Tony Cenicola | The New York Times
There are levels of the luxury experience. And in a way, it’s about what our personal experience of what the sense of luxury might be. But the expression of the luxuriant could be many things. Tom Ford, himself, defines the luxurious as “having time”.
I can relate.
….
What I find to be luxuriant in context, to be just that: time.
And what I find the most fleeting action for me, personally, is about the loss of timing that I wish that I had — to read. It’s not that I don’t have time to read lots of things. But mostly it’s about work. Working, as I seem to be doing, pretty much all the time, seven days a week. And I’m not thrilled about that. I savor the exploration of books. Books that are not about my work, but about other things — like history, art, the senses, architecture, taste, beauty. Nature. Mystery. Imagination. And stories.
And it all does reach back to my time as a student, exploring incessantly. Now it seems like all I’m doing is focusing on studying writing that is related to the business of design and brand development. And all work makes for a very dull boy. So my path has been to focus on reading things that deepen the character of my perceptions that might be, in some instances, tied to work.
Tom Stoppard seems to do that, too. He works all the time. And he carries his work with him. In a bookbox made of leather that is designed to carry a bundle of books. That is a nice way of carrying work with you.
This reference, by David Colman | the NYTimes (late last month) speaks more precisely to his luggage, noted above — book satchel by luggage maker T. Anthony.
Here’s more on that company. http://www.tanthony.com/index.html
I went there — to check that out — trying to find out exactly what this book satchel thing was. Not that I wanted one — I could never carry that many books. I was looking for the answer — where is this thing? (And that inquiry to Tom Stoppard might come out like: “there is no greater moment of satisfaction than when all is revealed. “It’s so great in the theater when everyone catches up on the truth.” And that truth has been walking with him, traveling with him, for 30 years. Apparently everyone has the same question: “Everyone always wants to know what it is, and where they can get one.”
Well, I looked and this is all that I came up with:
A travel case (small, I know, but it’s the biggest image that I could find.)
Jewelry case. Who’s got that much, anyway?
Cosmetics case? Like the white, but where is the book satchel? No where, it would seem.
More from Colman’s interview: “I just thought that this is one of the great things that civilization has produced,” Mr. Stoppard. “If I am on a journey where I only have time to read one-and-a-half books, I never know which one-and-a-half I’ll feel like reading,” he said. “So I bring eight.” He continued — “It goes well beyond its function,” Mr. Stoppard said. “There are all kinds of connections it brings with it. It’s like having something substantial which you don’t have to justify because it does have a use, but it’s also like bringing a bit of home with you.”
T. Anthony’s styling seems relatively non-luxurious in orientation. It’s pretty solid. But kind of boring. What’s the code to their branding, I really don’t know — it’s not perceivable. At least by me.
Back then, 30 years back, travel was different and the voyager would carry far more to celebrate presence of home — somewhere else. And the greater care seems to show — the case was constructed of tooled bridle leather, select wood and polished steel, sturdily fabricated — strong enough “that it has survived the checked-luggage netherworld for three decades.”
What’s your luxury?