Leica M7 Hermès edition, unboxed and lovely


Ahhh, Leica special editions. How you love to come out, and cost lots of money. The Hermès edition is no exception, though, as expected, the design is still 99.9% the same as the other Leicas. But this one has a delicious special-process orange leather grip, plus a special 35mm f/1.4 Summilux lens made using a new process that makes it as light as the black alloy lenses, but chromed like the heavier brass ones.

The owner says he’s going to take a lot of crap from other Leica people because he intends to never use the camera. Well, yeah, and here’s some right now! These things are meant to be used! I collect beautiful, expensive old books, and then when someone says “why are you reading that, you’re going to ruin it,” I tell them “it’s a freaking book!” It wants to be read.

Similarly, this is a camera. A rangefinder to be precise, but it needs to be touched and clicked and whacked against things on accident. That’s what cameras do. Ah well.