ABSOCIETY

Theme · 1990–2021 · 22 editions

Very special skins

This collection gathers the rarest Absolut skins, made in tiny numbers, for a single shop or event, or never released at all. The criterion is scarcity rather than style: a skin belongs here when only a handful exist, because it dressed the bottle for one boutique, one bar, one city or one moment, or because it stayed a prototype or a display piece. The oldest is La Doudoune, a padded jacket for the bottle sold in Paris for Christmas 1996 in 150 copies. Fashion designers, artists and local partners all took part, in materials from chain mail to aluminium and neoprene. They are the hardest Absolut skins to find.

22 editions

  1. Per Götesson #2 2021 · 1 variant Per Götesson's second skin for Absolut: hand-made denim with a spiral zip running around the body, a jeans pocket carrying the branding, and an extended collar with the designer's tag tucked underneath. Ten were made, and went to the press at the private view of his SS21 collection.
  2. Military Skin #1 2020 · 1 variant A camouflage neoprene skin, stocked in small numbers at selected military bases.
  3. Military Skin #2 2020 · 1 variant The second camouflage neoprene skin, on a different pattern from the first, and again sold only at selected military bases.
  4. Sacai Spray Nozzle 2020 · 1 variant The silicone sleeve from the sacai set, made to fit over a refillable spray nozzle.
  5. Concrete 2019 · 2 variants A skin made with the Korean label Studio Concrete and sold in one place only: Absolut Lab, the temporary store in Shanghai. It came in two colourways, a light blue and green run of fifty and a near-white run of twenty.
  6. DOE 2019 · 1 variant A skin made with DOE, the Chinese fashion and streetwear label.
  7. Per Götesson 2019 · 1 variant Ten skins in bespoke indigo yarn-dyed denim, each closed with a silver-plated button engraved with its edition number. Per Götesson made them for an Absolut event at the Hoxton in London.
  8. 5 cm 2017 · 2 variants A neoprene sleeve designed by the Chinese fashion label 5cm and sold only through I.T stores in Beijing, Chengdu, Guangzhou and Shanghai. It came in two formats — 100 of the 200 ml and 200 of the 700 ml.
  9. Switzerland 2015 · 1 variant Fifty skins, 3D printed. Alberto “Sting” Russo worked from Poya, the folk painting of the Gruyère region that records the herds climbing to the summer pastures — nineteenth-century inventories that have since become landscape. Pastures, animals and trees are cut into the Absolut silhouette, rendered for printing by the agency C:LYNK and then finished and painted by hand. It was shown at launch events in Geneva and Zurich.
  10. Guacharaca 2014 · 1 variant A skin shaped as a güiro, the scraped percussion instrument. It was due to launch in early 2015 and Pernod Ricard Colombia cancelled it late the previous year; six prototypes are all that exist.
  11. Makerfest #1 2014 · 1 variant Ten leather bottle covers, cut and stitched by Steven Enns of the Hand and Sew Workshop.
  12. Makerfest #2 2014 · 1 variant Ten leather bottle covers, entirely hand sewn horween leather with brass accents and a red leather seal.
  13. Diesel Denim 2013 · 1 variant A skin made for Colour Mutation, the event held on 18 July 2013 for the collaboration between Diesel and the G&B shop in Flero, Italy. Four versions were produced — Colour Mutation, Ruby Seabreeze, Tonic and Green Temptation — and none were ever distributed.
  14. Canarinha 2010 · 3 variants A tissue skin Pernod Ricard produced for the 2010 World Cup and handed to a short list of Brazilian bars as a display piece. Seventy were made — never sold, and among the hardest of the skins to find.
  15. Andres 2009 · 1 variant A skin made from the lids of old kitchen pans, released in 200 copies for Andrés Carne de Res, the Colombian restaurant where Absolut was the best-selling imported spirit that year. The medallion reads “Ciudad de la luna — Absolut vodka”, the metal tag “Afortunado! Puedes llevarte a casa esta edición limitada”.
  16. Blue Cozy 2003 · 1 variant A Cozy that never reached the shops. 500 were made in 2003 and the edition was never officially released.
  17. Tube 2003 · 1 variant 200 bottles by the French artist Patrick Daumont, sold in two Paris shops only — Lavinia and the Grande Épicerie at Le Bon Marché. The aluminium tubes that sleeve the bottle come off and lie flat as a tray.
  18. Archi Couture 2002 · 1 variant A bottle bag rather than a skin, drawn by Isabelle Ballu with Absolut and the award-winning architect Michel W. Kagan. 150 were made, for the French market, for Christmas 2002.
  19. Trockel 1999 · 1 variant Fifty bottles by the German artist Rosemarie Trockel, each sheathed in a coat of chain mail, with ABSOLUT and TROCKEL engraved on the side of the cap.
  20. Xuly Bet 1997 · 1 variant A skin by the clothing label Xuly Bët, sold in selected Paris shops for Christmas 1997 over a standard blue label bottle.
  21. La Doudoune 1996 · 1 variant Possibly the first Absolut skin of all: a padded jacket for the bottle, designed by the Polish designer Irena Gregory and sold in selected Paris stores for Christmas 1996. 150 copies.
  22. Seagram Bag 1990 · 1 variant The first cooler bag Absolut ever put out, made by Seagram.

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