WinstonChurchill

Dunhill Bladon Leather Collection

For Spring / Summer 2010 London luxury goods firm Dunhill is debuting a new line of gentleman's heirloom luggage dubbed the Bladon Leather collection. With a nod to Dunhill's history of creating beautifully crafted and durable leather luggage for almost 120 years, the collection is made of tanned leather with a natural grained appearance crafted into timelessly elegant but always functional forms. Honouring the brand's esteemed British heritage, Bladon takes its name from the English town where Sir Winston Churchill is buried - a British icon who was a faithful customer of Dunhill. Each of the four styles in the Bladon collection are destined to become heirlooms, with the designs respecting every demand of the modern luxury traveller. The resilient vegetable tanned cowhide leather ensures each piece is individual, with every cut of hide presenting variations in marks and shades which will darken with age, taking on a soft and rich patina over the years.

Tags: Dunhill, leather, London, luggage, UK, Winston Churchill, WinstonChurchill

Used Cigar Sells for $7,000

by Tom Johansmeyer (RSS feed) —

Filed under: Cigars

The top luxury cigar brands can fetch $50 a stick or more, but that's usually for the whole thing. Like a car, the minute a cigar is used, it loses a good chunk of its value ... unless it's Winston Churchill who used it.

In 1941, a cigar smoked half way by British prime minister Winston Churchill was cast aside, only to be rescued by a member of his staff, who sent it to a friend. Like many of the cigars he smoked at the time, this one bore a personalized label, which continues to adorn the stick.

The unfinished -- probably unsmokable -- cigar brought in $7,000 in a recent sale, but there aren't many cigars that would sell for this amount. If you figure you'll be famous, though, maybe you should start tossing your butts into a plastic bag.

You never know ...

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Tags: churchill, cigar, cigars, smoking, Winston Churchill, WinstonChurchill

Famous 1920s Steam Yacht for Sale at $70 Million

by Jared Paul Stern (RSS feed) —

Filed under: Yachts & Sailing, Wealth

For $70 million you can be the proud new owner of the SS Delphine, one of the last great private steamships of the 1920s, built for motorcar magnate Horace Dodge. The 257-ft. yacht was launched in 1921, fitted out with an interior by Tiffany & Co. and every conceivable luxury a gentleman could wish for on the high seas. Constructed at the Great Lakes Engineering Works in Michigan, she was pressed into service during World War II as the flagship for Admiral Ernest Joseph King, Commander-in-Chief of the U.S. Navy, and Winston Churchill and President Roosevelt are said to have met aboard her prior to convening the Yalta Conference with Stalin in 1945. In the decades following she fell into disrepair until a European clothing mogul had her fully restored to former glory, including the steam engines, several years ago at a cost of $60 million. Along with accommodations for 26 guests and 28 crew members, there's a music salon, cinema, fitness center, spa, sauna, smoking room, swimming pool and original fixtures like the telegraph machine in the mahogany pilothouse.

[via Duncan Quinn]

Tags: Delphine, Horace Dodge, HoraceDodge, Michigan, SS Delphine, SsDelphine, steamer, steamship, Tiffany, Tiffany Co., TiffanyCo., Winston Churchill, WinstonChurchill, yacht

Paris' Famed Hotel de Crillon for Sale at $420 Million

by Jared Paul Stern (RSS feed) —

Filed under: Luxury Travel & Hotels, Wealth

Paris' famed Hôtel de Crillon, one of the world's most luxurious hotels with a clientele of celebs and royalty, has been put up for sale by its American owner Starwood Capital for about $420 million. Constructed in 1758 as a government building commissioned by Louis XV, the palatial edifice (above) near the Champs Elysées on Place de la Concorde was converted into a hotel 100 years ago. Its Leonard Bernstein suite, on the top floor with a wrap-around terrace, features one of the late maestro's pianos.

Other luminaries past and present who have patronized the Crillon include Marie Antoinette, King George V, the Shah of Iran, Winston Churchill, FDR, Elizabeth Taylor, Jackie O, Mariah Carey, Madonna and Arnold Schwarzenegger. The hotel is more likely to be sold to a high net-worth individual or a property investor rather than one of the large hotel chains, the Times of London reports. Starwood took over the Crillon in 2005 as part of its €2 billion acquisition of Taittinger's hotel and champagne empire.

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Tags: Elizabeth Taylor, ElizabethTaylor, hotel, Hotel de Crillon, HotelDeCrillon, Leonard Bernstein, LeonardBernstein, Paris, Taittinger, Winston Churchill, WinstonChurchill

Globe-Trotter Celebrates 110th Anniversary with Bulletproof Bag

by Tracy Chait (RSS feed) —

Filed under: Luxury Travel & Hotels

Globe-Trotter, the British luggage designer which since 1897 has furnished luxury carryalls for the likes of Queen Elizabeth II and Winston Churchill, will soon add another formidable piece to its collection: a bulletproof case designed by Ross Lovegrove. Weighing in at under three pounds, it's the lightest rigid suitcase of its kind. Even before this news, Globe-Trotter was getting around: the luggage maker recently collaborated with J.Crew to craft limited edition pieces for its new luggage collection, and it showed up last year in the Conran Shop with a special rolling fashion statement.

The Lovegrove piece will make its debut during New York Fashion Week in September, posing from the windows at Moss. Until then, you can still get the perennial classic, the Centenary trolley suitcase in orange (designed by hand from Vulcan Fibre and lined in silk) at Moss for $1,580. The Lovegrove designed Air Cabin, by comparison, will retail for $3,500.

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Tags: bulletproof, centenary trolley suitcase, CentenaryTrolleySuitcase, conran shop, ConranShop, globetrotter, j.crew, luggage, moss, queen elizabeth, QueenElizabeth, ross lovegrove, RossLovegrove, travel, winston churchill, WinstonChurchill

Davidoff Launches Winston Churchill Cigars

by Rigel Celeste (RSS feed) —

Filed under: Cigars

Swiss cigar manufacturer Oettinger Davidoff has announced their latest creation, a cigar named after the famous Sir Winston Churchill. The Churchill Millenium Blend is set apart from many of Davidoff's other cigars in a couple of ways, including the fact that it's quite a bit stronger in flavor and is wrapped in a rare variety of tobacco leaf that leaves it with a darker than average appearance. The Churchill range of cigars will be made of tobacco grown in the Dominican Republic, Peru, Nicaragua and Ecuador.

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Tags: churchill, cigar, cigars, davidoff, oettinger, oettinger davidoff, OettingerDavidoff, winston churchill, WinstonChurchill

Churchill Painting To Be Auctioned Off

by Sandy Maple (RSS feed) —

Filed under: Auctions, Art

Winston Churchill was a man of many talents - the master statesman was a Nobel Prize winning author as well as well-respected amateur artist. He painted Marrakech around 1948 and gifted the work to President Truman. In a note accompanying the painting, Churchill described his work as as "about as presentable as anything I can produce." The painting, which depicts one of the city's gates against the backdrop of the Atlas mountains, became one of the American president's most prized possessions, leading him declare, "I shall treasure the picture as long as I live and it will be one of the most valued possessions I will be able to leave to (daughter) Margaret when I pass on." Truman did leave the painting to his daughter upon his death in 1972 and now she is putting it up for auction. Now valued at $1.03, it hits the auction block at Sotheby's in London on December 13. The previous record for a work by Churchill was set in July, when his Chartwell Landscape with Sheep sold for $2.06 million.

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Tags: art, art auction, ArtAuction, chartwell landscape with sheep, ChartwellLandscapeWithSheep, churchill painting, ChurchillPainting, marrakech, painting, president truman, PresidentTruman, sothebys, winston churchill, WinstonChurchill