Bringing a touch of the 1930s to your coat pocket

The global ugliness of the 1930s and 40s was diminished somewhat by a few spots of beauty: The art deco architecture of Manhattan and its attendant interior design of arabesque motifs, applied particularly to doorways, verged on the iconic.

Those years were also a good time for Lucien and André Dupont, sons of Simon Tissot-Dupont and inheritors of his eponymous luxury-accessories company. They were in the midst of going international, crossing the Atlantic to New York to sell their families luxe goods on Fifth Avenue.

Commemorating that period, S.T. Dupont has decided to release two series of limited-edition accoutrements – ranging from lighters to humidors to pens. First comes the French Line, which takes its nautical design cues from the steamliner company that transported the elite to America in the 19th century. The second is the New York Fifth Avenue line, which utilizes those historic motifs (not to mention a whole lot of lacquer and gold plate) — and they’re also a much more portable piece of art de vivre than a door.

Each of the New York Fifth Avenue lighters takes the company’s artisanal craftsmen some 120 hours to build, the majority of the work being done by hand (the difficulty, apparently, comes in expertly applying the taupe and chocolate lacquers, as well as the engraving). To make sure the aforementioned craftsmen don’t eventually collapse of exhaustion, the company plans to release a limited number of each product, including 1,929 lighters – in honor of Lucien’s first trip to New York – and 329 humidors.

The globular design at each New York Fifth Avenue piece’s center was inspired by the two-ton Atlas statue at Rockefeller Center, created in 1936 – and while you won’t have the weight of the world on your shoulders in quite the same way as that mythical Titan, if the daily stresses become too great, the S.T. Dupont lighter can at least facilitate a calming smoke break.

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