What's new

Metropolis Razor...Anyone Ever Seen One?

I was watching this auction on ebay and had thoughts of bidding, but it shot up to almost $300 dollars at the end.

It's a beautiful razor. I believe it's Italian, but I could not find any info on the brand at all. Have any of you seen (or maybe have) one like this? Anyone here the lucky winner?

proxy.php
 
A few hours ago on Ebay one of these sold for nearly $300 dollars, I had been watching it as it was the most striking DE razor I have yet to see, with a beautiful green interior on the case.

I googled it but literally one thing came up which was an ad for one with no pictures from a Missouri site, was deleted but the asking price was $15 dollars. :ohmy:

Is this from Gillette with the Metropolis theme? Are they very rare? Not sure if I can link ebay items after they have ended?
 
Jesus, I just posted a thread on this exact topic after seeing it on ebay. I will delete mine, absolutley stunning razor, I bid $100 but it went straight to near 4300 on the last second.
 
It is beautiful. I had $115 ready to try and snipe, but once it went up I just watched. Style-wise I would put it up next to a Darwin.
 
They seem to also be a blade make or brand, as the only other thing I found was an ashtray on ebay which must have been a promotional item for Lametta' Metropolis blades. Seems Italian?
 
The razor does indeed seem to be italian, but I'm under the impression that this is a Gillette razor.

King Gillette had a grand idea for people to live in a big multi level city powered by a waterfall that was going to be called Metropolis. Makes sense for a gillette razor to have that name, but what is it doing on an italian razor? (it IS italian)
 
The head does look very much like the New Improved, but could certainly be a copy. Will be interested to hear if anyone else has more info.

The razor does indeed seem to be italian, but I'm under the impression that this is a Gillette razor.

King Gillette had a grand idea for people to live in a big multi level city powered by a waterfall that was going to be called Metropolis. Makes sense for a gillette razor to have that name, but what is it doing on an italian razor? (it IS italian)
 
Nice-looking piece. The handle looks like the baldacchino at St Peter's basilica.

The name is probably just a coincidence, I think. The head reminds me less of a Gillette than of a Fa Tip, because of the long curved comb. The case reminds me faintly of a Merkur / Hoffritz / Pomco, and so does one of the pictures Alex posted. The other looks a bit like a Rotbart - maybe they contracted out the manufacturing?

Just possibly the maker had read King Camp's book, but more likely it was picked because they wanted a name that sounded sophisticated. If there were any connection to the book by King Camp, I would expect the skyline on the case to look more like this:

 
They seem to also be a blade make or brand, as the only other thing I found was an ashtray on ebay which must have been a promotional item for Lametta' Metropolis blades. Seems Italian?

lameta means metal plate or razor blade in Italian
 
Last edited:
Nice-looking piece. The handle looks like the baldacchino at St Peter's basilica.

The name is probably just a coincidence, I think. The head reminds me less of a Gillette than of a Fa Tip, because of the long curved comb. The case reminds me faintly of a Merkur / Hoffritz / Pomco, and so does one of the pictures Alex posted. The other looks a bit like a Rotbart - maybe they contracted out the manufacturing?

Just possibly the maker had read King Camp's book, but more likely it was picked because they wanted a name that sounded sophisticated. If there were any connection to the book by King Camp, I would expect the skyline on the case to look more like this:
that is a viable theory...here is a link to the proposed metropolis
proxy.php
.http://www.library.cornell.edu/Reps/DOCS/gillette.htm
 
Top Bottom