In December last year, legendary British photographer, Rankin, teamed up with fragrance designer Azzi Glasser to create a unisex fragrance, S&X.
In case its name hasn’t given you a clue, the fragrance is “wild and provocative” – a blend of poivre (that’s pepper to you and me), olibanum (read, frankincense), castoreum (let’s just call it a pheromone), leather, jasmine and magnolia.
Glasser commented at the time, “I wanted to capture the smell of S&X as if it was taken through the eyes of Rankin and his lens, creating and producing his scented vision as a DNA print through my nose.”
Of course, Rankin has created the campaigns for the fragrance. And while most fragrance campaigns drop hints about the sexuality of fragrance, usually shrouded in mysterious stories are (seemingly) not intended to be understood, Rankin’s campaigns for his own fragrance leave no room for misunderstanding what S&X is all about.
They’re also the kind of ads you might want to watch over and over again (but not at work).
“Britain’s greatest photographer” [Business Insider], Rankin has shot everyone from Daniel Craig to the Queen and is the photographer behind Dove Real Beauty. He must also be “Britain’s greatest creative entrepreneur”. Among the many businesses he does own or has owned, he co-founded Dazed (originally Dazed + Confused) and Hunger, and now runs production studio, Rankin Film, creative production agency and The Full Service, with its team of creatives, directors, photographers, strategists, producers and editors.
And while he has filmed ads for Nike, Swatch, Dove, Pantene, Diageo, Coca Cola, Levi’s, BMW, H&M, Hugo Boss, L’Oreal, Rimmel, Reebok, Longchamp Aussi, Marks & Spencer…and very, very many charity campaigns (often pro bono) , “wild and provocative” is a Rankin signature:
Pamela Anderson, a vibrator and Coco de Mer lingerie. Happy Valentine’s Day from Rankin
…and sometimes, Rankin’s projects combine both of his hallmarks – sexuality and cause:
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