Stefano Ricci Dual Flame Lighter — Lapis Lazuli / Palladium

Stefano Ricci Dual Flame Lighter — Lapis Lazuli / Palladium

Lapis Lazuli has been set in silver and white metals as well as gold for as long as jewelers have worked with it, and for good reason: the blue of the stone behaves differently against each. Against gold it is warm, opulent, historical — the combination of ancient Egypt and the Byzantine court. Against palladium or silver it becomes something else: more precise, more modern, the blue freed from the pull of warmth in the surrounding metal and allowed to read as purely itself. Stefano Ricci applies this logic to a dual flame lighter, choosing palladium finishing for Lapis Lazuli and arriving at a version of the stone that is quieter than the gold pairing without being any less intentional.

Lapis Lazuli

The stone on this lighter is real Lapis Lazuli — the genuine article, not dyed howlite or synthetic substitute. The blue is the blue of the stone as it comes from the earth: dense, unrepeatable in its exact distribution of calcite and pyrite, different in every piece. Against the cool silver of the palladium finishing, the pyrite inclusions read as precise flecks of warmth within a cool field rather than as part of an all-warm composition. The effect is a stone that appears more precise and more mineral in character than it does in the gold version — a different object made of the same material.

Palladium Finishing

Palladium brings a restraint to this lighter that suits a certain kind of collector: someone for whom gold reads as a statement and palladium reads as a preference. The metal is as serious as gold, as rare, and in this context more technically interesting — the cool tone amplifies the blue of the stone and lets the pyrite set its own terms. The finishing is consistent across the lighter's hardware.

Dual Flame

The lighter produces two flame types from a single instrument: a soft, controlled flame for cigarettes and a torch flame for cigars. Both are immediately available. The dual flame format is the standard for Stefano Ricci's lighter collection — a working tool built to the same standard as the stone that accompanies it.

Now available at The Tobacconist of Greenwich.