Innholdsfortegnelse for December 2015 - Issue 43 i The Rake

GROWING UP IN NEW YORK CITY, I always wanted to be Italian. The thing was, I was inundated with images of cool Italian guys, from Michael Corleone to Charlie Moran in Stuart Rosenberg’s The Pope of Greenwich Village and Spike in Paul Morrissey’s Spike of Bensonhurst. All of which, at the time, were the opposing apotheosis of the prevailing nerdy, scholastic stereotype of Asian kids, which my mother — and her insistence on violin lessons and penchant for cutting my hair herself — had done nothing to assuage. To me, Italian guys, with their accents, their jewellery, their almost irrational confidence, defined the fabric of cool in New York. So much so that when I wrote my first screenplay in film school, it was about a Chinese guy who thinks…

In 1966, the magazine Paris Match photographed Jacques Dutronc in a less-than-unenviable position. He is reclining on a bed in the offices of the Catherine Harlé modelling agency in white polo neck and black mohair trousers, encircled by a phalanx of the agency’s top signings, who proffer bowls of fruit and Champagne cocktails like votive offerings. Dutronc had just referenced the Harlé agency in his single Les Playboys, which spent six weeks at No.1 and sold 600,000 copies; it was a hipster salon in 1960s Paris with It girls such as Anita Pallenberg, Nico and Anna Karina on its roster, and various photographers, filmmakers, Rolling Stones and members of Warhol’s Factory passing through and crashing on its couches. Here, in the centre of it all, supine and supreme, is Dutronc,…

In the mid 1920s, between quaffing the spoils of Georgia’s Khvanchkara vineyards and plotting genocidal penal systems, Josef Stalin hatched a plan to recreate the Red Army with invincible super-warriors by cross-breeding humans with apes. The resulting hybrids, the theory went, would pack the sheer, brutal, barrel-chested strength of larger primates but the intelligence and rationale — or at least enough of it to drive tanks and pull triggers on semi-automatics — of homo sapiens. Astoundingly, this fact is met with gasps of horror from all who hear it, not because success in this act of meddlesome husbandry could have enhanced the tyrant’s already staggering death toll, but because humans are so inexplicably squeamish about anything that involves tinkering with their own species’ gene pool. When it comes to canines,…

Should you decide that the world of hand-rolled tobacco is one you wish to comprehend, there are — as well as plenty of field research with as varied a selection of cigars as you can lay your hands on — certain names you must know. First is the father-son team who run the finest cigar shop in the world, Edward and Eddie Sahakian of Davidoff of London; the second is Nick Foulkes, for there are few finer and more knowledgeable writers about cigars on the planet. But the person who really demonstrates an understanding of this particular sector of luxury is the woman who, by all accounts, arrives at José Martí airport in Havana to rapturous applause: Jemma Freeman, the sixth-generation managing director of Hunters & Frankau, Britain’s sole importer…

At a formal concert or seated gathering, an invited member of the royal family, or a statesman, perhaps, will enter in the very last seconds, usually as the lights go down, ushered to their position by venue employees thrilled to have them there. There were no royal highnesses, right honourables or excellencies at the Richard James show of LC:M in January this year, but there was Dan Rookwood. At the last moment in came Dan, glasses on, well-groomed beard, camel coat hanging perfectly over his pebble-grey double-breasted suit. Dan is the envy of a lot of hacks, for he has the sort of star quality and good looks that many journalists write about but don’t possess. At the end of that particular day, when the Kingsman line was being presented…

As the saying goes, the apple sometimes does not fall far from the tree. From the delightful Kim family in North Korea, to Kirk and Michael Douglas, and of course the United Kingdom’s first family, the Windsors. The clan in question for the purpose of this piece is the Foulkes family, the most stylish in Shepherd’s Bush. Nick Foulkes, the patriarch and Rake contributing editor, featured in last year’s list of Rakes of the Year. It is with great pleasure that we bestow Freddie Foulkes, his younger son, with the same award. This has been the year he has shown himself to be as sartorially adept, transformative and experimental as his father was at the same age, a time when Nick went to an Oxford black-tie party in a leather…

You don’t so much meet Massimo Bottura as you experience him. One moment the space before you is empty; then suddenly it is filled with him. An electric, effusive energy, a fierce and fearsome intellect, and a sincerity that is immediately apparent. Your brain struggles with comprehending the parameters that define the man. Then something clicks and you realise it is his code of ethics that shapes him. That informs the food he cooks. The heady, alchemic, opiatic mixture of slavish devotion to the produce of his native Emilia-Romagna region married with a nostalgia encoded in him in the kitchen and at the table of his mother and his grandmother — and then refracted through a mind searching for new expression by way of bold, mind-altering, technical virtuosity. And so…

‘As I slept, I had the most beautiful and pleasing dream, but there was nothing in the dream that has not come true, exactly as the dream told it. Now I should like to recount that dream, the better to delight your hearts, for affection begs and commands me to do so.’ GUILLAUME DE LORRIS, ROMAN DE LA ROSE It is almost impossible to express just how closely connected a man can be with the clothes he wears, with the way that those clothes make him feel, the way they enable him to create a finer vision of himself or channel a sense of identity that might otherwise escape him. Readers of this magazine will doubtless know these feelings well. To the passionate dresser, clothes can become a whole world…

In southern California lies a workshop where some of the most highly skilled artisans produce the most lust-worthy automobiles on sale today. Going by the collective name of Singer, these enthusiasts take classic 964-era Porsche 911s, the dynamically purest of all 911s, and re-build them from the ground up, borrowing all of the best elements of Porsche’s history. To some, this might sound like a bunch of petrolheads attempting to play God, messing with a formula that has proven to be one of the greatest in sports car history, but what these boys do borders on alchemy. They re-fabricate the rear haunches in a way that would give Sir Mix-a-Lot palpitations, the trademark curvaceous lines widened to accommodate a wider rear track. Virtually all mechanical and electrical aspects of the…

When you think of New York, you have myriad examples of institutional landmarks that paint this extraordinary city: they are as big as Brooklyn Bridge and as small as the hot-dog carts. But few summon up the rakish sinews as much as Barneys in Midtown Manhattan. At Barneys, menswear is curated as if it were a museum, and there is as much attention given to small artisan brands and artistic, experimental fashion labels as there is to behemoth household names. Over the years it has honed itself as a perfect shopping experience, and at the centre of this is one man who, during 36 years of service for this hallowed marque, has risen to the very top. Tom Kalenderian, the Executive Vice President and men’s General Merchandise Manager, is one…

AROUND 80 PER CENT OF THE CONVERSATIONS that took place between me and the founder in the past six months focused on tackling the same subject: how, in a world full of trolling, one-upmanship, fat-shaming, reality T.V. and cultural dumbing-down, does a man feel uplifted? How can you contextualise ‘cool’ in a way that is achievable or tell a story that is relatable and makes you feel better afterwards? There is, of course, no easy answer. But at this time of year, there is no better opportunity to try. This issue of The Rake is a pointed effort to round off the year — a very successful one from the magazine’s point of view — on a high note, focusing attention on fulfilled lives and the pursuit of excellence without…

BERNARD BUFFET BY NICHOLAS FOULKES If people were asked to list several artists off the top of their head, chances are that Bernard Buffet would not be one of the recurring names. However, as Nick Foulkes puts it in his latest book, Bernard Buffet: The Invention of the Modern Mega-artist, Buffet was “one of the glittering constellation of talented youth who had found fame while still in their teens, and who had shaped French culture and the perception of France during the fifties and sixties”. Nick uses hyperbole only when it is deserved, so if this sentence is anything to go by, Buffet is significant. If you are familiar with Foulkes as an author, you will already be aware that few authors can do what he does. He is a…

Days rarely go by without hearing about, seeing or coming across another coup by Hublot. Jean-Claude Biver, the former chief executive, successfully ushered the brand into a new era, with the result that even if you know nothing about watches, you will know the brand. What happens now that Mr. Biver has left is down to a handful of people who are taking Hublot into its next epoch. One such person is the remarkably rakish Benoît Lecigne. Benoît is the Brand Director for France, Belgium, Luxembourg, the United Kingdom and Ireland. He is wonderfully genial, has a joie de vivre, and a sense of style that mixes the old and the new with Elkannian aplomb. He is also fascinated by coats of arms and heraldry, especially the ostrich feathers of…

I have been converted. It’s been a short, swift radicalisation, and now that it’s happened, don’t try to reintegrate me. As The Rake is forever seeking to push sartorial boundaries and venture into new ground, nothing is more satisfying than a brand within the limited yet ferociously competitive world of the artisan that produces a work of art heralding the future — something that appears as a vital innovation in the realm of menswear. The brand on this occasion is the British shoemaker Gaziano & Girling, and the innovation is the perfect, and ultimate, urban boot. Think of London: a jostling city with Roman architecture and infrastructure within Norman within Elizabethan within Edwardian within Georgian within Brutalist within neo-modernism — quite the clusterfuck. Now think of its climate: rainy, cold,…

Hollywood loves a Brit. Leading men from the British Isles have taken over the film world: look at Oscar winner Eddie Redmayne, runner-up Benedict Cumberbatch, as well as Tom Hardy and Tom Hiddleston, who will no doubt follow them. Americans are hiring Britons to play their presidents (Sir Daniel Day-Lewis as Abraham Lincoln), their revolutionaries (David Oyelowo as Martin Luther King, Jr), and even their superheroes: a couple of years ago, Batman (Christian Bale), Superman (Henry Cavill) and Spider-Man (Andrew Garfield) were all burgundy-passport-carrying citizens of Her Majesty. Then there are the women, led by Carey Mulligan, Keira Knightley and Emily Blunt, and we haven’t even started on television, where a running obsession with the plight of the American male hasn’t hindered the recruitment of the public-school-educated Damian Lewis and…

The reigning pontiff, rake of the year? It’s not as left-field a decision as it might seem at first glance — and not just because of the sartorial finery that is ingrained in Catholic culture. The ways in which Jorge Mario Bergoglio is unique are abundant. He’s the first non-European pope since the Syrian Gregory III died in the year 741. He worked as a nightclub bouncer. As a young man he had part of a lung removed due to a lethal infection. He lives in a simple two-room apartment rather than the Commandment-breakingly ornate Vatican’s Apostolic Palace, departing from hundreds of years of papal tradition in the process. He is a champion of peace and co-operation — as every senior religious cleric should be — but he has even…

Menswear is entirely fuelled by enthusiasm, both from a design perspective and a retail one. When working with clothing such as jackets, shirts, suits or shoes, the parameters are much more restrictive in comparison with womenswear — for classical menswear, at least. You need energy and enthusiasm if you are going to catch the modern man’s attention. The man who passes a hundred navy, pinstripe and houndstooth pieces a day and needs inspiration. Well, should you be heading down Madison Avenue on the lookout for something that will meet this criteria, Paul Stuart, the home of jazz-age dandyism and American style legends, will do the trick. This is a massive store and easy to get lost in. It is full of sartorial treats, but the real treasure here lies in…

Earlier this year, The Rake was invited to see two of the fashion industry’s most iconic names give a talk at Central Saint Martins, London’s most prestigious school of fashion and design. The students were all part of the M.A. course and came in all shapes, sizes and styles. And, of course, they were fascinated to discover more about the minds of the speakers, Domenico Dolce and Stefano Gabbana. We were not the only members of the rag trade in the audience: there was also the editor-in-chief of Harper’s Bazaar, Justine Picardie, and Suzy Menkes, the doyenne of all incisive fashion journalism. The talk was bold and informative, and you knew that, all around you, every word was being hung on, their words scribbled down furiously so not a drop…

Flavio Manzoni is fluent in a language that you and I will never understand. And that is the language of aerodynamics. Just looking at the air flow through, over and beneath a car, he can already see its shape coalescing before him — a shape, he stresses, that is born out of an authentically technical purpose, which gives it its raison d’être. And it is for this reason that Manzoni was charged with the creation of one of Ferrari’s most important vehicles, the eponymously monikered LaFerrari. The Rake sat down with this extraordinary man to be inducted and seduced by his brilliance and to momentarily catch a glimpse inside the mind of the single keenest intellect working in automotive design today. Because Flavio Manzoni is not just writing the aesthetic…

Natural selection may have bowled us the odd googly to date — marsupials, stripes on zebras and Donald Trump running for president, to name but three — but only a terminal curmudgeon could deny the wonders it’s worked for contemporary quality goods. It’s taken, so far, three billion years of painfully gradual genetic mutation for the skin of the porosus crocodile to boast its current blend of suppleness and strength, and for its scales to feature such poetic graduation in size and shape. Similarly with galuchat, the shark or stingray skin that encases jewellery boxes and the kind of furniture found in seventies rock stars’ country piles. Named after Louis XV’s master leather artisan, Jean-Claude Galluchat, who introduced it to France during the 18th century, galuchat only has the delectable…

Narrowly focused interests often cause us to miss the forest for the trees. I’m not ashamed to admit I love cars but that motorcycles leave me not merely cold but soporific. Watches suffer that separation, too: most wristwatch enthusiasts have little interest in pocket watches and almost none in clocks. And yet … I do not slip out for a cuppa when Antiques Roadshow turns up something for the table or mantelpiece rather than the wrist. Clocks, especially long-case types, have fallen out of fashion, the decline starting after the second world war. Modern homes had small, accurate electric clocks that didn’t need periodic winding. Quite: on a recent episode of the aforementioned television show, the watch-and-clock expert warned the guest, who had brought in a fine 19th-century table clock…

At Venetian masquerade balls of the 16th century Renaissance period, masks were worn to hide one’s identity, providing a temporarily changing appearance. Fast-forward to the 21st century, and people are hiding behind a new type of mask. The modern city’s pavements have become saturated with people wearing masks made from acetate, with two dark lenses acting as a one-way mirror, allowing the wearer to see all but not be seen. The primary function of sunglasses — protection from the rays — has in fact become secondary. Anonymity is still a goal worth seeking, it seems. The first ‘sunglasses’ were actually created by 13th-century Chinese judges, who wore smoked quartz lenses so that the court they presided over couldn’t see their facial expressions. The lenses had no glare-blocking abilities, so they…

Tom Cheshire is Sky News’s technology correspondent, which covers just about everything: he’s interviewed astronauts and Silicon Valley C.E.O.s, broken stories on car hacking and Islamic State’s social media propaganda, chased a solar eclipse in an aeroplane over Iceland, had his brain zapped by direct electric current, and fallen off a hoverboard. Prior to Sky News he was associate editor at WIRED, and he is the author of The Explorer Gene, an account of three generations of explorers from one family. In this issue he looks at another pioneer, the motorboat racer Joe Carstairs. “Carstairs was unique,” Cheshire says. “She wasn’t just the fastest woman on water — for a while she was the fastest Briton on water, and cut a dash while doing it. When she grew bored of…

In 1940 an American pilot landed his amphibious plane just off Great Whale Cay, an island in the west of the Bahamas, about 150 miles south-east of Florida. He didn’t stay long. A friend, a newspaper columnist, later reported: “He came back in a big hurry, reporting in some alarm that when he landed in the water, a short, stock-built dame came popping out of the house on the cay with a double-barrelled shotgun in her dukes and dull menace in her lovely orbs.” The pilot had had a lucky escape from Marion ‘Joe’ Carstairs — a speedboat champion, cross-dressing lesbian, heiress to an oil fortune, and the ‘Queen of Whale Cay’. Later that year, a group of American tourists moored their schooner and rowed up to a beach on…

There are certain terms that just don’t have the cachet they used to. One of these is ‘icon’. Kim Kardashian? Not even close. Natalie Portman? Keep trying. Taylor Swift? You’re dead to me. Another is ‘jet set’. Now that every schlub who can pull together $60 in tips can hop on an Air Asia flight, the art of travel has become nothing more than a cramped mass-market commute — “Oh, you’d like to use the toilet? That’ll be $20 extra.” It’s hard to believe that just one generation ago, there was a small but glittering cadre of impossibly glamorous people who flitted between international capitals on a whim, chasing the sun, the sex, the scandals and the seasons. And there was one woman who did it better than most. Long…

In a video doing the rounds on the web at the time of writing, an enraged Martin Freeman pulverises a cake and a typewriter with a sledgehammer, then turns a garden shed into kindling with a chainsaw. The actor might harbour a little simmering existential angst from time to time — more on that later — but fans of Freeman and his burgeoning body of work needn’t be alarmed: the violent tantrum in question was the climactic point in the video (a vignette documenting a D.I.Y. enthusiast’s implosion under the pressure of suburban banality) for Paul Weller’s slow-burn funk single Pick it Up. The collaboration is not Freeman and Weller’s only connection. Alongside Bradley Wiggins and Soho tailor Mark Powell, the pair make up what some eager fashion nomenclaturists in…

“Forty is the old age of youth; fifty is the youth of old age.” Victor Hugo What do the following leading men, perhaps the American leading men, have in common? Tom Hanks, Brad Pitt, George Clooney, Denzel Washington, Tom Cruise, Johnny Depp and (as of this year) Robert Downey Jr? The answer is they’re all over 50 years of age, and basically the superstars of 10 years ago. As arbiters of fashion, taste and cinematic masculinity, they are more respected than their younger peers and bedewed with more awards, and the fascination with them has matured as charitably as their looks. What is it about men of that age that grips the cultural conscience? The history of the Hollywood leading man has a torn richness. After the dawn of sound,…

What can one say about Jason Basmajian, Chief Creative Officer of the Savile Row heavyweight Gieves & Hawkes? There are a number of places that one might start: for example, with his extraordinary eye for detail, or his modesty, his decency, his monumental creative vision or even his innate ability to perfectly comprehend just what a brand needs and embody it effortlessly in his designs. One might even make mention of how he has, in a little over two years, transformed a formerly conservative British tailor into one of the most influential forces in contemporary menswear. Make no mistake, to have taken the Gieves & Hawkes of two years ago and to have exacted such a remarkable transformation is nothing short of miraculous. Ever since he introduced his rugged, richly…

If there is one luxury British brand that can be credited with a recent transformation, it is Turnbull & Asser. Over the past couple of years, the universally acknowledged ‘Peacock of Jermyn Street’ has come a long way in a short space of time, much to the credit of its visionary owner, James Fayed, Esq. Having met James on a number of occasions, I can say with all candour that this is most unsurprising, because few men possess such generosity of spirit, warmth and integrity, and few men are so passionate about the remarkable story of the brand that has been entrusted to them. Such qualities are rare in menswear today, and this alone makes him a more-than-worthy Rake of the Year. Charismatic as he is, his accomplishments are predictably…

It would be very easy for Stefano Pilati to ignite the fashion stratosphere with fireworks. It would be very easy for him to conceptualise a new radical silhouette, an iconoclastic philosophy of sartorial brutalism or neo-deconstructionism. But to do that, to create clothing that essentially has a ticking clock of guaranteed anachronism hardwired into it, militates against everything Pilati believes in, because he knows that genuinely beautiful clothing — made with honesty and artisanship, two qualities synonymous with the house of Zegna, where he feels privileged to take the helm as head of design — should be timeless and ageless. He strives to empower men with the possibility of individualism through clothing that is simultaneously complementary yet beautifully discordant. He enriches the intellect of his customers by compelling them to…

Had the 1946 referendum that decided Italy’s fate as a republic gone the other way — and plenty of monarchists advanced suspicions of fraud at the time — the life of H.R.H. Prince Emanuele Filiberto Umberto Reza Ciro René Maria di Savoia, better known as Emanuele Filiberto of Savoy, would have been very different. The pendulum swung in favour of republicanism, however, and Filiberto grew up in Geneva, as the Italian constitution that sprang from the post-war settlement prohibited the male line of Savoy kings of Italy from entering Italian territory. That’s not to say the only male-line grandson of Umberto II, the last King of Italy, has led an ordinary existence: hopping regularly from his home in Monte Carlo to Geneva and various destinations in Italy (the cross-border ban…