Bespoke Rolls-Royce Phantom Draws Inspiration from Antique Japanese Art

April 30, 2021 10:55 AM

Photographs (scroll down). Billionaire entrepreneur, art connoisseur, social innovator, lunar enthusiast (application link to join his 2023 SpaceX voyage), and author of the most re-tweeted tweet, Yusaku Maezawa collects 16th-century Oribe ware; the car he commissioned has a green and cream color scheme inspired by the Japanese pottery. Per R-R p.r.: The upper part is finished in Oribe Green, a fully Bespoke colour created exclusively for the client; in an unusual move, Rolls-Royce has made the paint available for use on the client’s private jet.

Yusaku Maezawa in Sept. 2018: Japanese Billionaire Buys Every Seat on SpaceX's First Passenger Flight to the Moon; in March 2021: Japanese billionaire to fly eight members of the public on SpaceX moon flight ["dearMoon" voyage, set for 2023]

posted by Iris Gambol (35 comments total)

I would not mess with whatever supervillain emerges from that vehicle.
posted by gwint at 11:27 AM on April 30, 2021 [4 favorites]

Clearly I need to take more pictures of me holding my woodworking projects while wearing white gloves and dark grey sweats.
posted by straw at 11:30 AM on April 30, 2021 [2 favorites]

After enjoying some bubbly from the built in champagne cooler, somebody is going to stick their knee through those hand carved walnut (or whatever) speaker grills in the door. But, I guess being rich means you don’t care about such things.
posted by njohnson23 at 11:31 AM on April 30, 2021 [1 favorite]

I better take my crusty old shoes off before I get....no wait, I better just stay away from a car like that.
posted by Xoebe at 11:32 AM on April 30, 2021

I loathe wealth, but i must admit it is very pretty to look at. Before today I'd never heard of him. His wikipedia article is sorely lacking the details that led to his billionaire status.

I better take my crusty old shoes off...
Currently wearing black boots covered in small splatters of plaster from when I was working on building my own dressform. Maybe if I wasn't such a Poor, I could just get a ZOZO suit and have someone else make me clothes that fit. Alas, I will have to keep my creative pursuits in-house.
posted by FirstMateKate at 11:39 AM on April 30, 2021 [3 favorites]

Argh, ZOZO. The first pair of jeans I got from them was sublime, the second was terrible - supposed to be the exact same cut, differed by several inches in the waist. I’ve never heard what happened or what the data collected is being used for or anything.
posted by clew at 11:47 AM on April 30, 2021

These people have too much money.
posted by bleep at 12:08 PM on April 30, 2021 [13 favorites]

Looks great, but I'd still go with British Racing Green.
posted by Capt. Renault at 12:12 PM on April 30, 2021 [6 favorites]

Sorry Zozo. That is one ugly fucking car.
posted by Joan Rivers of Babylon at 12:42 PM on April 30, 2021 [1 favorite]

I’m very surprised it’s a left-hand-drive model. Japan’s a right-hand-drive nation, like the UK.
posted by Thorzdad at 12:43 PM on April 30, 2021 [1 favorite]

> His wikipedia article is sorely lacking the details that led to his billionaire status.

Until I hear different imma go with exploiting something and/or someone.
posted by glonous keming at 12:47 PM on April 30, 2021 [10 favorites]

These photos are easier to view (via CNET 's Roadshow)
posted by Iris Gambol at 12:52 PM on April 30, 2021 [3 favorites]

I'm just shocked a Rolls-Royce gets nearly 20mpg, TBH.
posted by los pantalones del muerte at 12:52 PM on April 30, 2021 [1 favorite]

I’m very surprised it’s a left-hand-drive model. Japan’s a right-hand-drive nation, like the UK.

It's all about cachet. Normal people in Japan have right-hand-drive cars. Special rich people in Japan have left-hand-drive cars imported from overseas.
posted by Faint of Butt at 12:55 PM on April 30, 2021 [6 favorites]

No dashboard display for phone integration or navigation, just nifty carved wood panels. I guess when you're that rich your driver better just know where they're going at all times, since I don't think popping a rubber or plastic phone holder up on that dash is gonna fly.
posted by dragstroke at 12:59 PM on April 30, 2021 [4 favorites]

The car is two-toned, with a pale undercarriage; I think it's going to sequester majestically in the coordinating plane's cargo hold, as a commissioned work of art in a custom frame. [Here's a 2019 tour of the old plane: At the start of the video, Maezawa, sitting in his very luxurious-looking chauffeured car as it takes him to Narita Airport, explains that he’s going to Australia, and decided to do a tour of his private jet while he’s there, since that was what his YouTube subscribers requested most. As they’re driving, he says that since he bought the plane four years ago he hasn’t ridden any commercial airlines, and he flies about twice a month, so he’s actually made good use of it.]

Oribe ware is gorgeous, and I wish his collection had inspired a custom piano. Other Yusaku Maezawa art-related doings: He bought seven works at Christie’s and Sotheby’s at New York’s 2016 spring auction, spending $98 million within two days. In a statement Maezawa announced he plans to put the art on public display in Tokyo at his Contemporary Art Foundation, which “hosts collection shows twice per year.” Here’s what Maezawa bought...
posted by Iris Gambol at 1:27 PM on April 30, 2021

I'm just shocked a Rolls-Royce gets nearly 20mpg, TBH.

When speaking the Queen's about British motors, old boy, "mpg" is short for "miles per gas-tank".
posted by They sucked his brains out! at 1:55 PM on April 30, 2021 [5 favorites]

> His wikipedia article is sorely lacking the details that led to his billionaire status.

Until I hear different imma go with exploiting something and/or someone.

In the wikipedia link it looks like he'd set up a fashion retail website that became the biggest in Japan eventually got bought out by Softbank. He's a dotcom billionaire but more of the 1.0 variety that just wanted to sell you stuff than the current crop that try to weaponize speech or force people to do the same job they were already doing but with less pay and protection. The high school he went to is affiliated with Japan's top university so he was already either quite smart, had rich parents, or both.
posted by any portmanteau in a storm at 2:12 PM on April 30, 2021 [4 favorites]

I'm just shocked a Rolls-Royce gets nearly 20mpg, TBH.

Probably thanks to its ZF eight-speed automatic transmission, linked to GPS to optimize shift points based on location and speed. I am not making that up.
posted by Thorzdad at 2:13 PM on April 30, 2021 [1 favorite]

I'm just shocked a Rolls-Royce gets nearly 20mpg, TBH.

I would suspect that is mp(English)g which would be about 16.5mp(US)g. Does that make more sense now? I suspect it aligns more with what you were expecting!
posted by Brockles at 2:42 PM on April 30, 2021 [1 favorite]

On the one hand: Nobody should be a billionaire. That they exist at all is a symptom of a broken global society.

On the other hand: Starting off as a drummer for a punk band, building up the wealth of a small nation in the fashion industry, and using that wealth to buy bespoke Rolls Royces and trips around the moon? That's basically playing life as a video game you're aiming to get the high score on.
posted by Navelgazer at 2:46 PM on April 30, 2021 [11 favorites]

yes, it's very ugly, and yes, British Racing Green would be an improvement (esp. if that color were applied to a Lotus Elise instead!!!)
posted by supermedusa at 2:59 PM on April 30, 2021

Not attractive to me, but there's a cultural reference there that isn't mine, so perhaps it looks better to the Japanese. It's better than, like, matching the color of Grimes's tongue or something, which is what I'd expect a certain other rich dude to do.
posted by praemunire at 2:59 PM on April 30, 2021 [3 favorites]

Regardless of aesthetic quality, that seems like a dangerous color to paint a car--is he trying to camouflage it or something?
posted by LooseFilter at 3:44 PM on April 30, 2021

using that wealth to buy bespoke Rolls Royces

apparently it is "Bespoke"
posted by thelonius at 3:51 PM on April 30, 2021

I'm just shocked a Rolls-Royce gets nearly 20mpg, TBH.

The g there refers to gallons of peasant blood. Still shocking, I know.
posted by thatwhichfalls at 3:55 PM on April 30, 2021 [4 favorites]

When you become a billionaire, it should be like becoming the Year King. Your every whim should be catered to, then, on 1 May, your heart and bank account should be cut out and thrown to the people. #distuptwealth #theoldgodsawaken
posted by GenjiandProust at 4:19 PM on April 30, 2021 [10 favorites]

I disappointed that it wasn't this Rolls-Royce when I clicked through.
posted by Reyturner at 6:12 PM on April 30, 2021

I'm ok with it. People love class warfare, so think of it this way. This represents a transfer wealth to a variety of artisans, craftspeople, tradespeople, and engineers, who get to utilize their skills making an object that somebody wants but doesn't need.

I never thought much about the RR brand, other than occasionally seeing one their massive sedans cruising around L.A. But this video impressed me. That ceiling really is pretty awesome.

Personally, the only Rolls Royce I ever really wanted was the one that Lady Penelope got around in.
posted by 2N2222 at 7:17 PM on April 30, 2021 [2 favorites]

I'm familiar with Oribe ceramics, and the exterior color is a spectacular interpretation. But when I saw the Hermes upholstery, my brain went, "Oh God, avocado is back."
posted by halfbuckaroo at 7:19 PM on April 30, 2021 [1 favorite]

I might enjoy a laugh at the sheer extravagance of it all, but in a way we're all better off that these craftsmen and women work on projects of this sort, rather than going off to be highly-trained engineers and tradespeople working for some multinational military contractor, off somewhere in first-world countries, making murder weapons that will kill innocent people in third-world countries. If a fancy pigment for a private jet is the worst excess that happens, I'd think I could live with that and hope others could, too.
posted by They sucked his brains out! at 10:13 PM on April 30, 2021 [3 favorites]

A Rolls is pretty cheap compared to a Starship. Supposedly he's contributed a pretty big chunk towards the development costs for dearMoon, which considering how hardware rich SpaceX are (SN15 this week if the weather clears up, SN16 some time in the next fortnight), must be wallet-lightening, even for a billionaire. Dear indeed.
posted by rhamphorhynchus at 9:14 AM on May 1, 2021

@GenjilandProust precisely, and I came here to make a Billionaire-Eating Bulls remark. One fun billionaire, that's the billionaire quota, and if they're not fun enough the bulls eat them and the next billionaire enters the ring.
posted by away for regrooving at 11:09 PM on May 1, 2021 [1 favorite]

And then you wait in the school pickup line in a thunderstorm, and 2 kids sprint though the mud with their backpacks coats and umbrellas, leap in, leave the doors open 30 seconds while they fiddle with their umbrellas, and slam the shit out of the doors.
posted by freecellwizard at 3:42 PM on May 2, 2021

Billionaire's bacon, courtesy of Snoop Dogg.
posted by They sucked his brains out! at 4:11 PM on May 2, 2021