, in the Louvre’s neighbouring Musée des Arts Décoratifs, a similarly miraculous act of transubstantiation took place, whereby leather — specifically, kangaroo hide — was transformed through the intellect of an extraordinary designer named Alessandro Sartori, the Creative Director of Berluti, into a material so evocatively ethereal that the trench coat it was used for looked like…

The more you get to know Francesco Barberis Canonico, the creative director of the world’s oldest continuously operating cloth mill, as well as its ceaselessly energetic spokesman and ambassador, the more you can distill his character into a single adjective: ethical. He is a man who understands that his role in life is to create material that is profoundly principled — in the way it is shorn from free-ranging Australian sheep; in the way it is woven with no impact to the environment in his beloved Biella, northern Italy; and in the way it impacts the lives of those it clothes. Foremost in his mind is the creation of fabrics that are simultaneously aesthetically dazzling, long-wearing and comfortable, and also epitomise Vitale Barberis Canonico’s legendary reputation for quality. Importantly, Canonico…

Tomo Brejc became interested in photography in early childhood, and has remained intimate with the medium ever since. Based in London, Tomo shoots for fashion magazines such as Esquire U.K., Esquire U.S., Big Black Book, GQ U.K., GQ France, GQ Style, Harper’s Bazaar U.K., L’Officiel Hommes Italia, Mr Porter, L’Uomo Vogue and Telegraph fashion, among others. He has shot actors including Christoph Waltz, Benedict Cumberbatch, Kit Harington, Tom Hiddleston, Miles Teller, Jamie Campbell Bower, Nicholas Hoult and Sam Claflin, among others, and musicians such as Tinie Tempah and Labrinth. Now adding The Rake to his C.V., Tomo took the trip to Telluride, Colorado, to photograph this issue’s cover star, Samuel L. Jackson (page 84). A few years after picking up a skateboard, Aaron Smith picked up his first camera. Both…

Many British people love the Krays like they love King Arthur, Winston Churchill, James Bond and Michael Caine. Never mind that the Krays killed, tortured, bullied, robbed and exploited, they contributed to the forming of the country’s self-image. Robin Hood aside, they were, and are, Britain’s most fabled criminals outside the realm of the serial killer. For proof of their enduring fascination, you need only note that Tom Hardy, one of the most acclaimed and bankable of British actors, is filming a new biopic in which he plays both of the Kray twins, Ronnie and Reggie, yin and yang, Tweedledum and Tweedledee. The fascination inspired by the Krays is at least partly based on their clothes. The film is paying great attention to detail to the brothers’ outfits, with Hardy…

Of the many varied and beautiful dog breeds on this planet, the greatest is the innocuously named Lagotto Romagnolo, or ‘Water Dog of Romagna’. But it is not their gun-dog skills or their woolly waterproof overcoats or their extraordinary sensitivity to motion that sets them apart. Rather, it is their olfactory sense, 100,000 times more acute than that of a human being, and its particular ability to pick out the aroma of a genus of tuber known to the natives of Tuscany as ‘Trifola d’Alba Madonna’, and in more pedestrian colloquialism as ‘White Truffles’. For they are the dogs that detect, unearth and bestow upon humankind the epiphanous Tuber magnatum that taste like the sexual drippings of God’s most beautiful female angels. But is there a human equivalent of the…

The jewellery marque Grima is sacred in the closed world of makers, clients and collectors of 20thcentury artists’ jewellery. From the early 1960s until his death in 2007, Andrew Grima went, creatively, where none of his forebears or contemporaries dared to go. Referring to Grima’s most intense period of creativity, in the 1960s and 1970s, his most trusted goldsmith, Tom Scott, called him “a one-man design movement”. His work is spoken of in the same breath as sculptors Henry Moore and Barbara Hepworth, rather than jewel houses such as Chaumet and Boucheron. Grima admitted to “disliking virtually all jewellery that was popular at the time”, so he found a new language in jewellery design that had no precedent and has had no equal since. Preferring textured yellow gold to platinum…

A Rake’s Progress, a series of eight paintings by 18thcentury English artist William Hogarth, details the roguish antics of its well-heeled anti-hero, Tom Rakewell, whose surname’s etymology comes from the notion of raking up hell. Byron’s epic poem Don Juan charts the exploits of the 17th-century Spanish noble ne’er-do-well, and the full title of Mozart’s famous opera, based on the same character, is Il Dissoluto Punito, Ossia il Don Giovanni, which translates as ‘The Rake Punished, or Don Giovanni’. (Mozart himself was no stickler for propriety, as evidenced by his canon in B-flat major, Leck mich im Arsch — literally, ‘Lick me in the arse’.) Easily the most compelling character in William Thackeray’s Vanity Fair is the debauched blueblood Lord Steyne. The dissolute cad is as prevalent a persona in…

COMPLEMENT ITEMS White cotton oversized trench coat, Giorgio Armani.…

For millennia, man has attempted to master time. The Peruvians in 400BC used the thirteen towers of Chankillo, harnessing a system using the setting position of the sun to surmise what time of year it was. Soon after, on the other side of the world, a Greek mathematician domiciled in Ptolemaic Egypt called Ctesibius invented possibly the most obnoxious and loathed household item, the alarm clock — it was much more cumbersome and impractical in those days, but no less annoying to have one’s slumber disturbed after some sordid Saharan shindig. The story continues through to modern interpretations: garden sundials (a far smaller version of the larger obelisk sundials, circa Egypt 2000BC); town hall or parliamentary clock towers; the ubiquity of pocket watches in the industrial revolution; and the transferring…

Texas, the Lone Star state, where the stars at night are big and bright. It might not be renowned as a fashion hotspot, but it is the second wealthiest state in the U.S. and the home state of the Dauphin of men’s style, Tom Ford. Overlook it now and you will miss what is a flourishing sartorial scene, led by the boutique brand Hadleigh’s. Hadleigh’s, which describes itself as a ‘custom clothier’ and is the brainchild of married couple Ed and Gable Shaikh, can be found in the hallowed grounds of Highland Park Village, Dallas, the first self-contained shopping mall in the U.S., and, since 2000, one of the country’s National Historic Landmarks. Ed Shaikh, the Creative Director, shows The Rake around the complex, pointing out the spot, he says,…