The paper and ink…
Because Hannibal is such a refined man, he sent the letter on high-quality unlined paper, written with a fountain pen and closed with a wax seal. Clarice knows who the letter is from as soon as she sees the envelope.
Forensic FBI agent: “On the letter there’s one partial fingerprint, here. Not enough to hold up in court, but…”
Clarice: “I–I know it’s him. Where he was when he wrote it, is what I need.”
Forensic FBI agent: “Well, the paper isn’t going to help. And yes, it’s linen fiber. Yes, it’s on the expensive side, but, no, it isn’t so rare that you’re not gonna be able to find it in a thousand different stationary stores throughout the world. It’s the same with the ink, and the same with the wax. And [the] Las Vegas postmark, well, you can check it out, but I’ll bet you a dollar it came from a remailing service.”
Clarice: “No, Las Vegas would be the last place he’d be. It’d be an assault on his sense of taste.”
The snifters…
She reads it and then gathers together professional snifters who worked in the perfume world and other luxuries to figure out where this letter may have come from. (I said all of this to get to this part of the movie.) These professionals are in a room and the letter is being held with tweezers so that no one’s scent can get on it. They are passing around the letter to smell the scents emanating from it:
Snifter #1: “(sniffs) Handcream…(sniffs) Raw ambergris base…(sniffs) Tennessee lavender…(sniffs) Trace of something else.”
Female snifter: “…Fleece…”
Snifter #1: “(sniffs)…Lovely.”
Clarice: “What’s ambergris?”
Snifter #1: “Ambergris is a whale product. Alas, much as we’d like to, we can’t import it. Endangered Species Act.”
Clarice: “Where isn’t it illegal?”
Snifter #1: “Japan of course. Couple of places in Europe. You’d almost certainly find it. Somewhere in Paris, Rome, Amsterdam.”
Female Snifter: “Maybe London.”
Male Snifter #2: “This bouquet was hand-engineered to someone’s specifications.”
Clarice: “Is there any way of knowing which shops?”
Snifter #1: “Of course. We’ll give you a list. It’ll be short.”
With this lead, she sends letters (through Interpol) to all of the perfumery stores in Europe that the snifters suggested. Clarice wants them to send, to the FBI, videos of their store activities in the last few weeks. This is how they eventually track down Hannibal.
What’s the point?
What’s the point of bringing up this movie series? What does all this have to do with the cologne game? Well, hindsight is 20/20. In writing this article, I began to realize that the scene of the forensic scientist studying the paper, ink, and wax of the letter, and the snifters deconstructing the scent of Hannibal’s bespoke lotion/cologne, sparked my journey down the rabbit hole of:
- What is luxury?
- The world of fine writing instruments, inks, stationeries, etc.
- The history of colognes and the art of designing colognes
This journey wouldn’t happen immediately, but these questions floated in the back of my mind. And when I saw the clip of the snifters again, I asked myself, “What the hell is ambergris?” More on that later.
What is luxury?
I’ve been fascinated with luxury since I was a child. In fact, some of my family members were wealthy. When I was young, my demanding aunt made me stay in her mansion for a few days while I was in Haiti, separating me from my paternal uncle (whom I was visiting). Keep in mind that she wasn’t even there…no one was there but her servants. That’s another story. I was always fascinated with luxury things and I knew, at a young age, that I was going to be wealthy. When I was introduced to a certain multilevel marketing business, I learned about wealth and magazines for the affluent, like the Robb Report.
A few years ago, I began to notice that, at the end of the Robb Report, there were interviews with people who were powerful or successful in their fields. One time, they interviewed a gentleman who was running his family’s business, which had been operating for over four generations. His family’s business was a luxury brand company that sold things like mink carpet. Yes, you heard that right…mink carpet! But that wasn’t what stunned me!
He began to talk about luxury. He said that Americans don’t really understand what luxury is. He said that Europeans have a better understanding of it. According to this gentleman, because Americans don’t know what luxury is, brands can take advantage of them. A brand can place its logo on a t-shirt and charge $300.00! It can do this because Americans don’t know what luxury is—and the luxury brands that serve Americans know this too! So, what is luxury?
In 2012-13, this curiosity led me to a book called Meta-Luxury. In this book, the authors say that the term “luxury” has been abused so much as a deceitful marketing tool that the public doesn’t understand what luxury is anymore. They write that in the days of old, only kings, royalty, and the noble class had access to luxury, so there was an understanding of what it was. Now the definition has become cloudy.
Because of this confusion, the authors created the term “meta-luxury” to describe real luxury. They define something as a true luxury if it contains four components:
- Craftsmanship
- Focus
- History
- Rarity
Explaining Craftsmanship, the authors state, “…this notion refers to a philosophy of creation that aims for excellence, not efficiency. It embodies an expertise and a commitment that is often passed on from one generation to the next; a living legacy of years, decades and sometimes centuries of continuous innovation and preservation, teaching and learning. An approach that envisions each unit as an autonomous element rather than a replica. Thus, craftsmanship is, to makers, a principle as much as, to customers, it is a fundamental driver of demand.” (pp. 24-25)
Explaining Focus, they state, “…All in all, this notion is strongly connected to the idea of purpose. Focus is all about the unwavering determination to be the absolute best at something rather than fairly good at a bit of everything.” (p. 25)
Explaining History, they state, “…it becomes a unique achievement when such longevity is not merely about surviving, but about continuously evolving. Some brands manage to preserve their past while constantly reinventing their future: holding true to an immutable DNA, they succeed in remaining relevant over time…As human beings, we seem to need to anchor ourselves to things and symbols that stand firm in the flow of time, and brands are no exception.
We are attracted by those brands that transcend the span of our own lifetime, standing the test of time to epitomise a sense of accomplishment and eternity…they are brands that possess the ability to leave a mark; to influence and to embrace change in time. History does not relate exclusively to the past. It is about having a strong sense of a brand’s place in time.” (pp. 25-26)
And lastly, explaining Rarity, they say, “…we do not refer to unjustified or artificial exclusivity, but to rarity as an inevitable and natural implication of the pursuit of excellence. Such rarity is usually driven by different factors, which go form the cost of effective materials or specialized labor to limitations on capacity imposed by quality requirements….rarity is the result of an overarching approach…Quality is the constant, and everything else follows.” (p. 27)
Michael Jackson and Elizabeth Taylor…
Soon after I was impacted by that scene in the Hannibal movie, I ran across an article on Michael Jackson and Elizabeth Taylor. I believe that, at the time, he was living out of the country. He returned and wanted to see his close friend, Elizabeth. He stopped in Vegas to go to a perfumery and have a perfume made for her. The article said that he spent $10,000 to have the perfume made! This article further clarified that aspect of the Hannibal movie: that there were perfumes that cost thousands of dollars. It also confirmed that you could have one bespoked! This led to another question: What makes expensive colognes expensive? In fact, how can I tell what’s luxury? This question would plague me for years. But for now, I’d go down the rabbit trail of colognes…
To be continued…
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