5 things you wouldn’t expect from luxury brands – feat. Karl Lagerfeld, a bathtub, and André the Giant.

‘When he was a child growing up in Grenoble, France, acromegalic wrestler André the Giant had Samuel Beckett for a neighbor. And since young Andre was too huge to take the regular bus to school, Beckett would drive him there in a van he probably bought with royalties from Waiting for Godot.’ 

This sure is a rather unusual mix of circumstances, and a very uncommon combination of antithetical characters: a wrestler and a Nobel Prize winner.
Apparently, they used to talk about cricket.

5 things you wouldn’t expect from luxury brands.

1. Montegrappa / Sylvester Stallone

Montegrappa is the oldest Italian manufacturer of fine writing instruments.

Sylvester Stallone is known mostly for beating up people in movies, or defeating entire armies dressed in a jute bag.

Despite the differences, the actor designed a limited edition pen, “Chaos”: it features skulls, snakes, and other things.
Available in 18 karat gold and/or sterling silver, the pen cost $5,000.

In this case, the things you wouldn’t expect are two: Stallone as a pen designer, and Stallone with a pen in his hands.

2. Louis Vuitton / Michael Phelps / Annie Leibovitz

Louis Vuitton almost fooled the London Olympics Brand Police with this picture of Michael Phelps in a bathtub, taken by legendary photographer Annie Leibovitz (read more here http://tinyurl.com/c5kp4ap)

LV, a certified “Made in the USA” big boy with the perfect frat face and the stereotypical physique du rôle for an American Pie-esque movie, a legendary photographer and a bathtub. Right. 

3. Marc Jacobs / Juergen Teller / Victoria Beckham

One of the coldest women in the fashion business, to many a humourless, stuck-up snob, Victoria Beckham surprised us all when appeared in Marc Jacobs Spring/Summer 2008 ad campaign, shot by German artist Juergen Teller, AKA one of the most iconic, ironic and wittiest photographer around.

The Iron Lady in a bag was the opposite of what you would expect, for two reasons: she is the one who buys – ergo the one in charge – not the commodity, and the one who tells people what to do. Imagine the conversation: “Get inzide da bag, schnell!” “OMG, I shouldn’t be doing this!” 

4. Karl Lagerfeld / Road safety

Karl Lagerfeld? Road safety campaign? Together?
It’s like eating a canned “Full Monty Breakfast”, while drinking a bottle of vintage Perrier-Jouët Belle Epoque.

5. Jaguar / Lana Del Rey

‘Lana del Rey chosen for new Jaguar ads’, report the newspapers.
The singer, famous for her song “Born to Die”, sits, with sad, worried eyes in a luxury sports car.
Not very uplifting.
Moreover, the whole thing reminds me of poor James Dean. Spooky. 

London Web Agency Appnova – keep following us on Twitter @appnova and “like” us on Facebook for useful news and tasteful digressions about geeky stuff.