PCA 2021: Manny Iriarte Enterprises

This is hardly Manny Iriarte’s first trade show. He’s been a fixture in the Arturo Fuente booth for as long as I can remember. The Cuban-born artist and designer is responsible for a plethora of Arturo Fuente cigar boxes—OpusX 20th comes to mind—and accessories, including work on the company’s collaborations with Hublot. Iriarte is at the 2021 PCA Convention & Trade Show showing off new Arturo Fuente-themed accessories but this time he is selling them through his own company. As he explained to me earlier, it’s been a bit of an adjustment from the old days: now he has to be in his own booth all day long.

Officially, it’s being done through Manny Iriarte Enterprises, his new company, though it’s probably better known as The OpusX Society, which is the main project from his new company. It’s a line of accessories—some of which made in collaboration with Elie Bleu and others made elsewhere—and it certainly is generating buzz. While I’m not a huge fan of the LED lights, I do like the blue and yellow design of the display cases.

The OpusX Society / Elie Bleu El Azul Humidor

Speaking of designs I like. This looks good in pictures but it is so much more stunning in person.

This is one of two humidors made by Elie Bleu, the French humidor company. Named El Azul and El Rojo—Spanish for the blue and the red—the two humidors measure 15.15 inches x 9.84 x 6.69, rated to hold around 75 cigars.

Three different types of wood are used for the humidors: African bubinga, blue sycamore and Spanish cedar.

Of note, these are being distributed by Elie Bleu.

MSRP: $8,000

Production: 25 Humidors

Release Date: July 2021

The OpusX Society / Elie Bleu El Rojo Humidor

Same as above, but it’s red? It’s not actually red so I thought it wasn’t on display.

MSRP: $8,000

Production: 25 Humidors

Release Date:

The OpusX Society Carbon Fiber Cases

You can purchase two-finger carbon fiber cases for around $100 from Visol, so this might actually be somewhat of a value or at least an instance where the premium for the OpusX name isn’t that much. Of note, I don’t know who is making these cases, the Visol reference was just a point of comparison.

MSRP: $149

Production: Regular Production

Release Date: July 2021

The OpusX Society / Elie Bleu J-14 Lighters

Brian Burt has been using a J-14 lighter all week, albeit an older colorway from 2017 and not one of these new designs.

It’s a single torch flame lighter—though the flame is a bit wider—though, the body looks like a soft flame lighter.

MSRP: $440

Production: 25 Pieces Per Color

Release Date: July 2021

The OpusX Society Don Carlos Ashtray

Each ashtray measures 9.44 inches in length, 10.5 inches in width, and 2.97 inches in height. This is definitely my favorite of the trio, I really like the way the vertical stripes on the side look like.

MSRP: $175

Production: Regular Production

Release Date: July 2021

The OpusX Society Gran Reserva Ashtray

Same as above, different colorway.

MSRP: $175

Production: Regular Production

Release Date: July 2021

The OpusX Society Hemingway Ashtray

This actually reminds me more of the OpusX 20th than Hemingway, but it’s pretty nonetheless.

MSRP: $175

Production: Regular Production

Release Date: July 2021

The OpusX Society / Elie Bleu EBC-4 Don Carlos

This is a new double guillotine cutter from Elie Bleu and there are three Fuente-themed colorways for it.

MSRP: $219

Production: Regular Production

Release Date: July 2021

The OpusX Society / Elie Bleu EBC-4 Cutter Gran Reserva

Same as above.

MSRP: $219

Production: Regular Production

Release Date: July 2021

The OpusX Society / Elie Bleu EBC-4 Cutter Hemingway

Same as above.

MSRP: $219

Production: Regular Production

Release Date: July 2021

The OpusX Society / Elie Bleu J-15 Lighter Don Carlos

You can see these in the pictures above. The J-15 is a new single-flame lighter from Elie Bleu. I haven’t gotten to play around with it yet, so I don’t have any thoughts other than I like the Hemingway version of the lighter the most.

MSRP: $219

Production: Regular Production

Release Date: July 2021

The OpusX Society / Elie Bleu J-15 Lighter Gran Reserva

Same as above.

MSRP: $219

Production: Regular Production

Release Date: July 2021

The OpusX Society / Elie Bleu J-15 Lighter Hemingway

Same as above.

MSRP: $229

Production: Regular Production

Release Date: July 2021

The OpusX Society / Elie Bleu J-15 Lighter Manny Iriarte

This is a Manny Iriarte-themed version of the aforementioned J-15. It looked very lonely hanging out in the bottom of a pretty large display case.

MSRP: $229

Production: Regular Production

Release Date: July 2021

The OpusX Society Don Carlos Humidor

These humidors measure 19.25 inches x 10.5 x 8. They are likely out of most people’s humidor budgets, but they are a lot more affordable than if a humidor like this was made by Elie Bleu.

The humidors are more or less the same except for the exterior colorway and the interior trays, which feature different cutouts for each brand.

MSRP: $1,275

Production: Regular Production

Release Date: July 2021

The OpusX Society Gran Reserva Humidor

Unfortunately, it was pretty tough to get a sense of how great these humidors are because of how tightly packed they were in the booth. It also meant my pictures aren’t great, so I’d recommend clicking on the linked story.

MSRP: $1,275

Production: Regular Production

Release Date: July 2021

The OpusX Society Hemingway Humidor

Each humidor will come with six Boveda 84 percent seasoning packs, six Boveda 69 percent packs, and a Bluetooth hygrometer. There are slots inside the humidor to hold the Boveda packs.

MSRP: $1,275

Production: Regular Production

Release Date: July 2021

The OpusX Society Coffee Mugs

I’m not really a coffee drinker, so this does little for me.

MSRP: $42 (Pair of 2, $84)

Production: Regular Production

Release Date: July 2021

The OpusX Society Glencarin Glasses

I also am not a huge fan of drinking out of Glencarin glasses, which tends to be awkward.

MSRP: $44.75 (Set of 4, $179)

Production: Regular Production

Release Date: July 2021

The OpusX Society Rocks Glasses

I do like drinking out of rocks glasses, so third time’s a charm?

MSRP: $44.50 (Pair of 2, $89)

Production: Regular Production

Release Date: July 2021

The original version of this story referred to the cutter as “EDC4” it is “EBC-4.”

Charlie Minato

I am an editor and co-founder of halfwheel.com/Rueda Media, LLC. I previously co-founded and published TheCigarFeed, one of the two predecessors of halfwheel. I have written about the cigar industry for more than a decade, covering everything from product launches to regulation to M&A. In addition, I handle a lot of the behind-the-scenes stuff here at halfwheel. I enjoy playing tennis, watching boxing, falling asleep to the Le Mans 24, wearing sweatshirts year-round and eating gyros. echte liebe.