kanye west

Tiret has a nice little thing going for itself when it comes to high-status celebs who want some of them, on their wrist. I previously wrote about a watch that Tiret made for Usher here. The same concept (but done differently) was applied to a watch for musician Kanye West. You have the same oblong "Second Chance" watch case design, in 18k yellow gold. Coming with a gold bracelet or reptile strap, Kanye seems to be enjoying his (as he seems to wear it a lot).

The watch dial features two Swiss quartz chronograph movements. So you have two times, two chronographs, etc... The real allure is in all the jewel work. Tiret claims it took them over five months to create the dial. The dial itself is in gold toned mother-of-pearl, with a combo of white, yellow, brown, and black diamonds. The bezel is lined with very large diamonds as well. The watch is said to have a total of about 8 carats of stones. Kayne's face has been immortalized on the dial - complete with sunglasses. Retail price for this is said to be about $180,000, and is custom made specially for each client.

Ariel Adams publishes the luxury watch reviews site aBlogtoRead.com.

Just when you thought athletes and music performers had completely run out of ideas about how to blow their money, Kanye West dug a little deeper.

The rapper, who is known for boorish and controversial behavior as much as he is his music (taking the microphone from Taylor Swift at the 2099 MTV Music Awards and saying that Beyonce was more deserving of the award that Swift won), replaced his bottom enameled teeth with a row of gold and diamond implants to create a shiny new smile.

He posted a picture of his mouth on Twitter.com, writing, "My teeth are real diamonds... these are not fronts... I replaced my bottom row of teeth with diamonds." West is known for his deep-thought Tweets.

West showed off his expensive new look in an appearance on The Ellen DeGeneres Show this week and told the TV host why he felt he needed to replace his teeth. He says, "I just thought the diamonds were cooler."

It's his money.

Joe Jonas turned up on the red carpet at the "Camp Rock 2: The Final Jam" movie premiere in New York City last night wearing a fashionable Dior Homme suit. The Dior Homme black wool suit is unusual, in that it has a slashed lapel blazer (as seen on Joe Jonas on the far right). The premiere was held at Alice Tully Hall at Lincoln Center; "Camp Rock 2: The Final Jam", which features all three of the Jonas Brothers, will air on September 3 on the Disney Channel.

Jonas isn't the only celebrity donning Dior duds of late. Kanye West and his Rosewood Movement are big fans of Dior Homme, too. West and his Rosewood pals have been seen wearing a Dior Homme Black Classic Skinny Suit (as reported by Luxist yesterday). West's suit is sold in Beverly Hills and New York City boutiques and retails for $2,200. It is available during every season, unlike the one worn by Jonas, which is Spring 2009 Runway and not available anymore (Dior isn't doing slashed lapels this season).

The Rosewood Movement is a fashion initiative in which its followers wear the same sharply tailored suits. It stems from the Rosewood Civil Rights Movement, but in this case is meant to raise the level of sophistication within the rap and hip hop worlds.

Leading by example is being taken a step even further. Rap singer and record producer, Kanye West, is apparently requiring everyone associated with his G.O.O.D. music distribution company to dress alike---something he is calling the "Rosewood Movement". West and his posse, which at times includes fellow musician and G.O.O.D. client John Legend, are seen at events dressed in matching attire.

The Rosewood Movement is a fashion initiative in which Kanye and his group wear the same sharply tailored suits. It stems from the Rosewood Civil Rights Movement, but in this case is meant to raise the level of sophistication within the rap and hip hop worlds. Kanye is known to be a fashion trend setter, so this is meant to influence his followers to dress a bit sharper.

The current dress code is a Dior Homme Black Classic Skinny Suit (as seen on West in this photo). It is sold in Beverly Hills and New York City boutiques and retails for $2,200. It is available during every season.

West has explained in interviews that the Rosewood Movement is much more than just a fashion statement. It also includes good manners, no profanity in public, "calling your grandmother" and "taking care of your kids."

The Rosewood Movement launched in July and other suits West's group have worn include Lanvin and Club Monaco. Dior Homme will continue to be the suit of choice until further notice.

The classic look works well for West.

What was that large piece of jewelry around Kanye West's neck last Sunday at the BET awards? For his comeback performance West wore one of the biggest chains we've seen yet. The thick gold chain held up a huge enameled pendant of Horus, the god of the sky, war and protection in ancient Egyptian religion. The son of Isis and Osiris, Horus was usually depicted as a falcon-headed man as he is in Kanye's necklace. West also wore a four-finger pyramid ring, the total of which are rumored to have a $300,000 price tag. He posted large pictures of the pieces on his blog. Both pieces were created by Jacob the Jeweler. West is famous for his extravagant jewelry. He has worn a jeweled Jesus and another pyramid ring before.

Even had the Real Estalker not revealed the fact that this Hollywood home belonged to Kanye West the listing pictures might have been enough to clue me in. Few people share West's unique love of both stark beige minimalism and candy-colored Pop Art and combine them with as much unfettered enthusiasm.

As the Real Estalker wisely posits, West is a man of intriguing contradictions sometimes fronting as a deeply serious artiste and sometimes displaying a humble, childlike delight. His three-bedroom home is over 4,200 square feet of space tucked high above the city and it's got some very interesting features not the least of which is a fishtank in the bath tub and a mural on the dining room ceiling.

More traditional Hollywood luxe details include a large dressing room, large windows showcasing city views and travertine marble in bathroom. West's aesthetic loves are in evidence. A whole room feautures multi-colored Jetsons art. One room has a full-sized Buzz Lightyear and what appears to be some sort of chair with Takashi Murakami's colorful flowers. Three Campbell soup can pictures sit above a vintage Louis Vuitton trunk. The home does not have a pool but does have room for one and would probably sell better with that addition, positioning it as a more traditional Hollywood celeb lair. It is listed at $3.995 million.

Project X Designs, a new London-based Rolex customizer, has already won some high-profile fans including James Bond himself - Daniel Craig. Project X, which also produces its own Limited Edition Rolex designs in small runs, began with a custom Submariner and Daytona a few months ago which have nearly all sold out. Two new Daytona models have just been released. Founder Daniel Bourn, 37, also launched the London Watch Company in 2003 which specializes in building collections of vintage "investment grade" Rolexes for private clients. Bourn is actually a former investment banker who developed an "obsessive compulsion" for collecting rare, modern and vintage luxury watches and decided to change careers.

Bourn launched Project X Designs (PXD), which has offices in Hanover Square, London W1, out of a desire to "provide a service to clients who appreciate the history and allure of original manufacturers' brand name – guaranteeing maximum performance with minimal maintenance – but who seek the individuality that contemporary high volume production does not offer." It's an aesthetic that appeals to celebs like Kanye West - The Classicist reported on his blacked-out Rolex earlier this year - and Craig, a diehard Rolex enthusiast as we noted last year, who owns PXD's custom Submariner.

PXD offers two distinct services via its website: the first, a bespoke service which, like a bespoke suit, tailors a new luxury wristwatch with unique features to the clients' own personal specification. For example, a leading Formula One Racing Team have commissioned a special Daytona - carrying the company logo on the reverse together with the details of the race victory - for each of its Grand Prix winning drivers. Ex Bond actor Roger Moore also has a bespoke watch in development from PXD. The second element of PXD is the introduction of collectible limited edition (runs of 24) customized Rolex watches inspired by the retro styling of the classic Rolex models from the past.



The bespoke customization service offered by Project X Designs is the 'backbone' of the site whereby watches can be tailored to suit the clients' demands. At present there are 18 Rolex models to choose from and 19 options ranging from different straps to DLC (Diamond Like Carbon) blacked-out watch cases at £1,650. Clients may choose as many of the bespoke options as they wish - more options are in development and will be added to the site in the future. The super-cool DLC Daytona pictured above from the new series is priced at £10,750 or about $17,500.

Rapper, producer, designer, and tastemaker Kanye West could obviously have any watch in the world. The one he chose is a customized all-black Rolex Submariner by Swiss firm Black-Out Concept (above), on a black nylon NATO spec strap. Kanye made a decision a while back that Rolex would be his signature watch brand, but he wanted to add his own twist; Black-Out's version was perfect. "It looks hard, it looks really cool," he explained in naming the watch one of his 10 style essentials. "It's a new take on a classic watch." He also likes the fact that they take a Rolex and literally "paint it black" (coat it, actually).

Black-Out Concept was founded in 2007 by Fabrice Letellier in Geneva. An avid watch collector, racecar driver and all-round exotic car enthusiast with the means to indulge his passions, the idea was born when Letellier had some of his supercar collection given a matte black treatment, i.e. blacked-out. Next he decided to do the same with his Rolex, and soon some of his fellow car and watch aficionados followed suit. Obviously there was a market for it. Letellier contracted with one of Geneva's best watchmakers to perfect the black out process for timepieces, which is done using two low-friction, scratch-proof finishes used by the military, PVD and DLC (diamond-like carbon).

Black-Out also creates customized blacked-out cars, including Ferrari, Lamborghini, Bentley and Aston Martin; the Black-Out package on the latter (see the gallery) costs about $40,000. They do customized matte black motorcycles as well built on a Harley-Davidson base, blacked-out Vertu Ascent cell phones - basically anything you can think of that would look better in all black. In addition to the Submariner they also black out several other Rolex models, including the GMT II, Daytona, Milgaus, and Deepsea, as well as other brands like Panerai, Bell & Ross and Audemars Piguet. Letellier has his own high-end watch brand in the works as well.



Of course, Black-Out aren't the only ones to offer blacked-out Rolexes; we've written before about Bamford & Sons' $30,000 PVD Daytona and other models, as well as Jacques Picard's $18,000 DLC Deepsea. (No, we don't know who thought of it first.) Black-Out doesn't actually sell watches, however, they customize yours at a cost of €5,000, or about $7,000, which includes Fed-Ex'ing to and from Geneva, and a set of three different straps including the NATO. So you can in fact get the look of the far more expensive models for much less - if you pick up a used Submariner in the $5,000 range - yet still have a watch that's every bit as exclusive, not to mention Kanye-approved. You can contact Black-Out's U.S. representative Christian Ginet at blackoutconcept@mac.com for more info.

For the first time ever, Vanity Fair is inviting civilians to nominate their favorite candidates for the International Best-Dressed List. Since its launch by fashion queen Eleanor Lambert in 1940, the List has been determined by an anonymous committee of tastemakers and a roster of influential voters (including yours truly for a few of the more recent years). Socialites and stars vie for a coveted position on the List.

Vanity Fair took over the list (and the voting process) in 2003 following Lambert's death. For 2009, the polling's going democratic in a "spirit of Obama-era transparency." You can vote for candidates for both best-dressed women and men on the magazine's website - Carla Bruni (right), Lydia Hearst, David Beckham and Kanye West among them - or write in your own choices. Winners will be announced in the mag's September issue.

From the Real Estalker:
--E Television presenter Giuliana Rancic has dropped the price on her Wilshire Blvd. condo in Los Angeles, shown above, to $749,000. The listing is here.

From the LA Times Hot Property:
--Ashton Kutcher has sold his former bachelor pad for $3.67 million, it was listed at $3.7 million.
--Fashion designer-turned-photographer Hedi Slimane has picked up a swank midcentury home in Beverly Hills for $4.1 million.
--Tawny Kitaen has listed her Newport Beach home at $3.45 million. The listing is here.
--Actor Kerr Smith has listed his home in Encino, California for $1,479,007. The listing is here.
--Soap opera actor Jerry Douglas has put his home in Encino, California on the market for $3.999 million. The listing is here.
--Jeremy Strick, the former director of the Museum of Contemporary Art in Los Angeles, has listed his Westwood-area home at $2.85 million. The listing is here.
--Reginald Hudlin, the first president of entertainment for Black Entertainment Television, has listed his Beverly Hills home for sale at $4.995 million. The listing for the five-bedroom home is here.
---Norm Zada, publisher of Perfect 10 magazine, has put his house in Beverly Park on the market for $24.5 million.

From the Wall Street Journal's Private Properties:
--A penthouse on the 165-unit cruiseliner known as The World, which calls itself the is a private residential community on a seafaring ship that travels around the globe, is for sale for $17.5 million. The listing is here. The apartment has prime views over the bow of The World and will accommodate up to 12 people. It includes dining areas with bar facilities and fully equipped kitchens with laundries plus 150 feet of private veranda and a private living area large enough to host your own parties. The listing is here.
--Tony-Award-winning producer Anita Waxman has dropped the price on her Lakeville, Connecticut home. We'll be checking out this one as our estate of the day on Monday.
--Sheik Abdul Aziz al-Thani of Qatar has cut the price of his Trump Park Avenue three-bedroom apartment to $10 million from $14 million. The listing is here.
--Alex Rodriguez, has gone to contract on his New York apartment. It was last listed at $10 million and was our estate of the day last October.

From Move Trends:
--Kanye West's six-bedroom home in teardown condition in Beverly Hills is back on the market. It first hit the market for $8.699 million last March and is now listed at $7.995 million. The listing is here.
--A Malibu home once lived in by Britney Spears and Kevin Federline is one the market for $11.75 million. The listing is here.

--The Inn at Jackson Hole, which was at $33 million back in September when we first mentioned it, has had a price chop to $26 million. It has 83 rooms and an onsite restaurant.
--Lindsay Lohan's former New York City apartment is listed for sale.
--Manny Ramirez has put his Boston apartment back on the market for $8.5 million. It was our estate of the day on Friday.

From the Daily Mail's Property:
--Sienna Miller has bought a cottage in the Cotswolds.
--Photographer Rankin converted an empty warehouse in North London into a space with his penthouse, a gallery and 11 flats but so far none of the apartments have sold.

From Berg Properties Big Time Listings:
--Tori Spelling and her husband, Dean McDermott, have sold their Westwood area home for $2.3 million. It was listed at 2.395 million when it was our estate of the day in October.
--Actor Tom Bresnahan has paid $1.68 million to purchase a Paul Williams-designed house in Los Angeles' Silver Lake area.
--Singer-songwriter Ruben Blades has put his five-bedroom house in Los Angeles' Windsor Square area on the market for $2.65 million. The listing is here.
--Jewel has sold her home in the Hollywood Hills, which had been listed for $1.75 million.

While many luxury labels are in the dumps these days, luxe French sport line Moncler is bucking the trend and opening new stores instead of shutting them. They recently opened their first freestanding US boutique in Aspen, and also just opened an impressive new shop in another ritzy ski resort, Gstaad. The Gstaad boutique features a luxurious alpine chalet theme with bluestone floors, pinewood ceilings and walls designed to evoke downhill skiiers in motion. Moncler, founded in France in 1952 and now based in Milan, has collaborated with the likes of Balenciaga, Yohji Yamamoto and Fendi, and is a favorite with stars such as Christina Aguilera, Alicia Keys, Victoria Beckham and Kanye West. It's high-end Gamme Rouge line (above) is designed by Italian fashionista Giambattista Valli. Last summer we reported that private equity firm The Carlyle Group acquired a 48% stake in the company.

Grammy Award-winning rapper, record producer and shameless self-promoter Kanye West plans to ditch his music career in favor of fashion.

West, 31, tells the London Daily Mirror he'll move to the British capital next year to begin at the bottom rung with an internship at Louis Vuitton's UK HQ in Bond Street - or so he hopes.

"I'm going to go and take an internship and just do something that's like completely normal," he tells the paper, "and just rap at the weekends or something."

If the Vuitton gig doesn't materialize, West will apply at other major European fashion houses in hopes of learning the rag trade. Any fashionistas out there want a major pain in the ass to fetch coffee and such?

From the LA Times Hot Properties:
--Celebrity manager Rick Yorn has sold his Brentwood house for $9.35 million.
-- Wrestler Stone Cold Steve Austin listed his 3,881-square-foot house in Malibu for $3,895,000 originally, it just sold for $2.5 million.
--The home belonging to Kanye West's mom, Donda West is expected to get another price cut, to $1.595 million. The contemporary home in the Playa del Rey area of Los Angeles was originally priced at $1.945 million and was dropped to $1.745 million at the end of May. The listing is here.
--The Polaroid house, shown above, is located on Malibu's Carbon Beach, has been home to plenty of A-list parties but with Malibu's new paparazzi crackdown the home is looking for just one owner. The property has 80 feet of beach frontage and has approved plans to build a 6,000 square foot estate with a beachfront pool and spa as well as the existing home. It is listed at $32 million.

From the NY Post's Real Estate section:
--Fashion designer Tommy Hilfiger is about to list his Plaza apartment for $50 million. The apartment is located in the northeast dome on the 18th and 19th floors of the building and includes four bedrooms, a formal dining room, large living room, library and gourmet kitchen.
--Paul McCartney is looking for a New York City apartment closer to the Upper East Side apartment of his new flame Nancy Shevell.
--Denis Leary's TV series "Rescue Me" has just signed a six-month lease with Loft 14, the 10-story condominium building at 135 W. 14th St., where taping of their fifth season will begin this month. The lease is for $14,000 a month and the apartment has a real asking price of $2,375 million.

From Berg Properties Big Time Listings:
--Actor Chris O'Donnell has paid an undisclosed amount for a house in Pacific Palisades. The seller bought it last year for $4.675 million. He sold his last house in Pacific Palisades for $5.05 million.
--Jamie Foxx has sold his Tarzana home. It was our estate of the day back in June.
--Nicolas Cage's Bel Air home is back on the market, this time for $29.999 million. It hit the market last September for $35 million and was later pulled. The listing for the classic home which has been owned by both Dean Martin and Tom Jones is here.
--Glenn Frey has paid $7.75 million for a six-bedroom estate in Hana, Hawaii, on Maui.
--Kiefer Sutherland has paid $8.25 million for a t five-story town house in Manhattan's West Village.

From the Real Estalker:
--Looks like neither Donald Trump nor the mystery buyer have picked up Ed McMahon's house. It is still listed at $4.6 million.
--Rumor has it that Cher has sold her Malibu mansion which was listed at $45 million.
--Stevie Wonder has put his home in Los Feliz on the market for $3.2 million.
--Nascar racer Denny Hamlin has put his North Carolina home on the market. It's our estate of the day later today.
----via Boston.com, quarterback Tom Brady is a real estate winner. He converted a Beacon Street town house into four condos and sold three of them saving the top floors floors for himself. As a result he earned back more than he paid two years ago for the building. His total proceeds were $7.95 million which is $1.71 million more than he paid for the entire building, according to public deed records.
--via Nashville City Paper, country singer Kix Brooks of Brooks & Dunn and his wife Barbara are the buyers in Nashville's biggest home sale of the year. They paid $5.45 million in August for a new house in Forest Hills.
--via the Real Deal, Moby sold his penthouse at the El Dorado, the twin-towered cooperative apartment at 300 Central Park West near 90th Street, for $6.7 million. It was our estate of the day in July of 2007 when it was priced at $7.5 million.
--Dane Cook has picked up a four-bedroom home in the Hollywood Hills for $7,078,412.

From the Wall Street Journal's Private Properties:
--Basketball player Allen Iverson has reduced the price on his Villanova, Pennsylvania home by 37%. We will be checking this out as our estate of the day on Monday.
--Basketball player Rasheed Wallace has cut the price on his Portland, Oregon home. It will be our estate of the day on Tuesday.
--Actor Matthew Modine has purchased a condominium in New York's Chelsea section for $1.7 million.
--Leonard Ross who put the Hearst estate in Beverly Hills on the market for $165 million has taken it off the market. He has decided to keep the home.

From the NY Observer's Manhattan Transfers:
-- A co-op penthouse in 1060 Fifith Avenue has sold for $48,836,000 setting a new co-op price record in Manhattan. Hedge fund manager Scott Bommer and wife Donya. The couple bought the home for $46 million penthouse back in January. The buyer is listed anonymously on the deed as Park View Trust.
--Writer Ian Buruma spent $1,495,000 on an apartment at the Kalahari on West 116th Street. He and Eri Hotta, who taught at Oxford until 2005, closed last month.
--Ben Stiller spent $10 million on a duplex in a prewar orange-brick co-op on Riverside Drive in the West 80s, the same building that his parents, Jerry Stiller and Anne Meara, have lived in for years.

Endless self-promoter Kanye West -- who proves he has a sense of humor about himself after all -- spoofs his persona in a new line of Absolut ads. The first time I saw the print ad (which looked like, but didn't have the Absolut references, what you see here), I didn't get it at all, and I had no idea what was being advertised. A little research showed me the light. I can't show you much here, since you need to be 21 to get into these sites. Log on and check them out for yourself. And don't lie about your age -- it's bad karma.

Forbes has just released its annual list of the world's highest-paid rappers, and Curtis "50 Cent" Jackson has catapulted to the #1 spot with $150 million in earnings over the past 12 months - more than double that of rival Jay-Z at No. 2.

When Forbes inaugurated the Hip-Hop's Cash Kings list last year, Jay-Z was firmly at the top. But 50 raked in over $100 million after taxes on a single deal earlier this year, the mag notes, when his stake in Glacéau (parent co. of VitaminWater) was bought by Coca-Cola as part of a $4.1 billion takeover.

This isn't to say that Jay-Z's doing badly; he recently signed a 10-year deal with concert promoter Live Nation worth $150 million. Meanwhile, Sean "Diddy" Combs and Kanye West clocked in at Nos. 3 and 4 with $35 million and $30 million respectively.