The best designer lighters in fashion

Fashion is a driving force for physical attraction, but it also fascinates consumers for its inherent sense of playfulness. Just as when we used to collect stickers as kids so we could brag about it to our friends, as adults we find ourselves shopping for expensive trinkets so that we can show them off in public, so that maybe, an evening out or at an afterparty, someone will notice us. What better way to start a conversation than «do you have a lighter?» The Edie Parker brand is the perfect example of how fashion can tinge even the most ordinary objects with aestheticism, going so far as to design accessories such as the Burn Clutch, worn by Californian it girl Devon Lee Carlson at the CFDA Awards. At first glance an ordinary black shiny leather clutch, Edie Parker's bag conceals a retractable lighter on the side, covered in silver. «Our best-selling burn bag and burn clutch are the hottest way to light up while chilling out,» says the item description. The case of Devon Lee Carlson's Burn Clutch is not the first time a lighter has become cool thanks to a designer brand and an it girl, indeed, Edie Parker's collection signals its revival. Smoking cigarettes has now completely lost its appeal, but brands still like to play with fire.

The Zippo lighter company, founded in the early 1930s, has thousands of collectors around the world, and these include fashionistas. From collaborations with Kith, Supreme, Palace and Bape for the hypebeast to those with Travis Scott for the American rapper's hardcore fans, the American company has taken the iconic silver metal design object to the catwalks - not quite the same as when Kate Moss took to the catwalk for Marc Jacobs' FW11 show, but it's come close. In the universe of Zippo's partnerships with fashion brands, the one with Vivienne Westwood seems to be the longest running. Thanks to Ai Yazawa's manga and anime series Nana, which in the 1990s revived the punk subculture narrating the story of a Japanese counterculture band, the lighter in the shape of the figurative Orb (designed by the English Dame twenty years earlier, but which landed on the Zippo in the 1980s) appeared in several scenes around the neck of bassist Shin, arousing envy amongst the most fashionable readers. In 2023, the lighter company paid tribute to the designer who passed away in December 2022 with a limited re-edition, a Zippo embossed with the iconic Orb. 

Zippo x Vivienne Westwood

Nana

Nana

Zippo x Travis Scott

Zippo x Palace

Stussy

AMBUSH

AMBUSH

Zippo x Kith

Vintage Cartier Lighter

Yves Saint Laurent Vintage lighter

Yves Saint Laurent Vintage lighter

Vintage Cartier Lighter

Zippo x Supreme

Zippo x Bape

Zippo x Supreme

Untold Truth

Untold Truth

Apart from new millennium punks who indulge in Vivienne Westwood designs and dupes imitating the necklace illustrated by Yazawa in Nana, lighters have attracted the attention of several other brands in recent years. Stussy, which over time has signed products from the most diverse fields, this year launched the Boot Lighter Case, a metal boot that has made the rounds on the web, and even more recently the Metal Beweled Lighter Case, studded with colourful stones. Along the same lines, Aimé Leon Dore made a gold-plated lighter case engraved with a woman reading. Years earlier, Ambush had made a case in embossed 925 silver attached to a chain, to be worn on one's body like the Untold Truth ring.

In fashion, every detail counts, especially when you have to leave a good impression on someone who has just asked you for a lighter. If once the leading maisons for this genre were Cartier and Yves Saint Laurent, the former for more than a century with productions in multi-carat gold, the latter since the 1960s following the rebellious but impeccably chic spirit of the founding designer, today the most famous lighters play with irony, from Edie Parker's handbag to Moschino's macro lighter and Lacoste's textile experiments. In modern times smoking is no longer cool, but knowing how to light Palo Santo with style still is.