Baltic Outlook January 2013

JANUARY 2013

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8 Editorial Staff Chief Editor: llze Pole / e: ilze@frankshouse.lv Editor: Ieva Nora Fīrere / e: ieva@frankshouse.lv Copy editor: Kārlis Roberts Freibergs Design: Marika Štrāle Layout: Inta Kraukle Cover: Alamy

Baltic Outlook is published

by SIA Frank’s House Stabu 17, Riga, LV 1011, Latvia ph: +37167293970 w: frankshouse.lv / e: franks@frankshouse.lv Director: Eva Dandzberga e: eva@frankshouse.lv Advertising managers: Indra Indraše e: indra@frankshouse.lv / m: +37129496966 Ieva Birzniece e: ieva.birzniece@frankshouse.lv m: +37126416866

Check out Baltic Outlook’s profile on Facebook The opinions expressed in this magazine are those of the authors and/or persons interviewed and do not necessarily reflect the views of airBaltic AS and the editors at Frank’s House SIA. Advertisers or their representatives assume full responsibility for the content of their advertisements, and for ensuring that this content corresponds with the laws and other normative acts of the Republic of Latvia. All rights reserved. No part of this magazine may be reproduced in any form without the written permission of the publisher.

Printed at Poligrāfijas grupa Mūkusala, Latvia, phone (+371) 67063187

© Peter Farago & Ingela Klemetz-Farago

CONTENTS / JANUARY

Robert’s thought The best bit is at the end

10

City icons A market with flair

12

Agenda January 2013

18

Review New year, new books, new journeys

20

Four must-sees in Berlin

22

People Inese Ozola

24

Style 23 shades of white

26

Gear Nordic fundamentals

28

Thing of the month Notebook

30

Design Dutch designer Hella Jongerius

32

Your next destination: Brussels

42

Interview Ingela Klemetz-Farago and Peter Farago

48

Travel Sweden in the spotlight

66

Gadgets Latest inventions for 2013

68

Cars The new Range Rover

74

Food & drink in Riga and Tallinn

77

airBaltic news

Read Baltic Outlook on your iPad! Download free of charge from App Store.

Welcome aboard

Martin Alexander Gauss Chief Executive Officer

Dear Customer, We expect 2013 to be an exciting year. Our success over the past year in turning airBaltic around has been encouraging, and we will firmly stick to this approach when defining our future.

We have been concentrating on popular high-demand routes and added frequencies to 12 destinations in Europe and the CIS already this winter. At the same time, we have decreased flying on low-demand routes, which has made aircraft available for service to new attractive destinations, without actually increasing the total size of our operations. We are delighted to introduce six new destinations for the coming summer season – Prague (Czech Republic), Heviz-Balaton (Hungary), Larnaca (Cyprus), Rijeka (Croatia), Olbia (Italy), and Malta. We have designed the schedule to offer convenient travel between these destinations and Riga, and beyond to airports in the Baltics, Scandinavia, Russia, and the CIS. Furthermore, we continue to improve the schedules and structure of our network of 60 destinations in Europe, Middle East, Russia and the CIS. This effort will shorten connection times in Riga for faster travel, increase flight frequencies on highly demanded routes, and will help us to offer single-day trips to more and more cities, and will allow you to be more flexible with your time at your destination. On top of this convenience and flexibility, we also improve our aircraft utilisation by serving the same amount of flights with fewer aircraft. This enhanced efficiency helps us to better control costs and maintain our price leadership that we are known for.

And... did you know that every 15 seconds, at least one BalticMiles loyalty card is used across Europe and Russia?

Thank you for flying airBaltic,

Yours, Martin Alexander Gauss

BALTIC OUTLOOK / JANUARY 2013 / 7

Text by Robert Cottrell, owner of Robert’s Books Photo by Reinis Hofmanis, f64

DETAILS / ROBERT’S THOUGHT

JANUARY

I am

The best bit is at the end

passing through the U-bend of life.

Which doesn’t sound very attractive, I know.

But if your first thought is to call for a plumber, then don’t worry. It’s mostly good news, and here’s how it comes about.

During the past decade or so, politicians and economists have become a bit less fixated by national wealth, and started thinking more about other aspects of life.

Instead of assuming that money makes people happy, they’ve been asking people how happy they feel, and then trying to work out why. The logic here is that, once governments know what makes you happy, they can give you more of it.

For me, the most striking result from research in America and Europe is the correlation between happiness and age.

On average, we’re very happy in our teenage years, but then we get steadily more miserable in our early 20s, and gloomier still in our late 30s and 40s, to hit a rock bottom in the early 50s.

After which – spoiler alert – the feeling of happiness rises sharply again, and goes on rising into old age. By your late 60s, you are happier even than you were at 18.

Happiness, in other words, is U-shaped.

High at the 18 end, and low in the middle.

I’m delighted to hear it. Assuming that I’m an average person – a proposition that in most circumstances I would want to contest, but which rather suits me here – then I’m now at the bottom of the U-bend. I am as

“Older people have fewer rows and come up with better solutions to conflict. They are better at controlling their emotions, better at accepting misfortune and less prone to anger” glum as I will ever be. From here to eternity, I go on getting happier.

It’s tempting to say that these studies must be wrong – that the people who compile them are asking the wrong questions, or misunderstanding the answers. Historically we have looked upon happy old age as a very rare privilege, not a normal state of

affairs. Happiness studies are a new field.

Mistakes are likely, even inevitable.

There again, I find the explanations advanced for late-life happiness encouraging, even persuasive. According to The Economist: “Older people have fewer rows and come up with better solutions to conflict. They are better at controlling their emotions, better at accepting misfortune and less prone to anger… They come to accept their strengths and weaknesses”.

So it’s not that my life will get better, but that I will get less demanding, less ambitious, and better at rubbing along with other people.

I can buy that. I can also see that a thesis like this becomes self-fulfilling. If I believe that I will get happier as I get older, then very probably I will ease up a bit, lower my demands and my stress levels, and, indeed, become more happy as a result.

Best of all, this gives me a new way of looking at the young. Lately I have been prone to envy all those preposterously clever and healthy people in their 20s and 30s bursting out into the world. But now, equipped with my U-shaped view of life, I can feel a certain patronising sympathy for the increasing miseries and frustrations that lie ahead of them.

It is the young who should be envying me. And what better thought than that to put a spring in my middle-aged step for the New Year? BO

DETAILS / CITY ICONS

TEXT BY IEVA NORA FIRERE | PHOTO COURTESY OF F64

A market with flair Fly to Riga with airBaltic from

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Riga Central Market Opened in 1930 Occupies 5.7 ha emains one of the largest R markets in Europe avilions open daily from P 08:00 – 17:00 Nēģu iela 7, Riga

The five main pavilions of Riga’s Central Market look like upsidedown letter ‘U’s and stand out prominently in the city’s skyline.

They extend almost to the edge of the Daugava River, where their wavelike pattern is taken up by the five arches of Riga’s Railway Bridge. That, which now looks like a harmonious and well-planned assembly of arch-like structures was initially put together by sheer and rational necessity.

Soon after Latvia declared its independence in 1918, the newly proclaimed capital city began to address the acute need for a clean and well-organized marketplace.

The marketplace also had to be large, as numerous food enterprises were springing up and Riga was experiencing a postwar period of economic growth. Riga’s city planners

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decided to recycle five former zeppelin hangars that the occupying German forces had abandoned in Latvia’s western region of Kurzeme. Exceeding 37metres in height, the hangars were too tall for the market’s needs, so only the top portions were used and embedded on specially constructed pavilion buildings made of stone and reinforced concrete.

This is by no means one of the loudest marketplaces in the world – far from it. Although many of the vendors and purchasers are of exuberant Slavic background, the temperament here is reservedly Baltic. Nobody will grab you by the sleeve and try to push their products on you. You will usually only be addressed after something has caught your eye and you have stopped to take a look at it.

Begin your tour of the market at the dairy pavilion (piena paviljons), where you will occasionally be treated to scenes right out of a historic postcard. Well-kept middleaged women stand by Sovietera scales from the 1980s.

Nearby, tourists crowd around a counter covered with blocks of black, sticky paste labelled “hemp butter” in English.

This local product made from roasted and ground hempseeds is popular with visitors to Latvia.

Each of the market’s five pavilions is notable in one way or another. The vegetable pavilion stands out among the other four – which are dedicated to meat, dairy, gastronomy and fish, respectively – with the most recent facelift. It offers numerous varieties of sauerkraut, a popular dish in Latvia during the cold, winter months.

The fish pavilion is perhaps the most lively.

Fresh and smoked lampreys, a local delicacy, are offered from practically every stall.

Although most of the catch has come straight from the Baltic Sea and been brought in from producers in such coastal villages as Ragaciems and Salacgrīva, some of it is also prepared on the spot in the Riga market’s vast underground labyrinths.

Your shopping bag will likely be filled with various delectable wares at this point, so head back to the milk pavilion. There, at a small stall with a slightly slanted counter, you can buy some of the best pončiki in town. Costing only 13 santims apiece, these cherryfilled, oil-baked pastries will be just what you need to round off your market shopping trip. BO

Special thanks to our experienced guide, Juris Berže

One great way to explore the Riga Central Market is in the company of a shopping list, while another way is with a guide, since the place is just as much about culture and atmosphere as it is about products and sales

DETAILS / LOCAL AGENDA An evening with Kārlis Lācis. Night for orchestra, choir and soprano Excerpts from the ballet Oskar Strok. Riga Tango Great Guild Hall (Lielā Ģilde), Riga / January 30

© JAnis Deinats

JANUARY / 2013

PUBLICITY PHOTOS

What is Latvian tango? It has been featured in music by Latvianborn composers Oskar Strok and Aleksandrs Okolo-Kulaks, who were inspired by the legendary Argentinian tango music composer Ástor Piazzolla. Nowadays, Arturs Maskats and Kārlis Lācis are continuing to compose works inspired by tango music.

The latter, Kārlis Lācis, is one of the most popular and sought-after Latvian stage and film composers.

At the end of this month, he will be getting together with a group of like-minded colleagues to take a look at non-academic music from a strictly academic angle. His music draws listeners with its vivid melodies, distinctive harmonies and aptly characterized moods. The audience will hear incidental theatre music assume a new breadth and depth, interpreted and performed by a symphony orchestra.

Tickets at www.bilesuparadize.lv More information at www.lnso.lv

Roberta Gambarini

Roberta Gambarini, Raimonds Pauls and the Latvian Radio Big Band Latvian National Opera, Riga / January 28 The rebirth of the Latvian Radio Big Band, which had kept quiet for the past 16 years (though originally founded in 1966), has been one of the highlights of the Latvian music scene in 2012. Brought together under the supervision of Māris Briežkalns, the patron of the legendary Rīgas Ritmi (Riga Rythms) festival, the Big Band’s re-initiation took place in December, in a performance with American jazz vocalist Kurt Elling. This year begins with a no less stunning event, featuring Italian jazz vocalist Roberta Gambarini and legendary Latvian composer and pianist Raimonds Pauls. A dynamic and virtuoso performer, Gambarini draws rave reviews and enthusiastic fan support wherever she performs. Her North American debut Roberta Gambarini: Easy to Love was nominated for a 2007 Grammy Award in the Best Jazz Vocal Album category. In 2010, her last album So In Love was also nominated for a Grammy in the same category.

Tickets at www.ticketservice.lv More information at: www.rigasritmi.lv

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V, 2012, oil on canvas

Ēriks Apaļais. Words personal exhibition kim? Contemporary Art Centre, Riga / January 25 – March 3 Ēriks Apaļais (1981) is a young Latvian painter, whose creative career has been closely connected with Germany. For six years he has been attending the Hochschule für Bildende Künste (University of Fine Arts) in Hamburg as a student of Prof. Andreas Slominski, while

holding exhibitions in some of the most prestigious art galleries in Germany and receiving such prizes as ars viva 11/12 – awarded to young artists with links to that country. Apaļais’ exhibition in Riga examines the link between painting and language, as for him, the creative process is like a search for words in the desire to express oneself.

Maskavas iela 12/1 More information at www.kim.lv

DETAILS / LOCAL AGENDA Voldemārs Johansons.

Organiskie raksti / Attractors personal exhibition Arsenāls Exhibition Hall, Riga / Until January 27

Meanders, 2011

Voldemārs Johansons (1980) is one of the most interesting Latvian contemporary artists to have gained international recognition. One of the themes that he examines is the creation of forms and patterns in nature, which he has also extensively studied in his earlier works. The creation of structures also occupies the artist’s attention in Organiskie raksti / Attractors, an exhibition that demanded thorough and extensive preparation. Nature scientists and computer programmers played an important role in creating the end result, and it would not be an exaggeration to call Johansons’ latest project a lengthy biological research study, with the results put on display in the form of installations, sculptures and works in graphic art.

More information at www.lnmm.lv

D E V E L O P M E N T O P P O R T U N I T Y I N T H E B A LT I C S

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DETAILS / EUROPEAN EVENTS

In association with www.anothertravelguide.com | Publicity photos

Barcelona

© Jackson Pollock/VEGAP 2012

© Helmut Newton Estate

Jackson Pollock, Joan Miró Foundation / Until February 24

Helmut Newton, British Vogue, London 1967

Berlin

Coursing around his huge canvases as in a trance, the Abstract Expressionist classic Jackson Pollock (1912-1956), led by some unknown hand, liberally splashed paint onto his works, creating the feeling that his whole body was doing the painting. This is certainly one of the most powerful images in 20th-century art history. Initially not a particularly well-known artist, Pollock was discovered

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by Peggy Guggenheim, who organized his first solo exhibition at Venice’s Museo Correr. Pollock gradually gave up a typical artist’s usual arsenal, including brushes and palettes. Instead, he turned to painting with a stick, a hard painter’s brush, his hands or simply to pouring and forcing paint onto the canvas. His works don’t contain specific images, but are dominated by an energetically charged chaos.

Pollock spent his whole life battling with his demons, which he never did conquer. He died in a car accident at the age of 44.

Alongside Pollock, one can also see the works of Yves Klein, Bruce Nauman, Andy Warhol and Saburo Murakami at the exhibition, illustrating an era that breached the borders between art and performance.

Parc de Montjuïc www.fundaciomiro-bcn.org

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Helmut Newton: World Without Men / Archives de Nuit, Helmut Newton Foundation at the Museum of Photography / Until May 19 Helmut Newton is a fashion photography legend. He continues to be unparalleled in his own way, as none of his other colleagues was able to push the boundaries of fashion photography as far as Newton succeeded in doing during the 1970s. His women, wearing high heels, balance seductively on the edge of fashion, sex, money and power, knowing full well that right there, not far away, is the abyss. The boundary between pleasure and pain sometimes tends to be quite delicate, but Newton’s subjects don’t even entertain the thought of stumbling. They would rather push the spirit of daring just that little bit further.

The Helmut Newton Foundation in Berlin is now showing two legendary books by Newton in an exhibition format - World Without Men and Archives de Nuit. The first came about in 1984, bringing together fashion photographs that Newton took from the 1960s to the 1980s in the most diverse places (including Paris, Saint Tropez, Los Angeles, Milan, Berlin and London). Archives de Nuit, for its part, is a black-and-white photo story of Paris, revealing Newton as an outstanding portrait, nude, landscape and still life photographer.

Jebensstraße 2 www.helmut-newton-foundation.org

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Stockholm Moment – Le Corbusier’s Secret Laboratory Moderna Museet / January 19 – April 18 Modernist classic Le Corbusier (1887-1965) is considered to be one of the most influential architects of all time. However, while architecture is certainly the most striking feature of his work, it isn’t the only aspect of his extensive legacy. Painting also had an equally significant

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role in Le Corbusier’s life. At the centre of the new exhibition is the architect’s ceaselessly creative fluctuation between two seemingly differing impulses – the adulation of mechanical objects and searches for poetic form. One of the exhibition’s highlights is the opportunity to see his comparatively rarely exhibited paintings and sculptures.

Skeppsholmen www.modernamuseet.se

DETAILS / EUROPEAN EVENTS

The Dance of Life, 1899-1900

Oslo

* Price available for bookings at least 5 months in advance

Celebrating Edvard Munch’s 150th “No longer shall I paint interiors and people reading, or women knitting. I will paint living people who breathe and feel and love”, said Edvard Munch (1863-1944), a fascinating Norwegian artist who pioneered Northern Expressionism.

In 2013, the world will celebrate his 150th birthday with an extensive programme of exhibitions and events. This is a great occasion to discover Munch beyond his most famous and iconic work, the legendary Scream.

One of the central stopping points in the celebratory marathon of events is the Munch Museum in Oslo, which houses more than 1100 of the artist’s paintings, 4500 drawings and 18000 graphics in its collection. The museum will host a travelling exhibition named Modern Eye until February 17, offering

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visitors the chance to see more than 60 paintings, 20 works on paper, 50 photographs and a number of films on the artist. Meanwhile, on March 1, the museum’s doors will open for the From Munch to Slettemark exhibition, showing the works of a private Norwegian collection to the public for the first time. This showing will focus on Nordic and Scandinavian art in the period from 1900 until 1960.

The city of Oslo has also created a special Munch itinerary, which includes addresses where Munch lived, as well as places that inspired him. For example, the Grand Café, which was also popular with playwright Henrik Ibsen, is portrayed in Munch’s painting Henrik Ibsen at the Grand Café (1898).

The full Munch anniversary-year programme of events can be viewed here: www.munch150.no

London Constable, Gainbourough, Turner and the Making of Landscape, Royal Academy of Art / Until February 17 This exhibition presents the creative work of three outstanding representatives of British landscape painting – John Constable (1776-1837), William Turner (1789-1862) and Thomas Gainsborough (1727-1788), while providing an insight into the further development of this art form in Great Britain.

All three painters were members of the Royal Academy of Art. The works by this great British trio strikingly reveal the changes that

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landscape painting experienced during the 18th and 19th century.

Even though Gainsborough’s portraits were “hot items” and only a few of his landscapes found buyers, they are still considered to be a significant part of his creative work.

Turner was a tempestuous product of Romanticism. He was interested in nature as an element, with the end result arousing an almost shockingly sentient impression, portrayed through the use of bold colours and brushwork. Constable was a sentimental Romantic and one can sense the presence of nostalgia in his landscapes.

Burlington House Piccadilly www.royalacademy.org.uk

John Constable R.A., The Leaping Horse, 1825

Photo: © John Hammond © Royal Academy of Arts

Photo: © Børre Høstland, National Museum

In association with www.anothertravelguide.com | Publicity photos

DETAILS / REVIEW

TEXT BY Roger NORUM | PUBLICITY PHOTOS

New year, new books, new journeys These just-released titles are guaranteed to start your year off with a severe case of wanderlust

Dangerous work: Diary of an Arctic adventure

Sir Arthur Conan Doyle

Steve McCurry

The iconic photographs E-books be damned: nothing can compete with this large-format photo book, a collection of stunning images from one of the world’s most beloved travel photographers. McCurry makes genius use of light, form and composition to show a window into other worlds. From images of children and farmers, pilgrims and fishermen, he explores life lived around the world at its street corners, temples and mountainsides.

Extended picture captions at back. Breathtaking.

British Library www.publishing.bl.uk University Of Chicago Press www.press.uchicago.edu 30 EUR

There can be no better bedtime reading this year than this gorgeous travelogue, penned by the creator of Sherlock Holmes when he was just 20 years old. Doyle spent half a year as a ship’s surgeon on an Arctic whaler, and his adventurous journal – which has been uniquely reproduced here as a facsimile photographed from the original parchments – documents the exciting Golden Age of seafaring with humour and daring.

Lonely Planet’s best in travel 2013

Phaidon, www.phaidon.com 50 EUR

Lonely Planet, www.lonelyplanet.com 12.35 EUR

Commemorating Lonely Planet’s (LP’s) 40th anniversary, this lavishly photographed book compiles the recommendations of LP authors, editors and the online Thorn Tree community to get you up close with some unforgettable travel experiences. In addition to great individual destinations – many of them on airBaltic’s route map – you’ll find a collection of themed holidays that centre around ideas such as bike hire schemes, elephant rides and, um, snakes.

Text by Adam Jacot de Boinod, author of The Meaning of Tingo and Other Extraordinary Words from Around the World, published by Penguin Books | Illustration by Inga Briede

Julgransplundring (Swedish) — the removal of all the decorations from the Christmas tree

Fully Furnished and Serviced Offices Prime location in the Central Business District Class A Office building Immediate availability – move in today Flexible terms Convenient meeting rooms Underground parking Virtual Offices Professional management

Call +371 6703 5200 The Meaning of Tingo is a compilation of extraordinary words and expressions from around the world that have no equivalent in English. Adam Jacot de Boinod’s passion is scouring the planet for language oddities and every month, Baltic Outlook features one of the many amusing terms that he has come across in his travels.

info@valdemaracentrs.lv | www.valdemaracentrs.lv 21 K. Valdemara Street, Riga, LV 1010 Owned and managed by BPT | www.bptam.com

Berlin,

Germany

DETAILS / Four MUST-SEES

TEXT BY MATTHEW HIRTES | PUBLICITY PHOTOS AND BY CORBIS / SCANPIX

Katz Orange

Little Black Book

Berlin seemed doomed to an eternal game of catch-up on the gastronomy front, its restaurants rarely talked about in the hushed tones reserved for eateries in Spanish cities such as Barcelona and San Sebastián.

However, with Katz Orange, which opened in January 2012, Berlin has made a quantum leap forward. Sourcing organic ingredients from local and regional producers wherever possible, the restaurant can host the ideal dinner party, as its menu caters to meat-loving, fish-fancying, vegetarian and even vegan guests. The chef behind the playful cuisine is Daniel Finke, an emerging talent and a name worth remembering.

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Bergstraße 22 www.katzorange.com

KingSize

Kreuzberg Looking for cool Berlin? Feel the chill by going local in the hipster Kreuzberg area, rather than having your wallet hit hard in the tourist traps around Alexanderplatz.

Kreuzberg, or as natives dub it: X-Berg, is one of Berlin’s most vibrant neighbourhoods. Boasting an enviable central location, its history is one of immigration (predominately from Turkey), punk rock (Iggy Pop played the S036 club

in the 1970s), and hip hop music (introduced by US servicemen when there was still a Berlin Wall). Germans rarely drink on an empty stomach. Line yours with a visit to Mustafa’s kebab stall on Mehringdamm (www.mustafas.de).

The Germans are famously known for irony rather than humour, if the name of this miniscule Mitte dive is anything to go by – unless the owners were referring to a king-size bed. A hedonist insomniac’s dream, the club’s doors swing open at 9 PM and reluctantly close at 7 AM. DJs, playing the latest and greatest cuts in disco, house and techno, make sure that the party makes it all the way through to dawn. Marvel at the creations by upcoming artists in this bohemian locale.

Friedrichstraße 112b www.kingsizebar.de

Kottbusser Tor station on the U1 and U8 lines, Mehringdamm station on the U6 and U7.

SO36 at Oranienstraße 190, www.so36.de

Auguststraße This 900-metre-long street in the Mitte district is a hive of galleries, nightclubs and restaurants. A working-class East German district prior to the dismantling of the Berlin Wall, August Street reinvented itself during the 1990s, becoming Berlin’s premier arts destination in the process. Beat a retreat from its buzz by popping into do you read me?! (Auguststraße 28, www.doyoureadme.de).

This bookshop with the friendliest and most informative staff stocks magazines and more from all around the world, covering everything from design to fashion to society. Elsewhere, Clärchens Ballhaus (Auguststraße 24, www.ballhaus.de) furthers Berlin’s claim as Germany’s 24-hour city. Enjoy an alfresco coffee during the day or watch the evening party get started by a crowd ranging from teenagers to octogenarians.

Rosenthaler Platz or Weinmeisterstraße on the U8 line

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DETAILS / PEOPLE

Of love, sexuality and femininity “The most beautiful clothes that can dress a woman are the arms of the man she loves.”

This quote by Yves Saint-Laurent is a favourite of up-and-coming Latvian designer Inese Ozola (34).

While Inese is self-taught and new in the field of design, she certainly knows how to make an entrance. The most recent example is her new brand Amoralle, a bold statement of female sexuality that has brought Inese admirers from across the globe within a very short time 22 / AIRBALTIC.COM

TEXT BY KARINA OBORUNE | PUBLICITY PHOTOS

When it comes to their own outfits, the key figures of the fashion empire often hide behind something plain and preferably black.

Amoralle’s creator is not that kind of designer. She wears red lipstick, high heels and impressive cuts.

Inese is as bright as her brand, which over the past four years has grown from the SockBox stockings and lingerie store into the Amoralle luxury design house.

Amoralle is a cross between the Italian amore (love) and English immoral. As Inese puts it, this is a story of love, sexuality and femininity, all played out obscurely, since a woman should always be a secret. There’s no better compliment to Inese’s work than a client who says she feels more feminine when wearing Amoralle women’s wear.

And Inese has quite an arsenal to enhance a woman’s beauty: lace- decorated lingerie, fine velvet bodysuits decorated with Swarovski pearls, tempting stockings held up by suspenders and silky deep-décolleté nightgowns.

After a hard day’s work, business is put miles away by slipping into a silky nightgown, Inese says of one of her collection darlings, Fragile Jasmin, which is delicately trimmed with golden lace.

It’s aristocratic as much in appearance as in price (about 680 EUR), with less decorated versions of the nightgown being one third of this sum, but still impressively romantic and feminine.

For Inese, fashion shows are always a reference

point. “You’ve got minutes to say what’s been on your mind for the past six months”.

Despite the random sleep before the show, Inese loves the preparation process, which she finds invigorating. The biographies of wellknown fashion figures serve as a source of inspiration to her. For Inese it’s not a story of brands but of the personalities behind them, who share one common trait – daring to flow against the stream.

“Only strong personalities reach what they desire,” Inese says. Being a selftaught designer, she has received her own portion of scepticism and disbelief, so she really knows what she’s talking about.

As for the future, Amoralle’s creator is superstitious and isn’t yet ready to reveal what we can expect from her next. However, one

Inese Ozola

thing is clear – Amoralle’s first runway has lead it onto the global fashion stage, with industry heavyweights like the Italians getting interested in this Latvian statement of femininity. BO www.amoralle.com

DETAILS / STYLE

23 shades of white Styling by Agnese NarNicka, One Wolf Photo by Gatis Gierts, f64 Photographed at Paviljons, Domina Shopping, Riga 1

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1/ Purse by H&M, 29.95 LVL 2/ Collar by Vita Radziņa, Paviljons, 9.80 LVL 3/ Tutu skirt by Leny Tomy Factory, Paviljons, 35 LVL 4/ Sweater, H&M, Galerija Centrs, 29.95LVL 5/ Scarf by Walk With Dog, Paviljons, 21 LVL 6/ Scarf, Zara, 16.95 LVL 7/ Socks by Walk With Dog, Paviljons, 7 LVL 8/ Hat, Zara, 5.95 LVL 9/ Hat by Sleepyhead, Paviljons, 14 LVL 10/ Leather bracelets by RR, Paviljons, 15 LVL apiece 11/ Sweater, Zara, 35 LVL 12/ Candle, Riija, 14.90 LVL 13/ Milk, Daugava, 0.89 LVL 14/ Cup, Riija, 13.50 LVL 15/ Hand soap by PienSpa, Riija, 6.70 LVL 16/ Leggings by QooQoo, Paviljons, 30.80 LVL 17/ Shirt, Zara, 25.95 LVL 18/ Napkin, Riija, LVL 4.85 19/ Children’s polo shirt by PAADE, Paviljons, 21 LVL 20/ Sheep by PATE, Paviljons, 7 LVL 21/ Zefīrs candy by Laima at Prisma, 0.90 LVL per package, 22/ Eyeglasses by Max &CO, Pasaules Optika, 73 LVL 23/ Soy wax glass container candle, Paviljons, 9 LVL

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Addresses in Riga: Paviljons, Prisma and Daugava at Domina Shopping, Ieriķu iela 3 | Riija, Tērbatas iela 6/8 | Zara, Tērbatas iela 30 | H&M and Pasaules Optika at Galerija Centrs, Audēju iela 16

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MIXED USE DEVELOPMENT OPPORTUNITY IN VILNIUS DEVELOPMENT HIGHLIGHTS • Land area – 19 055 sqm • Scope of development (GBA) – - Total net areas – - Residential (GSA) – - Commercial (GLA) – • Parking planned – 450 spaces • Detailed plan approved

38 300 sqm 33 500 sqm 16 500 sqm 17 000 sqm

LOCATION

DETAILED PLAN REGULATIONS

PROJECT DETAILS

Located in central Vilnius, just 3 minutes walk from the most important street of the city, Gediminas Ave., and only 10 minutes walk from Vilnius Old Town.

Fully developed infrastructure with public transportation stops, several kindergartens, schools and prime shopping streets. In addition, shops restaurants and cafes operate nearby.

• Intensity – 2,1 • Density – 60 % • Height – 5 floors (20m) • Purpose of use – residential and commercial • Date of approval – Autumn 2012

Approximately 17 000 sqm GLA of multipurpose commercial building for B+ office and/or hotel. On the left part of the site, a mid/high level residential complex with total of 16 500 sqm of GSA is planned.

CONTACTS: GIEDRIUS RAGAISIS Head of Advice, Lithuania + 370 612 16 408 + 371 6750 8400 g.ragaisis@newsec.lt www.newsecbaltics.com

THE FULL SERVICE PROPERTY HOUSE

Exclusive adviser

DETAILS / GEAR

TEXT BY ROGER NORUM | PUBLICITY PHOTOS

Nordic fundamentals “There is no such thing as bad weather, only bad clothing” – Scandinavian proverb When I was a kid, if you wanted to stay warm in the winter, you would put on an itchy woollen cap and scarf, don an ill-fitting, hand-me-down coat and head outside to grin and bear it. Since then, a gaggle of fancy cold-weather technologies has made its way into our closets. One German company now even weaves silver threads into its fabrics, which generate a warm electric current when hooked up to a battery pack. However, in Scandinavia, where it’s been cold for longer than humans have been alive, the best local outfitters still stick to the basics, adding a dash of modern textile know-how to organic, natural materials to keep you toasty all season long.

Bergans of Norway

Haglöfs

Woolpower

After pioneering the first anatomical rucksack in 1908 and outfitting Sir Edmund Hillary’s ascent of Everest half a decade later, this Norwegian outdoor company has taken its gear to the masses. The company now integrates its trendy outdoor products with Dermizax technology, a waterproof, windproof, durable and highly stretchable laminate with doubled perspiration wicking that allows moisture through with minimal condensation – in other words, you’ll stay dry but won’t sweat it up. Another Bergans textile, TecnoWool, combines traditional organic wool with modern fabrics, reinforcing the excellent heat-preserving qualities of wool, better regulating body temperature and transporting moisture away, thereby increasing thermal insulation.

Based out of Avesta, Sweden, this adventure outfitter makes full use of several versions (Ripstop and Elastane) of multi-layer Gore-Tex, the waterproof, breathable form of Teflon that makes fabrics impenetrable to liquid while still allowing water vapour molecules to pass through. The company’s best jackets – the revolutionary Cirque and Endo, for example – mix a soft shell with the properties of a hard shell and a ski jacket, integrating a hybrid brushed mesh and flannel lining, with a durable waterrepellent treatment that further improves water shedding. If that’s not enough to tempt you, some 35 percent of all of Haglöfs’ Ökotexcertified fabrics are made of recycled or recyclable materials.

This Swedish group teamed up with scientists half a century ago to produce tubular-knit thermals for the Swedish military. Today, Woolpower’s functional, thin and multi-layerable clothing keeps the annual builders of the Jukkasjärvi Ice Hotel (see page 60) very warm. Woolpower’s gear melds Merino wool with a polyamide nylon that results in a strong, elastic, moisture-resistant and quick-drying blend named Ullfrotte Original.

The outside remains smooth, while the inside fabric contains tiny, finely-designed, seamless crevices that trap heat against your skin. The company sources its wool entirely from southern Patagonia, guaranteeing the ethical treatment of the sheep that give of themselves so that we might stay warm.

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Ipe Cavalli

Ego

Roberto Cavalli

Angelo Cappellini

Poliform

Zanaboni

Angelo Cappellini Pico

Giorgio Collection

Poliform

Saint Babila

DETAILS / THING OF THE MONTH

TEXT BY LAURA KENINS | PUBLICITY PHOTO

Noted It’s the New Year, so time to turn over a new leaf, perhaps a paper one, and keep that New Year’s resolution to write down all of your appointments or start a journal.

By keeping a notebook close at hand, you’re in good company: many great thinkers have sworn by them. Charles Darwin’s notebooks combined shopping lists and observations on species, while Benjamin Franklin kept a list of 13 virtues to live by. Leonard Cohen and his notebooks are so connected that souvenir merchandise for his last tour included a notebook with his picture and a song lyric.

If you can’t decide between a day planner and a notebook, then the Latvian paper designer Purpurs frees you from that choice with its Fluxbook, a notebook designed for a year, more or less. Start whichever day you like, fill in the dates yourself and use it for your diary or to-do lists. The Fluxbook concept is a play on words – ‘flux’ for flexibility and ‘lux’ from the Latin for light. Even if you don’t keep a list of virtues, you might be inspired to with this year’s notebook artists focusing on the theme of light (“sacred light, world light”). A religious theme connects the three available journals (in red, brown or gold).

Three Latvian artists were selected to design the collection. The red notebook was designed by textile artist Diāna Dimza-Dimme. Taking a Soviet-era key cabinet as her inspiration, the icon-like images feature the Virgin Mary as a “somewhat primordial female figure,” the artist says, “a story about a woman, through whom the world comes to life; the key to life. ” With such an inspiration, the notebook should be ready to hold your story, or the keys to your life, too. BO www.purpurs.com

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OUTLOOK / DESIGN

Publicity photos

Dutch

Hella Jongerius: one of the most influential female designers in the world

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designer Hella Jongerius has become famous for her ability to blend the industrial with craft, the traditional with the contemporary and art with technology.

Lately, she has begun a mission to change the design industry’s attitude and use of colour. By highlighting the paucity of the industrial colour palette, Hella wants to include livelier colours that change in the light.

Thus, in 2005, Vitra hired her as a colour consultant. Hella’s first decision was to begin producing the Eames plastic chair in three different shades of white. She has helped the Camper shoe company to lure clients away from the usual shades of black and brown, and also produces her own colours with the Swiss company KT.COLOR. The designer has collaborated with Porzellan Manufaktur Nymphenburg, creating the Nymphenburg Sketches service, as well as the biggest part of the company’s Four Seasons collection. The most famous part of this collaboration is a series of Animal Bowls. By choosing five out of the 700 animal figurines in the Nymphenburg archive, Hella put them in bowls, adding various patterns and ornaments.

Hella Jongerius was born in 1963 in De Meern, not far from Utrecht. She started studying industrial design at the Eindhoven Design Academy in 1988. After graduating from the academy in 1993, the young designer presented her Bath Mat at the Milan Furniture Fair with Droog Design.

In 2000, she created her own design company, Jongeriuslab, in Rotterdam, producing her own projects, as well those for such clients as Maharam (New York), Royal Tichelaar Makkum (Netherlands), Vitra (Switzerland) and Ikea (Sweden).

Her work has been exhibited in such museums and galleries as the Cooper Hewitt National Design Museum (New York), MoMA (New York), Design Museum (London), Galerie KREO (Paris) and Moss Gallery (New York).

Her new creative space and office can be found in a city that’s as eclectic, versatile, colourful and original as her own work: Berlin. Jongeriuslab is located on Kastanienallee 21 in the fashionable area of Prenzlauer Berg, which is home to some of Berlin’s most stylish and extraordinary art and design galleries. BO

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YOUR NEXT DESTINATION

The Brussels comic book tour Text by Una Meistere, www.anothertravelguide.com Photos by Ainars Erglis

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YOUR NEXT DESTINATION

If

Bad luck, somebody has already taken the Anothertravelguide brochure about Brussels, but don’t worry, all the information is also available at ANOTHERTRAVELGUIDE.COM in cooperation with airBaltic.

I start by telling you that Brussels is truly an unbelievably fascinating metropolis, then you’ll probably think I’ve lost my marbles. If you tell someone that you’re headed for Brussels, the usual reaction is sympathy and perhaps a thought like: ‘Can’t you find anything better to do?’ Despite these prejudices and a reputation for being one of Europe’s most boring cities, I’ve always taken great pleasure in my visits to the Belgian and European capital. Perhaps it’s because Brussels makes you use your imagination, instead of inundating you with a flood of impressions like Paris or London. The French and British capitals carry you off with their aesthetic, artistic and culinary intensity, whilst Brussels makes you work to get under the skin of its stereotypes. As a child, I loved those workbooks that asked you to connect a series of dots to come up with a drawing. When I came across a book that had similar dots marking 39 spots on a map of Brussels – each pointing to a large mural covered with comics, it seemed a perfect way to get to know the city from a completely different angle.

Brussels is known as the capital of comics, and has been the home of a museum called the Belgian Comic Strip Centre since 1989. The museum is in a very special structure – a warehouse designed in 1906 by Belgium’s most renowned practitioner of Art Nouveau, Victor Horta. It was built for the Waucquez family, which had made a fortune by wholesaling textiles. Now, along with its permanent exhibits, the museum hosts special exhibitions from time to time.

It also features a fabulous comic book store and often invites the creators to attend book openings. In the place of an autograph, you can sometimes get an impromptu comic drawn in your book. Comic strip art developed swiftly in Belgium after the Second World War, reaching an artistic apogee in the 1950s. There are two distinct schools of drawing – French and Flemish.

Hergé was the primary exponent of the French style, creating the legendary Tintin. Willy Vandersteen was the most famous member of the Flemish school. His best-known creations were Suske en Wiske, or Spike and Suzy in English. The ‘ninth art’ is well-represented at the museum, with enlarged drawings and threedimensional models. The permanent exhibits include an excellent illustrated history of the birth of the comic book and its development.

The idea to take comics into the streets of Brussels was born in 1991, thanks to a joint initiative by the city council and the Comics Centre. Some of the ‘illustrated streets’ are fairly central, while others are hidden away in byways, adding an element of childlike surprise and delight when you discover them. Even the most jaded adult could get excited upon seeing this art.

BALTIC OUTLOOK / JANUARY 2013 / 33

YOUR NEXT DESTINATION

Rue des Chandeliers

To make the tour more intriguing, it’s better to hunt down the more central artworks later in the evening, when the streets begin to empty and hordes of tourists no longer surround the renowned statue of the urinating boy on the Rue de l’Etuve. Right near the adjacent café is the very first comic mural in Brussels – its hero is Broussaille, from a series of that name by the Belgian artist Frank Pé. He was born in the Luxembourg district of Brussels that is now home to the European Parliament. In the mural, Broussaille and a friend are crossing the street where the mural is painted. On the nearby Rue du Marché au Charbon, in a small space hidden by the café Le Lombard, another mural shows a scene from the street as it looked during the First World War. It’s taken from Francis Carin’s Opera of Death, with the hero, Victor Sackville, arriving in Brussels as a secret agent on a mission from King George V. Not far away is another early comic mural at the Rue du Bon Secours 9. In a feat of trompe-l’oeil, the artist, Tibet, shows his hero Ric Hochet blending in with the façade and cobbled street.

The most unusual street in Brussels Not far from the Rue Danseart, where the cream of Belgian design is concentrated, one will find a strange small street called the Rue des Chartreux. One of its legendary denizens is the café Greenwich, famous as a haunt of the great Surrealist René Magritte, who went there to play chess. Perhaps his real reason for coming was to try to sell his works, since he was a total loser when it came to chess.

One of the other habitués, asked why he took money and not

Dandoy – Brussels’ most legendary biscuit shop

paintings from Magritte, remarked that if Magritte painted as badly as he played chess, then he’d surely rather take the money. Because of its many chess players, the air bristling with concentration, Greenwich became known as Brussels’ quietest café in its heyday.

The old cash register can still be found by the coat check.

Apparently, the venerable machine was imported from England, since it bears a notice that payment may be in pounds sterling.

Unfortunately, chess is no longer played there. The café has since been refurbished by Robbrecht and Dae, a Belgian architectural firm. Even though the lovely Art Nouveau interior has been lovingly restored, including the glass dome of the ceiling, many observed that the soul of the establishment has been irretrievably lost. As usual, people are upset when a place that they love is altered.

Nevertheless, while the old days are gone, the Greenwich retains a unique atmosphere. It’s still worth a visit – and don’t miss the washroom downstairs, with its authentic Art Nouveau interior of black-and-white tiles and decorative steel carvings on the door leading to the men’s room – it’s the most amazing washroom in all of Belgium!

The Rue des Chartreux also features a fabulous vintage store, Gabriele Vintage. It was established by Gabriele Wolf, a well-known costume designer who was among the first creative professionals to move onto this street. Her shop, which specializes in clothing and accessories from the 1920s through the 1980s, is popular with fashion designers, theatre people, and those from the film industry. The store is full of surprises, from stunning 1920s dresses

YOUR NEXT DESTINATION

Ric Hochet mural at the Rue de Bon Secours 9

to extraordinary 1980s extravagances. The other side of the street holds an eccentric design store called Espace Bizzar. Next to that is another comic wall – this one features an angel from Yslaire’s 1980s story XX Ciel.

There are also two odd lamps or sculptures, of metal and wood. They’re five metres high and their dark metal branches are decorated with tiny light bulbs. By day, when they’re not lit, they look like something that Magritte might have come up with.

However, the most unusual sight on the Rue des Chartreux is at the very end of the street, at the intersection of the Rue du Vieux Marché. You could easily pass it by without noticing, since it fits in with the street scene so organically, especially if the day is gloomy, as it often is in a Brussels winter. It’s nothing less than a urinating dog – an ironic take on the famous urinating boy. Unlike the statue of the boy, the bronze dog known as Zinneke, which means a stray, is not surrounded by tourists snapping pictures.

The Belgian sculptor Tom Frantzen notes that the model for the dog lives in that very quarter, so you might even catch a glimpse of it. The dog artwork dates to 1998 and is the third sculpture to urinate in Brussels. The famous urinating boy known as Manneken Pis dates from 1619. He was joined in 1987 by a shameless girl named Jaenneke Pis, who is protected from passing vandals by a metal screen. Thus, Brussels has almost a whole family of statues urinating in public.

A few minutes away from Rue des Chartreux is a fabled destination for fans of Belgian fashion – the first shop opened by the conceptualist Martin Margiela, where the now global empire of the Maison Martin Margiela was born. Alhough Margiela himself announced his decision to leave the fashion industry in 2009, the house that bears his name remains faithful to his style. The store was at the centre of a storm this autumn, thanks to collaboration between the Maison Martin Margiela and the Swedish giant H&M. One of the side effects was an attack by a vandal – in a protest against the bloated luxury market, a street artist covered the white façade of the flagship store with red and black graffiti and drawings of skulls. At the end of November, the graffiti still hadn’t been painted over, the face of the historic building still looking like an Abstract Expressionist painting. The street artist, who goes under the pseudonym Kidult, remarked: “All these retail outlets have once

YOUR NEXT DESTINATION

Halles Saint-Géry

used graffiti as a commercial tool to get more money and be cool without knowing anything about the culture. I didn’t simply say hello to them. If they really like graffiti, I just gave them what they love”.

Next to the spontaneous graffiti, on the other side of the street at Rue de Flandre 109, is a legal painting – another of the comic book tour’s highlights; it’s the artist Dupa’s parody of the urinating boy. Dupa has seated his hero, Cubitus, on a fountain – a large white dog who can communicate in human language. He lives with his master, a former sailor, and has taken on many a manly feature. For example, he walks on two legs and has hands instead of paws. However, he still has a weakness for chewing on bones and detests the neighbouring cat. You can see that he is quite thrilled by the urinating boy – but the boy is obviously disturbed by Cubitus’ presence.

The Surrealist café Those into comic books and Magritte should also visit the Rue des Alexiens. At number 55 there’s a bar called La Fleur en Papier Doré. At the beginning of the 20th century, Greet Van Bruaene, an art dealer known locally as Little Gérard, opened the bar in an 18th-century monastery. It soon became popular with the Surrealists – Magritte, Paul Rouge and Marcel Lecomte were regulars. If you can believe the legends, then it was here that Magritte had his first exhibit. He was then almost an unknown. As happens with many an

artist, he was sometimes short of money and paid with sketches and drawings or decorated the walls. Some of the stormy past is still alive here, from the worn and scratched tables to the back room that still serves as a venue for exhibits and poetry readings. One wall bears a black-and-white photograph of the Surrealists posing on the street in front of the bar. After the war, the watering hole attracted many members of CoBrA, a leading group of European avant-garde artists that lasted only briefly, from 1948 to 1951. Poetically associating themselves with the harbinger of new things– spring, and the child – they tried to bring a new aesthetic to a Europe ruined by war. Spontaneity was their watchword – they strove to be as impulsive as children, unleashing their fantasies in vivid colours and working with a wild array of materials.

Hugo Claus, a Belgian writer involved with CoBrA, married his first wife at La Fleur en Papier Doré. In 2008, his death caused controversy – suffering from Alzheimer’s, he chose euthanasia, which is legal in Belgium.

One of the most wonderful things about the bar is that it hasn’t really changed.

The ambience is that of a slightly dowdy, bohemian cavern overflowing with antiques and elements of kitsch. There’s a feeling of home in the half-light, especially on a cold winter’s day. Worn tiles cover the floor and the walls are nearly totally hidden by more than 400 framed sketches, drawings, photographs and newspaper clippings. In the summer there’s also an interior courtyard, decorated by the comic

YOUR NEXT DESTINATION strip artists Marck and De Wulf. Georges Prosper Remi, better known as Hergé (1907-1983) was another well-known regular here. The place is such a symbol of Brussels that the façade, three main rooms and numerous artefacts, including some of the furniture, have protected status as historic monuments. La Fleur en Papier Doré may not be the best place for dinner – it’s only a bar, after all – but you simply must sip a beer or a glass of wine here. You’re bound to have some sweetly melancholic musings about the passage of time as you gaze upon the scratchings in the tables and attempt to decipher them.

A few metres further down the street, there’s another fantastic mural. Its hero is Albert, who is capable of giving anybody in his vicinity a headache. He’s the creation of the French comic strip artist Yves Chaland, who perished in a car accident in 1990 – the wall is something of a memorial to him.

Back to Art Nouveau The comics tour turns deviously toward Marolles, where there was a leper colony in the Middle Ages. Later it became a workers’ district with its own dialect. Nowadays, Marolles reminds one of the Marais in Paris. Jeu de Balle, the most famous flea market in Brussels, has been located here since 1919. It’s chaotic and crawling with all kinds of freaks, and you can find anything here – from real antique pearls to useless junk. Most things are simply arrayed on the cobblestones, so crawling is sometimes quite literal. The wall showing

the adventures of Quick and Flupke, two bratty boys, is along Rue Haute, the central artery of the flea market. It also happens to be one of the oldest streets in Brussels.

Quick and Flupke were created by Hergé.

They’re not quite as famous as Tintin, but unlike Tintin they do not wander the world and stay put in Brussels. The street is packed with strange cafés and slightly alternative shops.

The Rue des Chandeliers would be a good place for their further adventures.

Narrow, dusky and cobbled, it’s a pedestrian zone and lined with street art.

The artists have essentially occupied the place, covering the façades with graffiti.

A wonderful place to have a rest or end your comic book voyage is Les Brigittines aux Marchés de la Chapelle. Midnight in Paris may not be the best movie by director and actor Woody Allen, but entering this café reminds one of the time travel taken by the central character in that film. You’re instantly transported to the Belle Epoque.

The Art Nouveau interior is lovely, and the ambience is truly unusual. It feels as if time has stopped. A roaring fire hypnotizes you, reflected by a gentlewoman’s portrait in glass. A collection of antique cameras, probably acquired at the nearby flea market, lines the shelves of an antique cabinet. The kitchen serves traditional French and Belgian food with a slight dose of creativity. Pheasant for two is presented with the air of a ritual. The chef will first tell you the story of the bird – where it was hunted down and how many weeks

Tintin mural at Stoofstraat 37

it was aged, and in what conditions. It’s then divided, the filet and legs offered separately. Being proper game, you might encounter some birdshot in the flesh. I only have time to touch upon this culinary adventure – with 35,000 eateries and cafés as well as a liberal sprinkling of Michelin stars, Brussels is not a city where you have to worry about going without great food.

To return to the centre of the city, you can make use of the panoramic lift that carries you from the Rue Haute to Poelaert Square. The trip takes only 30 seconds, but the views are breathtaking – whatever the season!

YOUR NEXT DESTINATION Insider’s view

Who said that Brussels is boring?

Derek Blyth is a writer and journalist. Originally from Scotland, he has lived in Brussels for more than 20 years. He is a former editor-in-chief of The Bulletin and has written countless articles and books on the city, including a regular column on Brussels life in Eurostar’s Metropolitan Magazine. In 2012, he published his guide The 500 Hidden Secrets of Brussels, revealing 500 places and details that few people know about Belgium’s capital city.

“In 2008, the travel website Tripadvisor announced the results of a poll that voted Brussels as the most boring city in Europe. There are two things that you can do when you are told that your home town is the most boring city on the continent. You can move to a more interesting place, like Luxembourg perhaps. Or you can prove that Tripadvisor is wrong. I decided to prove that Tripadvisor is wrong about Brussels. So I have put together a day in Brussels, which will show that this city, far from being boring, is possibly the most interesting city in Europe”, says the author.

Brussels in one day • Place Saint-Géry 23

The day begins on the site of the first settlement of Brussels. It was originally an island in the River Senne (or Zenne in Dutch, the original language of Brussels). The island has since vanished, although you can still see its outline in the curving streets. The river has also gone, buried below ground during the 19th century. However, it hasn’t vanished completely. If you enter the courtyard at 23 Place Saint-Géry, you will find traces of the river running between the old brick houses. The water is no longer flowing, but you can at least see what it was like.

• Halles Saint-Géry The brick and iron building in the middle of the square was once a market hall. Before the market was built here, this was an open cobblestoned square with an obelisk in the middle. The architect designed the market hall so that the obelisk would fit neatly inside. The vaulted basement sometimes has photography exhibitions.

• Le Roi des Belges Twenty years ago, the Place Saint-Géry was run down. Someone tried to turn the area into the Covent Garden of Brussels, but the project flopped.

It looked like a lost cause. Then Frédéric Nicolay noticed that the city had extended the pavement.

He opened a café called Java with tables and chairs on the street. People liked Java. It was cool but not pretentious. You could go there with your grandmother. Nicolay opened another café called Mappa Mundo. And another one called Le Roi des Belges. Soon the square was mobbed by young Europeans looking for the heart of Brussels.

Where to shop

• Hunting and Collecting Here is a cool concept store run by two Belgians with an eye for creative clothes, books, photos and shoes.

Rue des Chartreux 17 | Central Brussels www.huntingandcollecting.com

• Rue Dansaert This is the street where you will find Belgian fashion designers like Annemie Verbeke and Carine Gilson.

• Le Pain Quotidien Everyone knows Le Pain Quotidien, but the branch on the rue Antoine Dansaert is special, because it all started here back in 1990, when

Alain Coumont decided to open a bakery that made sourdough bread the old-fashioned way. He picked up a round table to create the atmosphere of a village café and served coffee in ceramic bowls, like a French grandmother would do. Now you get branches of Le Pain Quotidien in hundreds of cities across the world, but you might still want to take a look inside this branch, because it was the first.

Rue Antoine Dansaert 16A | Central Brussels www.lepainquotidien.com

• The Anspach Fountain Here is a monument to Brussels burgomaster Jules Anspach, who came up with the project to cover the River Senne and create the grand boulevards of central Brussels. The monument is dripping with details, but the loveliest feature, seldom noticed, is the figure of a young girl crouched below an arch, who represents the lost river that now flows through a tunnel.

• Nordzee The Nordzee fish shop, also called Mer du Nord, has a long steel counter where you can snack on fish soup or fried squid, along with a glass of chilled Spanish white wine. It can get quite crowded here, but the people who serve you are always charming, dealing with orders in French, Dutch, English or maybe even Spanish.

Rue Sainte-Catherine 45 | Central Brussels www.vishandelnordzee.be

• Plaizier Everyone updates their Facebook page when they go on holiday. But you are much more sophisticated, so you send hand-picked postcards.

You buy them here, in a shop full of whimsical and arty cards by Belgian cartoon illustrators and photographers. For example, you can send a card with a faded photo from Expo ’58, or one from the Ukelele Museum. Or something surreal.

Rue des Eperonniers 50 | Central Brussels www.plaizier.be

• Underpants Museum No, it’s not a joke. A brass sign next door to Plaizier confirms that this is the Musée du Slip, the Underpants Museum. It was founded some years ago by the Belgian artist Jan Bucquoy and is currently housed in a downbeat Belgian café.

Here you can see underpants worn by wellknown Belgian politicians, as well as French porn stars, each with a little label attached to confirm that the item is authentic.

Ваш эксперт по недвижимости тел. +371 67069116 www.rvlc.lv

YOUR NEXT DESTINATION • City wall The old city wall was torn down a long time ago, but a few fragments have been left standing, like a stretch that runs along a school playground and a tower that stands next to a bowling alley.

Greenwich café

this coffee house in the heart of the Marolles. They make sublime espressos and lattes using Ethiopian beans that are freshly roasted in the back room.

Rue Haute 140 | Marolles www.askumcoffeehouse.com

• Frituur de la chapelle

• The Flat

You can’t visit Brussels without eating a portion of frites, or French fries.

So here is one of the best fritkots in town, with two serving hatches next to the lovely Church of Notre Dame de la Chapelle, where artist Pieter Bruegel the Elder lies buried. The customers range from local school students to smart-suited antique dealers from the Sablon.

• Askum

It looks like you have walked into a private apartment, but don’t panic. This is the latest concept bar, decorated to look like a residential flat. You can drink a cocktail in the living room sitting on the sofa, or you can move to the bathroom and sit with your feet in the bathtub. You can even lie down on the double bed, if that’s how you want to end the day. It’s strange but sexy, like Brussels. Really!

Here is a cool place for a shot of espresso. Two Finnish men opened

Rue de la Reinette 12 | Central Brussels www.theflat.be

Place de la Chapelle | Marolles

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OUTLOOK / INTERVIEW

TEXT BY IEVA NORA FIRERE PHOTOS COURTESY OF FARAGO PUBLISHING AND Chanel

Chanel archaeologists Northern Women in Chanel • A photo project featuring 45 Scandinavian and Baltic models from seven countries: Denmark, Estonia, Finland, Latvia, Lithuania, Norway and Sweden; • 384 pages of Chanel garments ranging from the year 1925 to the Haute Couture Spring/Summer 2011 and Ready-to-Wear Fall/Winter 2011/2012 collections; • All proceedings go to the Swedish organization of Save the Children for the education of girls in various parts of the world.

Peter Farago and Ingela Klemetz-Farago, Fashion photographer duo Within a few hours, the white art space where I am standing will be buzzing with fashion connoisseurs, making this one of the hottest Helsinki events of the season. Right now, the freshly washed floor is still drying up, the red carpet is in position to be rolled out, and countless goody bags with small bottles of the latest perfumes

by Chanel Coco Noir stand ready to be distributed. Ingela and Peter Farago sit facing me, as beautiful and decorative as the photographs that they create. Their main claim to fame in fashion photography is Northern Women in Chanel – an almost ghoulish photo series that was recently published in a coffee table book. It depicts Scandinavian and Baltic women framed in near-timeless clothing items by Chanel.

The Faragos know the fashion industry like the back of their hand and call the most sought-after Baltic and Scandinavian supermodels by their first names, as close acquaintances. They combed through decades of Chanel’s haute couture and prêt-à-porter collections,

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and compare their latest publication to an archaeological dig, in which they have made a true cultural discovery.

I urge them to talk about what goes on behind the scenes in the industry, about the greediness and competitiveness, but they don’t fall for the bait. Ingela and Peter, who are a pair not only at work, but also at home, talk only about the virtues in fashion.

Their vision of things made Peter (then a photographer for the Russian Vogue) and Ingela (who previously pursued a music career in Sweden in a genre that can be described as fairytale rock) set up a fashion, art and luxury-focused publishing company. This happened exactly at the time when the words “economic crisis” were at the tip of everybody’s tongue. They have their own, specific definition of luxury – luxury as an opposition to the “wear and tear” culture. What they mean by that can be seen in their new book, and in the travelling exhibition that will end in Helsinki on January 27.

OUTLOOK / INTERVIEW

What is fashion to you?

Peter: Fashion is an art form that’s expressed through colours, shapes and forms. It also allows you to step into a world full of imagination, dreams, excitement and luxury. And speaking of luxury, we love it. If you look at Chanel, it’s not a story of clothing anymore, but rather of art pieces. The choice of the garments, the beads, the feathers, the tailoring, all are mesmerizing. For us, fashion is not about brands; about having the latest, the poshest, the coolest. It’s about having heritage and history.

Ingela: We’re not fans of the “wear and tear” culture. For us, everything has to last and have a meaning. That’s what we mean by luxury.

Kirsi Pyrhönen

Today, when it is minus 15 degrees Celsius outside, I can see very little in common between the roughness of Scandinavia and the elegance of Chanel. How did you come across the idea of putting the two together?

I: About four or five years ago, Peter mentioned how great it would be to work with a huge fashion house – to get an access to its archives and tell others about it through our photographic lens.

P: The idea was in the back of my head, all the luxury and craftsmanship stored in the archives of the grand fashion houses. It was a photographic journey that I had always wanted to take. One thing led to another.

We met people from Chanel and had a chance to present our idea to the company. As you can imagine, it’s a very closed fashion house. The proposal had to travel miles before it reached the people who made the final decision.

I: We had a huge amount of preparation work to do. The collections, the venues and the models – everything had to be planned to the smallest detail. It was particularly difficult with the models, because of their packed schedules and changing locations. We started off by making a list of girls with the most inspiring faces from Scandinavia and the Baltics. That list began with Freja [Beha Erichsen, a Danish supermodel, one of Karl Lagerfeld’s muses, who also features on the cover of the book – ed.], Helena [Christensen, from Denmark, at age 43, is one of the most experienced models in the Faragos’ list] and Carmen [Kass, the Estonian supermodel whose career was launched by legendary Vogue editor Anna Wintour in 1999 and whom Baltic Outlook had the pleasure of interviewing in October 2011 – ed.].

Carmen Kass

You mention the Chanel archives. How far back are we talking about?

I: The oldest clothing item in our book dates back to 1925, and it required serious procedures for us to be

Vicky Andren

BALTIC OUTLOOK / JANUARY 2013 / 43

OUTLOOK / INTERVIEW be yet another testimony to the fact that fashion works in cycles.

To be able to unearth such a large amount of brand history, let alone organizing all of the photo shoots – it sounds like you needed a big team to do that.

I: Well, it was just the two of us. Of course, we had help at various stages, like retouching the photos afterwards in Stockholm and art directing from New York, but basically we were two.

P: All together it took us one year, and the last four months were really tough. Towards the deadlines a working day could last for 20 hours. It involved lots of moving around, as some shots were done in the Arctic territories up in Northern Sweden; some were shot in a studio in New York or Paris. Basically, we spent the year with our suitcases. We had to plan extremely well and work quickly, because everyone involved was on a tight schedule.

My vision was to show a very vivid life.

That’s why the book consists of images ranging from black-and-white photography in the studio to a very bright location outdoors in the next page. We wanted it to feel diverse.

What inspires you?

I: Music, films, dance and theatre – we consume a lot of that. It’s not as much a question of genre as it is about the level of execution. We love opera just as much as rock and roll music, and I must confess that Peter even likes rap. Smiles.

Frida Gustavsson

able to borrow it for a photo shoot. [The black feather-decorated coat was created a year before Coco Chanel’s legendary little black dress was born, and has been stored in the fashion house’s archives in the suburbs of Paris for decades. For the sake of the book, it was loaned to the Faragos, who photographed it in the Salon de Haute Joaillerie at the Place Vendôme. The garment is so precious that due to insurance restrictions, it cannot travel abroad and had to be photographed within minutes – ed.].

P: What surprised me was how timeless this garment was. It didn’t seem tied to any specific decade and looked fabulous on a

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21st -century model. And also the quality of it; the textile, the feathers and the seams were all in excellent condition. Chanel takes good care of its archive. Every item that enters it is fixed up to look like new.

The seams are redone if necessary and the items are well-maintained.

Digging up nearly one-hundredyear-old fashion items sounds almost archaeological to me.

P: It certainly was! We scraped out things and where amazed by what we saw.

I: The forms, the lines and colours kept coming back. This book turned out to

What is it about the beauty of Northern women? What makes them take up an entire book?

P: Population-wise, Northern Europe is a small region, but it has given rise to so many supermodels. We discovered that Scandinavia and the Baltics have a wide range of beauty.

I: The Danes look a bit sexier, perhaps, with bigger lips; stronger-looking. The Norwegians are more elfish, like forest creatures. With their specific cheekbones, the Finns almost look as if they were from outer space. The Swedes are somewhere in between. Ginta [Lapiņa] and Ieva [Lagūna], from Latvia, are very plastic, classically beautiful; I’d say almost too beautiful.

OUTLOOK / INTERVIEW Can you tell this Northern beauty apart within the modelling world in general?

I: One thing that we discovered in common among Scandinavian and Baltic girls was their honesty and pureness. They are sweet, not ruined girls. They stand on their own, they are in charge of themselves. Actually they are women, not girls, with eyes that seem to be saying: I might be here for this brand today, but I still have my own life and personality.

Is your profession as glamorous as it sounds?

P: It’s even more glamorous! Smiles. Actually, we are very down to earth, preferring honesty to the thrill of the show. This is really our dream job. We love photography and fashion, and we love working together.

I: It’s a gift to be able to see things the same way. Like today, when we passed an empty house in Helsinki. We stood by a window to catch a glimpse inside, as it was a beautiful building. Standing there, we both said at the same time: ‘Look at that floor!’ Things have been this way for the past 15 years, since Peter first saw me on a street in Stockholm, came up to me and started talking.

Basically, he scouted me. Smiles.

Dorothea Barth Jörgensen

Theres Alexandersson and Linn Arvidsson

OUTLOOK / INTERVIEW

How competitive is the backstage of fashion photography?

P: It’s super competitive, but we don’t look at that. We don’t focus on the sideshow, but on our own vision.

Any vision, even if it is one’s own, has influences. Tell us about yours.

P: The list is quite grand. Irving Penn and Helmut Newton, both now brand names in themselves. Or the great Hungarian photographer Martin Munkácsi, who emigrated to the US and fixed his name in photo history in the 1930s, later inspiring such masters as Henri Cartier-Bresson and Richard Avedon.

Or André Kertész, the Hungarian-born photographer who settled first in Paris and then in New York. Or Clifford Coffin, who was so far ahead of his time. It’s such a variety of photographers who we really love and who have taught us how they see photography.

You work in three cities: Stockholm, Paris and New York. Which one inspires you the most?

The exhibition Northern Women in Chanel is on display in Helsinki, at the Laboratory gallery on Erottajankatu 9B (courtyard entrance), through January 27.

Northern Women in Chanel can be purchased at www.faragopublishing.com

P: It’s all three, but Paris possesses a special atmosphere that makes a city so easy to love. Most of our time is spent in New York, apart from the hot summers, when nothing beats the Scandinavian archipelago. We have a stuga, a summer house in Vaasa.

We tend to gather inspiration from

everywhere – exhibitions and performances, music; even seeing a small picture in the local newspaper can be inspiring. And travelling, of course. One of our last inspiring journeys was to Florence a year ago. It was early December, the city was empty and the colour scheme was fantastic, with different shades of brown and green dominating. We stood there and realized where all that Renaissance painting had come from.

You’ve managed to pick inspiring venues not only for photo shoots, but also for your exhibition, like Verdens Ende in Norway.

P: Yes, it’s a picturesque place in the southern part of Norway, with a horizon where the North Sea meets the sky. The rocks are grey one moment, yellow the other and reddish a minute after. The name translates as the End of the Earth, which we didn’t believe in at first.

I: We brought our exhibition there after it had been on display in Stockholm and Copenhagen. Bringing it outdoors to this harsh environment uplifted the images to a new level, making the aftertaste stronger. The exhibition drew about 120,000 people to the End of the Earth, a tiny place in the middle of nowhere.

It’s a magical place, like a mental spa – a place everybody should go to now and then. BO

OUTLOOK / TRAVEL

How Swede it is Forget Sesame Street’s bumbling, incomprehensible preparer of foodstuffs, the Swedish Chef. Stockholm’s new family of gastro-chic doyens of cuisine have turned this Scandinavian capital into one of Europe’s hottest haunts for the epicurious TEXT BY ROGER NORUM PUBLICITY PHOTOS

If the Kingdom of Sweden hasn’t graced your travel itinerary with its presence for a couple of years, then you’re probably still thinking that Swedish cuisine is all about boggy dishes such as köttbullar (meatballs), gravlax (salt-cured salmon) and falukorv (sliced, fried baloney served with ketchup and mashed potatoes). For centuries, the Swedish culinary tradition was concerned more with food storage than succulence: brief summer harvest periods required hardy locals to gather what they needed and save the bounty for future use. The main pride of a Swedish housewife was having the pantry well stocked in anticipation of long, cold winter ahead.

Luckily for us moderns, Swedish cuisine has emerged from the caveman days, when kerchiefed Nurse Diesels

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brewed up cauldrons of meat and potatoes. Today, exciting, world-class restaurants across Scandinavia are surging forth with local, seasonal approaches to gastronomy. Swedish chefs are making full use of the country’s open, cultivated landscapes, deep forests and large wetlands, which provide them with such delicacies as black grouse or unique home-grown goodies like lingonberries and reindeer lichen.

The traditional Nordic methods of smoking, fermenting, salting, drying, marinating and poaching have been brought back into the fold to create known-but-new taste sensations. While European chefs emphasise the predominance of taste, Swedes up the ante by also considering the essential role

OUTLOOK / TRAVEL of sight, smell, temperature and texture in the dining experience. This recent seismic shift in Nordic gastronomy eschews the flair and flourish of Franco-fusion food for back-tobasics cooking techniques that emphasise “locavorism” – eating locally-produced food – with ingredients that often grow a few metres from the kitchen they’re being prepared in. As celebrated French gastronomy writer Curnonsky put it, “Good cooking is when things taste of what they are.”

In the following pages, Baltic Outlook turns its taste buds to several excellent Stockholm restaurants – some tried and true, some brand new – to show how the Swedish capital has turned itself into a centre of gastronomic innovation and hedonistic dining.

Frantzen Lindeberg The deal: This intimate awardwinning restaurant in Gamla Stan serves molecular gastronomy that will both amaze and delight with its unusual tastes and presentations.

The specs: The consummate destination for foodies, an evening at this small, two-Michelin-starred spot is more a culinary journey than a meal. It is currently rated #20 on the San Pellegrino list of the world’s best restaurants, and voted Best

Restaurant in Sweden’s esteemed 2012 White Guide. The molecular French-inspired Nordic cuisine features touches that stimulate all the senses: langoustine presented alive before being prepared into a tartar at the table, bread dough that rises in a wooden box right in front of you; reindeer meat charred as the server holds it. Adventurers could consider ordering the horse meat, which arrives in a column of tartar slices before being roasted in front of you. Vegetarians, meanwhile, might try the Satio Tempestas, with 32 different ingredients. Once or twice a month, the chefs put on “Extreme Dinners”, which give them creative license to serve off-the-wall stuff like Swedish-farmed yak, live sea urchins and local crispy pig ears.

Don’t forget to down your meal with a shot of snaps, a distinct liquor flavoured with spices and herbs such as caraway or dill, often served in small, long-stemmed glasses.

The tip: Try to book a front-row seat right at the kitchen’s main preparation table or in one of the extra comfy OLBY Design chairs.

Lilla Nygatan 21 +46 (0)8208 580 www.frantzen-lindeberg.com

BALTIC OUTLOOK / JANUARY 2013 / 49

OUTLOOK / TRAVEL

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Mathias Dahlgren The deal: Easily Stockholm’s hottest restaurant, this twostarred Michelin establishment is run by its eponymous champion chef, Mathias Dahlgren.

The specs: Culinary champion and four-time Swedish chef of the year Mathias Dahlgren opened this astounding whitetablecloth spot in 2007. Modern and elegant and set inside the Grand Hôtel, with views across to the Royal Palace, Dahlgren’s kitchen takes Swedish ingredients and Scandinavian food traditions and infuses them with some very special je ne sais quoi. Chef Dahlgren has a fetish for sashimi, resulting in amazing concoctions such as salmon, cod, langoustine, oyster, lumpfish and salmon roe sashimi served with cucumber, ginger, horseradish emulsion and a “caviar” of soy-infused tapioca. The restaurant’s interior is an amalgam of modern Scandi design objects and lots of natural wood. Impeccable service; outstanding wine pairings. Foodies book now.

The tip: The next-door Matbaren is Dahlgren’s more casual (but still Michelinstarred) bistro, serving equally fine gastronomic delights.

Reservations recommended here too, although there’s usually a place or two at the bar.

Grand Hôtel Stockholm Södra Blasieholmshamnen 6 +46 (0)8679 3584 www.mathiasdahlgren.com

OUTLOOK / TRAVEL

Köttbaren The deal: This recently-opened, casual, hip and extremely coveted steak and burger bar – with possibly the best burgers in Stockholm – also serves a wonderful list of outstanding cocktails.

The specs: One of Sweden’s famed White Guide nominees for 2012, the award-winning “Meat Bar” is known for its buzzy, unpretentious atmosphere and industrialcasual decor: a door handle shaped like a butcher’s knife;

heavy brown wooden tables, candles reflecting off copper pots nailed to the walls and an open kitchen. The chefs do an outstanding selection of tartars, steaks and burgers, whose flame broiling and sauces (oxchili and salsa fresca, for example) lend them some unrivalled flavouring. After your meal, browse renowned bar manager Johan Evers’ list of excellent, innovative cocktails and place an order.

His Envyation is a take on the classic Daiquiri with Bulleit

bourbon, triple sec, lemon juice and bitters, while the Pelle Janzon is a thinly sliced marbled ox filet, with egg yolk and fish roe placed atop a slice of toast garnished with lemon juice.

The tip: Köttbaren doesn’t take reservations, so get here by 7 PM on weekends to avoid long waits. If there’s a queue, don’t despair: just cosy up to the bar and order something there.

Tegnérgatan 32 +46 (0)8505 24426 www.kottbaren.se

OUTLOOK / TRAVEL

Ekstedt The deal: A high-concept, perfectly executed Basque-Nordic restaurant with eye-catching open-fire cooking, run by a much-loved TV chef.

The specs: In late 2011, wunderkind chef and TV celeb Niklas Ekstedt opened this conceptual Basque-Swedish restaurant.

At 19, Ekstedt worked for Charlie Trotter in Chicago; at 21, he opened his first restaurant Niklas, voted the fifth best restaurant in Sweden in 2005 by the vaunted White Guide. At Ekstedt, everything – from starters to desserts – is cooked over an open fire (the wood burned is from Scandinavian apple trees).

Accordingly, the food here has a slight smoky flavour, with some of the regular (and scrumptious) suspects including baked langoustine with seaweed and pulses; and smoked beef tartar with morels, ox marrow and spring herbs. Despite cooking some excellent meats, Ekstedt tends to be renowned for his innovative fish dishes: try the smoked king crab, perch or baked trout – served in hay with roasted beetroot, oysters and parsley.

The tip: Some of the staff have done stints at El Bulli and The Fat Duck, making this a restaurant with real pedigree – and some of the best service in Stockholm.

Humlegårdsgatan 17 +46 (0) 8611 1210 www.ekstedt.nu

OUTLOOK / TRAVEL

Teatergrillen The deal: This old-school, white-tablecloth Franco-Nordic spot is still the place to be seen in Stockholm.

The specs: The interior of this playground for Sweden’s media and artsy set has hardly changed since it opened in 1968. It’s done up in heavy red velvet swathes and theatre accoutrements – masks and costume dummies, for example – thanks to the nearby Dramaten stage, giving the entire place no small amount of gravitas. The food doesn’t disappoint either, with classic dishes – cured salmon, oven-baked entrecote or meat and potatoes (literally) – that are prepared to perfection. The wine list has hundreds of vintages as well: treat your steak to a 1999 Armand Rousseau Gevrey-Chambertin Cru Clos or any of the Burgundies. As the restaurant has been around for nearly 35 years, the staff knows a thing or two about finding good help. The waiters and maitre d’s are among the best you’ll find in Stockholm.

The tip: One of Tyler Brûlé’s top five dishes in the world is Teatergrillen’s Classic Biff Rydberg, a sirloin with raw egg and horseradish, sided with diced fried potatoes and onions.

Nybrogatan 3 +46 (0)8545 03565 www.teatergrillen.se

OUTLOOK / TRAVEL

Restaurang Hjerta

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The deal: A rustic, casual restaurant in a beautiful waterfront setting – a former shipyard – serving great comfort food with a French twist.

The specs: Opened on Valentine’s Day, 2010, this Skeppsholmen find is ideal for casual couples (though it’s a hit with Stockholm’s trendy set as well). Nestled into a renovated shipyard and looking onto the Östra Brobänken quay’s white sailboats, the bright interior is the setting for innovative Franco-Swedish dishes.

The turbot, for example, has been on the menu since the place first opened

and is the chef’s signature dish. Hjerta also bakes its own stone oven-baked baguettes and pizzas at an on-site bakery. The famous skeppsbröd, or skipper’s bread, is a handsome pizza piled high with goat’s cheese, mushrooms, herbs and more. The restaurant is perfect after a visit to the neighbouring National Museum and Museum of Modern Art. The tip: Once it cools down after dinner, head in to Hjernet (“The Brain”), the restaurant’s cosy cocktail bar.

Slupskjulsvägen 28B +46 (0) 8611 4100 www.restauranghjerta.se

OUTLOOK / TRAVEL

Easy being green

TEXT BY ROGERÂ NORUM PUBLICITY PHOTOS

Scandinavian hotels have long been redefining what it means to be ecological. We take a look at three Swedish properties making waves way up north 56 / AIRBALTIC.COM

OUTLOOK / TRAVEL

New York boasts scores of Hiltons, Best Western, Mandarins and W’s. Shanghai, Beijing and Hong Kong are building Park Hyatts and Peninsulas up the wazoo.

Dubai’s mega-tech hotels continue to soar high in the sky. So what have the Scandinavians got?

Well, in case you’ve been living out the past decade or two in an ice cave, the Norwegians, Finns, Danes and Swedes have been making forays into unique and interesting hotel properties for some time now. The Swedes broke the (ice) mold nearly 25 years ago with their Ice Hotel in Lapland, and since then there has been no turning back. There are now hotels that resemble glass igloos, hotels that float on lakes, even free-standing, pod-like hotels built right into a river valley.

But this shouldn’t come as a surprise; Scandinavia’s very high standards of design innovation have always struck a chord, whatever your aesthetic sensibilities. Even the most humdrum of public spaces – airport terminals, museum restrooms – command a few extra moments of appreciation, with simple and subtle touches that make bold statements without screaming for attention. Employing simple lines, organic materials and a deft merging of function with form, Scandinavian style has become nothing short of iconic. The region’s design traditions champion the fusion of a highly stylized aesthetic with basic utilitarian demands as central to modern living – hardly surprising in a region whose harsh climate can mean a lot of time spent indoors. And yet perhaps the most striking thing about contemporary Scandinavian architecture is its simplicity. Emphasizing restraint, modesty and clarity, the earliest Scandinavian architects embarked upon an inventive incorporation of traditional forms with modern techniques, and a return to organic materials like wood and brick. Long before ‘eco-friendly’ became a buzzword, Scandinavian architecture established itself

as the most forward-looking in the world, setting a global standard for architectural modernism and foresight.

Fast forward to the 21st century, when the planet’s natural resources are being depleted and everybody and their uncle is hoping to capitalise on the “greening” trend. Luckily, the Nordic countries are natively about as green as you can get, from seemingly-interminable coniferous forests and laconic duned beachfronts, to undulating hillsides of lavender and slabs of granite that jut into the sea, to say nothing of glaciers, valleys and alpine mountains: Scandinavia boasts easily the most diverse geography in Europe. What’s more, the environment – and citizens’ right to access it on foot, ski or cycle – is enshrined in law. Across all the Nordic countries, the constitutional everyman’s right (allemansrätten in Swedish) allows both locals and visitors to pick berries, fish in lakes or ski across meadows anywhere – or walk freely right across the entire country, should you so desire.

So it makes sense that the Swedes would be round the clock coming up with innovative places to bed down for the night, and the only real obstacle for innovative local architects is their imagination. Opposing conventional hotellier wisdom, they have rewritten that not-so-age-old adage of modern construction: If you build it (in the middle of nowhere), they will most definitely come.

BALTIC OUTLOOK / JANUARY 2013 / 57

OUTLOOK / TRAVEL

TreeHotel, Harads Built high up in the pines of Sweden’s northern Boreal forest, this is easily the most out-of- thebox property idea to come around in a long time.

Comprising half a dozen individual, free-standing tree houses of sorts, each structure has been designed by a different architect and elevated as high as 12m in the air (over the next several years, they hope to build as many as two dozen different structures). “Each room is designed to have a different character and most contain double beds, seating, but no televisions, because that isn’t the ethos of the hotel,” says creator

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Kent Lindwall. Lindwall purchased the forest land, thereby rescuing it from being cut down, then built each room from locally-sourced wood and aluminum, installing floors heated with solar power. The designs are as fantastical as you can imagine, the interiors as comfy and cosy as you’ll ever need. Videgard and Tham’s Mirror Cube, for example, perches high over a forest valley, its exterior completely covered in mirrors and looking something like floating reflective box in the pines (a special protective transparent UV film has been applied to the glass, making it visible to birds). Inside is a spacious, lofted

living space, with the bed situated below, but outside the structure reflects everything around it, from the trees to the clouds. Other fantastical constructions include the Tree UFO, with portholes and an entry ladder that calls to mind that scene out of Close Encounters of the Third Kind, and another structure enveloped in reclaimed tree limbs and branches. The buildings are set just 60km below the Arctic Circle, so the Northern Lights and midnight sun are well within view. High living indeed.

From SEK 4400 (about EUR 510) per night

OUTLOOK / TRAVEL

Kolarbyn Eco-lodge, Västmanland Set smack in the middle of a forest next to gorgeous Lake Skärsjön, a few hours from Stockholm, this spot was originally founded in the mid-1990s as a way to teach people traditional techniques in charcoal burning. Since then, the collection of twelve cosy huts has evolved into one of Sweden’s most beloved – and indeed, most primitive – places to spend a night. Each tiny yurt-like hut, which sleeps two, is outfitted with berths bedecked with sheepskin rugs, so arriving with your own sleeping bag and pillow is de rigeur. There is no electricity to speak of – only candles and a wood-burning heater, for which you’ll have to head out and forage for wood (it’s hardly rocket science though: remember, you’re in a forest).

There are no fancy toilets, shower rooms or running warm water (all water used comes from a local spring), but none of these limitations seem to bother the adventurous couples, families and students who come here throughout the year to sleep with Mother Nature. Two communal fire pits let guests prepare their own food with their forest-dwelling neighbours, encouraging conviviality. In the morning, waking up to the sounds of the forest, you can head out on winter hikes and wildlife safaris – to spot moose or wolves, say. There is also a lakeside sauna, a visit to which is a necessary ritual in the deep, dark midwinter. As the owner, Andreas, puts it, “To live in nature ... It is just a really, really magical feeling to wake up in the morning, start the fire and hear the birds singing. It is just to be in this place, and that’s enough for many people. They don’t want to have our tours, they just want to be here.”

SEK 250 (about EUR 29) per person, per night

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OUTLOOK / TRAVEL

Ice Hotel, Jukkasjärvi Offer most people the opportunity to stay in an igloo for a night, and they’re likely to run the other way. But the really adventurous will jump at the chance to experience this most unique of overnight adventures, placed in a northern Swedish river valley that is about as remote a place as you could imagine. A unique, once-ina-lifetime experience, Sweden’s architecturally marvellous Ice Hotel was the first of its kind, beginning life as a 60 square meter igloo and now the world’s largest hotel to disappear each year, at 5500 square meters. Everything in this Arctic adventurer’s dream hotel – beds, floors and glasses – is carved from snow and ice, and kept at a balmy –5ºC. For shuteye, guests jump into expedition-strength, subzero sleeping bags, then lie down on a furry cut of reindeer hide. Though the hotel often recommends sleeping in the nude

in order to maximise heat generation inside the sleeping bag, wise visitors bring along mittens; endurance and an unorthodox sense of adventure are also recommended. Although the design and appearance change from year to year (depending on the architects’ whim), there’s always an on-site Ice Bar, offering (hot) drinks as well as snacks, and a restaurant that serves the local favourite, reindeer (if you’re sitting on a reindeer hide, with reindeer antlers hanging up above you, you might as well give this tender game a try). Eschewing a cold reception, staff here are surprisingly cheery, and they can organise pretty much everything under the Arctic sun: husky rides, snowmobile journeys and trips out to the tundra. Though not for the cold blooded, this is easily the most invigorating, dine-outable overnight experience Scandinavia can offer.

From SEK 2500 (about EUR 290) per night

OUTLOOK / TRAVEL

OUTLOOK / PROMO

Baltman, 2nd floor

The Galleria Riga – a modern-day shopping centre in the very heart of Riga

Oasis, 3rd floor

Since opening in 2010, the Galleria Riga has found its place in the hearts of Riga’s residents and visitors as a convenient shopping centre, which also happens to provide opportunities for relaxation and entertainment

The Galleria Riga

Galleria Riga shopping centre Dzirnavu iela 67 Entrances from Dzirnavu iela 67 and Blaumaņa iela 10 (between Brīvības bulvāris and Tērbatas iela) Information centre Tel. (+371) 67307000 info@galleriariga.lv galleriariga.lv/en

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lies in the centre of Riga, close to the Old Town, the Freedom Monument, several popular hotels, and the Quiet Centre – the Riga neighbourhood with the highest concentration of Art Nouveau architecture.

A wide variety of shops line the seven storeys of the building, providing visitors with a broad selection of items. Here you’ll find necessities for both daily life and celebrations.

At the Galleria Riga you can purchase items made by such famous labels as women’secret, Cortefiel, Springfield, Karen Millen, Oasis, Parfois, Ecco, Mango, Marella, Gino Rossi, Suitsupply, Baltman, Diesel, Triumph, Ioanna Kourbella, John Galliano, Alexander McQueen (the last three brands are available at the Mon Cheri store), Crocs, Piazza Italia, Liviana Conti and many more.

To better serve its customers, the shopping centre has a built-in parking garage (free parking for two hours on Sundays) and special stands for bicycles. Guests have use of free Wi-Fi and can take full advantage of Global Blue benefits. Those who are short on time, or who would rather place their trust in a professional, can shop with a personal stylist who will help find the most appropriate outfits, taking into account your style and needs, as well as the trends of the season. Other useful services available at Galleria Riga include a post office, dry-cleaning, currency exchange and beauty salons. A favourite spot for guests to stop for a moment’s rest is the centre’s fountain, from which there’s a great view of the building’s elegant architecture.

OUTLOOK / PROMO

Watch

Scarf

Wallet

Suitsupply Ls 39

Ecco Ls 49.99

Cufflinks Suitsupply Ls 69

Watch Laiks Ls 349

Laiks Ls 165

Gloves

Belt

Baltman Ls 22.90

Ecco Ls 54.99

Waistcoat Baltman Ls 47.90

Dress Karen Millen Ls 268

Brooch Parfois Ls 5.99

Shirt Baltman Ls 39.90

Tie Suitsupply Ls 25

Shoes Baltman Ls 202

Trousers Mango Ls 36.99

The biggest

Dress Oasis Ls 53

Gloves Mango Ls 32.99

Bracelet

Belt

Parfois Ls 6.99

Cortefiel Ls 20.99

news this season is the arrival of Europe’s fifth largest textile group, the Grupo Cortefiel, in Latvia. As a result, three of the group’s stores – women’secret, Springfield and Cortefiel were opened in November.

For an added taste of London charm in Riga, check out the newly opened fashion clothing and accessories stores Karen Millen and Oasis.

In other news, the 6th floor of the Galleria Riga has been home to Blue Wonders (Zili brīnumi), a knowledge-stimulation centre for children, since the month of September. The centre’s founders hope that visiting schoolchildren will acquire an even greater motivation to excel in their studies. In fact, the centre is a great place to visit and learn new things not only for children, but also for their parents.

The Galleria Riga is the perfect place for a hearty meal during the holiday season, with numerous restaurants on the 7th floor to suit all tastes. You will find Italian, Japanese and Indian establishments, to name just a few, as well as a new Italian bistro.

Bow-tie Necklace Eletto Ls 56

Paco Romano Ls 4

Earrings Diva Ls 4.39

Clutch Bra

Oasis Ls 12

women’secret Ls 12

Knickers women’secret Ls 10.99

Shoes Gino Rossi Ls 112.99

Clutch Marella Ls 75

Belt

Dress Karen Millen Ls 186

Eletto Ls 87.50

BALTIC OUTLOOK / JANUARY 2013 / 63

OUTLOOK / PROMO

Health and wellness rituals in Jūrmala Jūrmala – your ticket to health, relaxation and perfect harmony in all seasons, be it winter, spring, summer or fall

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Publicity photos

The resort hotels and rehabilitation centres of Jūrmala are known for their medical, rehabilitative and restorative procedures, many of which employ local natural resources that can be found only in Jūrmala. A diverse array of spa procedures, specially designed to increase overall health and well-being, can also be found in this seaside town. Here you can imbibe local mineral waters containing hydrogen sulphide, bromide or sodium chloride; indulge yourself with medicinal mud baths and body wraps; and relax with spa procedures that whisk away stress and rejuvenate both body and mind.

The climate of Jūrmala is restorative and calming.

Even a simple walk along the seashore will improve your well-being – the ionized sea breezes and airborne phytoncides (released by the surrounding pine forests) bolster the body’s thermoregulatory mechanisms and improve both heart fitness and blood composition.

The light exercise will help your mind to relax and your nervous system to strengthen itself. As you take a healthy stroll along the beach, your eyes will be rewarded with views of wooden architectural masterpieces. Built at the turn of the 20th century, these types of houses can be seen in few other places. The historic resort town is also a haven for Nordic skiers and pole walkers, being the perfect place for outdoor activities, as well as for escaping from the hustle and bustle of the big city.

If you have a hectic work life, then consider spending your weekends in Jūrmala. The resort town’s hotels and rehabilitation centres offer recreational and relaxing opportunities for both adults and children, as well as for couples or single travellers. Jūrmala is just as ideal a spot for a romantic get-away as for a business meeting.

Its spa centres offer almost 500 different procedures, during which specialists will recharge your body with new energy, strength and health. In Jūrmala you can find procedures offered nowhere else, due in part to the use of sea water, mineral waters and medicinal mud found only in the nearby Ķemeri National Park. Even the most scrupulous guest will be surprised by the combination of modern technologies and therapeutic natural resources to be found in Jūrmala.

Among the procedures offered are amber therapy, traditional medical procedures, aesthetic medical procedures, relaxing spa programs, hydrotherapy – including underwater massages, relaxing baths (pearl, honey) and restorative baths (detox, etc.); various types of massage (classic, aesthetic, therapeutic, firming), including massages for children; body wraps that not only have a relaxing and restorative effect, but that also nourish the whole body by promoting the deep absorption of essential micro-nutrients through the skin; mechanically applied physical therapy modalities for both medical (ionic therapy, electric muscle stimulation, etc.) and preventive (vacuum massage, LPG procedures, spa capsules) purposes; as well as magical juice detoxes that cleanse the physique and harmonize the body and soul.

Sometimes, all it takes to feel great is a little break! BO

OUTLOOK / PROMO

» Baltic Beach Hotel*****

Baltic Beach Hotel, a 5* spa and conference hotel right by the seacoast in Jūrmala. It offers cosy guest rooms, European and Italian restaurants, 10 conference halls, a 24-hour lobby bar, swimming pool with heated sea water and one of the biggest spa centres in Northern Europe.

» Amber Sea Hotel & Spa**** Elixir of Youth spa weekend (3 days/2 nights)

Package includes early check-in and late check-out, breakfasts, dinners, daily visit to the hotel’s aqua club (sauna, steam bath, swimming pool), parking, Wi Fi and four spa treatments per person.

Warm your body and soul by enjoying our winter season special – DAY SPA 5x5. Spend three hours in our spa for only for 25 LVL.

From 230 EUR per person Discount for Baltic Outlook readers – 10 %*

DAY SPA 5x5 I

Express Slim spa weekend (3 days/ 2 nights)

• Баня (Banya) visit (Russian and aroma saunas, snow room, Jacuzzi under an open sky and swimming pool); • Cocoon spa capsule; • Cosmetic body wrapping; • Back massage 30 minutes; • Green tea Spirit of bath.

DAY SPA 5x5 II • The Garden water relaxation area (amber sauna, old wood sauna with fireplace, hammam Turkish bath, swimming pool with cascades); • Cosmetic body wrapping in Rasul Arabian bath; • Soap mask with peeling glove; • Salt chamber; • Ion foot detox.

Package includes early check-in and late check out, breakfasts, dinners, daily visit to the hotel’s aqua club (sauna, steam bath, swimming pool), Wi Fi, parking and seven spa treatments per person.

From 280 EUR per person Discount for Baltic Outlook readers – 10 %* www.amberhotel.lv

* Upon presentation of a magazine issue

Choose from: Wellness ritual, Green tea ritual, Chocolate ritual, Wine Spa ritual, Vitamy ritual, Geo Thalasso ritual, Amber ritual, Beer ritual, “Golden shine” ritual, Cherry ritual or Linden blossom ritual.

(A spa ritual contains different body treatments and a massage, all delivered on the same day.)

Promotion code: Baltic Outlook Offer valid until 31.01.2013 www.hoteljurmala.com

» Boutique Hotel Light House Jūrmala

This complex is located right on the seacoast, permitting visitors to enjoy the sea air enriched with sated oxygen and ozone directly from their hotel rooms.

Book Elite Business Class rooms at a 20% discount – only for Baltic Outlook readers in January and February.

Promotion code: Baltic Outlook – January

www.lhj.lv

» Hotel Jūrmala Spa****

Enjoy your best spa experience by treating yourself to any face and body spa ritual.

What’s more, you’ll obtain a 15% discount!

www.tourism.jurmala.lv

Baltic Beach Hotel

DAY SPA 5x5 III • Swimming pool with heated seawater; • Gym and sauna visit; • Ķemeri mud applications for feet; • Back massage 30 minutes; • Oxygen cocktails.

Offer is valid from 15.01.-31.05.2013., Monday to Friday.

After the treatments you are welcome to enjoy a special winter 5-course lunch/dinner at our Caviar Club restaurant for only 20 Ls per person (offer with wine – 35 Ls per person). www.balticbeach.lv

How to get there From the airport Riga by taxi (apr. 15 min.)

From Riga Central Station: by train or minibus.

If you want to explore the centre of Jūrmala, ask for a ticket to Majori Station

BALTIC OUTLOOK / JANUARY 2013 / 65

OUTLOOK / GADGETS

TEXT BY ROGER NORUM | PUBLICITY PHOTOS

You got game These great new playful gadgets will give you plenty of ways to ring in the New Year right at home QOOQ No more greasing up your iPad This ingenious, kitchen-ready tablet comes chock full of 1000 international recipes, detailed step-by-step through HD video, photos and text. Recipes are searchable across cuisine type, difficulty level, preparation time and ingredients. You can also create your own weekly menus and shopping lists, and automatically adjust ingredient quantities to suit the number of people per meal. The 10.1-inch splash-proof, heat-resistant screen has waterproof buttons and non-slip feet. Available in red, cream and black. Bon appétit!

349 EUR | www.qooq.com

Kymera Magic Wand Command everything at home Guaranteed to be a hit with kids from 8 to 88, this buttonless remote control was originally funded on the BBC show Dragons’ Den. The infrared device can learn up to 39 gesture-based commands, allowing you to tap, flick and rotate to adjust volume, record a show or turn off the power. Can also be trained to control iDevices, DVD players and stereos.

49.95 EUR | www.thewandcompany.com

Pico Genie P100 Cinema in a box

Pioneer DDJ WeGO Spin like a pro anywhere

The first of its kind, this amazing, compact projector effectively transforms your smartphone, tablet or iPhone into a home theatre, mirroring the screen on any HDMI-compatible device as a large image against any surface. The jewel box-sized gizmo generates some 85 lumens of brightness at a WVGA resolution of 480 p. Works on battery power, too, with up to 2 hours on a single charge.

Admit it: you’ve always wanted to be a DJ, but just never had the right turntables (or music), right? Well, this high-tech console is perfect for becoming the next Paul van Dyk, consisting of two “platters”, a mini mixer, effects buttons and built-in lighting effects that actually help train you how to mix. The easy-to-carry unit comes in a choice of five colours (white, black, red, green or violet). Virtual DJ LE software included.

185 EUR | www.picopros.com

299 EUR | www.pioneer.eu

CARS

In association with Whatcar.LV

First drive: the new Range Rover

There’s still nothing else like the Range Rover. Audi, BMW and Porsche all sell SUVs that operate in the same sphere, but not one of them is anything like as statesmanlike. Or, arguably, manages to so successfully marry on-road luxury with offroad ability.

No wonder, then, that the current car is more popular than ever. It’s certainly not flawless, though, and the all-new version that’s just about to hit Land Rover showrooms is designed to put that right.

This fourth-generation Range Rover is more efficient and promises superior onand off-road credentials, with even more

luxurious and spacious accommodation.

It’s also considerably better equipped, but pricier, too.

Aside from the sleeker – albeit slightly less imposing – new look, the Range Rover’s huge weight-saving is the most obvious change. An aluminium body and a host of other technologies have conspired to make it up to 420 kg lighter than the outgoing model. While other car makers are crowing about 50-kg savings, this merely underlines what an advance Land Rover has made.

The changes make the car around the same weight as its rivals, with a big impact on fuel economy. The entry-level engine is now a

CARS V6 diesel, which is fine because the car is to put up with a lot of body roll in corners so much lighter. It joins a V8 diesel and a if you opt for the V6 diesel model; the V8s supercharged V8 petrol engine, come with active anti-roll bars that both of which are mildly more help the car stay remarkably flat and The new powerful and fuel-efficient than composed at all times.

Range Rover The new Range Rover is more they were in the outgoing car. remains All come with an eight-speed comfortable, too. You do feel some striking, auto box as standard, but only patter over battered urban streets, but has the V6 has a stop-start system. but it has genuine luxury saloon suppleness at higher speeds. become What’s it like to drive?

Likewise, it quashes wind- and sleeker Drive the V6 diesel and you than before road noise to the extent that only a feel the benefits of the weight Mercedes S-Class is quieter, and even loss straight away. For starters, then the margin is negligible. the car feels as swift as the outgoing V8, It might be a moot point for most would-be both getting away from the line and for owners, but there’s still little to reproach overtaking. the Range Rover off road. On the sand, rock It’s quieter, too. We’ve become used to and gravel we took it across in Morocco a refined diesels, but this one is especially couple of months back, it coped effortlessly. cultured, even from start-up. In fact, the Particularly clever and impressive is the new diesel is now the engine of choice. It’s new Terrain Response system that surveys quieter than the V8 diesel and feels just as the obstacles ahead and then selects the fast in most circumstances. optimum electronic setting to get you If blistering, sports car pace is on your wish through it. list, then the V8 supercharged model does What’s it like inside? deliver, but it’s also addicted to gulping One area where the Range Rover has always petrol. You’d have to question the wisdom exhibited its luxury credentials is in the of buying one considering the fuel prices. cabin. Quality of craftsmanship is even Perhaps the major advantage of the weight higher now and, thankfully, you still get the savings – whatever the engine – is how agile the Range Rover now feels. The old one terrific raised seating position and all-round visibility. wasn’t cumbersome, but there was always a sense of you having to drive around some of The number of switches and buttons has been cut in half, so there’s even more of a its vices – stopping distances, for instance, feeling of elegant restraint. Most functions and the way you had to manhandle it are now controlled through the large through some corners. touch-screen display, or using a menu in the This time it feels crisper, requires a lot less middle of the dials, although these can be steering input and stops and turns with distracting while on the move. far more accuracy. That said, you still have

The most welcome improvement is for rear passengers. A much longer wheelbase means that it’s far easier to get into and out of the vehicle. Once installed, you’ve got five centimetres more knee room.

For the first time, there’s an ‘executive seating’ option. It’s pricey, but you get two individual electrically adjustable rear seats instead of a bench, and a central tunnel dividing them.

The boot is just as spacious as before and is accessed through the traditional split-fold tailgate, although this is now powered.

Should I buy one?

Absolutely, if you can afford it. The one major irritation is that all this comes with a sizeable hike in the Range Rover’s price – by more than 10 000 EUR on some models. If you can swallow this, then there’s no denying that it’s a magnificent ride.

The world’s best SUV? Easily. The world’s best luxury car? That’s still debatable. BO

OUTLOOK / PROMO / DINING

Publicity photos

A bouquet of flavours, Art Nouveau style

Kalēju iela 9/11, Riga Tel. (+371) 67087580 E-mail: ambiente@kolonna.com www.ambiente.lv www.hotelkolonna.com

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At the turn of the 20th century, the opulent Art Nouveau style flourished in Europe’s cities, including Riga. Today, around 800 Art Nouveau buildings are scattered throughout Latvia’s capital, some of which are located in the old town.

One of these edifices houses Ambiente, the first Art Nouveau restaurant in Riga. It can be found on a winding, medieval cobbled street at Kalēju iela 9/11. As was common during the Middle Ages, street names arose from the trade shops that lined them. Kalēju iela (Smiths’ Street) once hosted several smithies. The building that hosts the modern-day restaurant is part of the Konventa Sēta hotel complex, which, in turn, is nestled into one of the oldest quarters of Riga’s old town.

Most of us associate Art Nouveau with a certain type of architecture. However, at Ambiente, this distinct style is also evident in the interior furnishings, food and even in the serving

methods of the dishes. The Art Nouveau era was punctuated by several trends, including a return to established values, the expression of personal perspective, and meticulous attention to the finest of details.

Ambiente has been set up as a typical early 20th-century flat and consists of five rooms – a kitchen, a dining room, a living room, a cabinet and a library. A large number of new features – such as refrigerators, modern cookers and cast-iron sinks equipped with faucets – were introduced to kitchens at the beginning of the 1900s. Cooks usually hung pots, pans and various utensils from brass hooks lined above the stove-top. Generally, the grandest room to be found in Art Nouveau flats was the dining room. Here the family ate its daily meals and held its celebratory dinners.

The living room served as a sitting room, where the hosts received their guests and drank tea

OUTLOOK / PROMO / DINING

while discussing the latest events. The flat’s menu at Ambiente also features sandwiches, cabinet served two purposes: if the man topped with boiled eggs and anchovies. of the house held a professional position About one century ago, dessert became that required the receiving of clients (such an obligatory dish with which to finish off as a barrister, doctor or architect), then a meal. This was partly due to Latvia’s entry business was conducted in this room. At into the sugar production industry. other times, the room was used to pursue In creating Ambiente’s menu, head manly hobbies and interests. Upon passing chef Māris Pastars looked for inspiration through the doors of Ambiente, it is easy in cookbooks and restaurant menus from to feel yourself going back in time. The the early 1900s. The cookbooks of that decorative Art Nouveau style is reflected in era also had separate sections on how to the furnishings and drawings on the walls; furnish and arrange rooms, as well as on even magazines and photographs from the how to best receive guests. Undoubtedly, era have been put on display in the hallways. these manuals on home economics and Ambiente’s head chef Māris Pastars says hosting have yet to be surpassed. Pastars that during the Art Nouveau has combined the ideas he At Ambiente, discovered with current trends period, Riga’s menus were quite Art bountiful and that the dining in European cuisine, thereby culture played a significant part setting up the restaurant’s Nouveau in daily life. Fish, wild game and is evident three-part formula in creating everything that can be grown in dishes: one part flavours found in the home gardens and fields have in traditional Art Nouveau foods, interior, traditionally been the mainstay of one part popular ingredients of food and Latvian cuisine. At the beginning the time, and one part moderneven in the day cooking principles. Potatoes, of the 20th century, hunting was serving no longer a necessity for survival, mushrooms and fish were highly but rather filled a ritual function. methods favoured back then, which is why For aristocrats, hunting provided Pastars recommends trying the the opportunity to showcase one’s mastery beer-batter-dipped fried herring with a at mimicking deer calls and reading animal warm potato-and-pickle salad on the side, tracks in the forest. Interestingly enough, or the beef stroganoff with wild mushrooms it is because of the barons’ passion for and a crispy potato pancake. hunting that there is now such a healthy Ambiente features background music number of moose in Latvia’s forests. It was from the Art Nouveau period, and single only about 100 years ago that moose, which diners are encouraged to leaf through the had been raised in captivity up until then, restaurant’s collection of books on the were released into the wild – eventually golden age of Art Nouveau. Ambiente is one forming the plentiful populations found in of three restaurants owned by the Kolonna Latvia today.

Hotels Group, and thereby reflects the Although the aristocrats were brought company’s commitment to providing only up to behave with good manners, they the best in service and comfort. The other were still fond of simple dishes. In order to two restaurants – Rozalija in Rēzekne and upgrade ordinary ingredients to restaurantAlexis in Cēsis – also feature local dishes and quality levels, chefs imparted them with traditions, in accordance with the wishes original and exotic spices, and tried to of their patrons: Rozalija serves Latgalian present the dishes in creative ways. Openfavourites and hosts special musical faced sandwiches were popular, and since evenings, while Alexis focuses on European the various cold-cuts and sausages were cuisine and themed wine evenings. usually made in-house, they were fancy Naturally, Ambiente reveals in the majesty of enough to be included as appetizers. The Riga’s Art Nouveau period. BO

Māris Pastars

BALTIC OUTLOOK / JANUARY 2013 / 71

OUTLOOK / PROMO / DINING

Pretty darling of a historic street Jauniela 16, Riga Hours: Mon.–Sun. 12:00–23:00 (+371) 67 22 01 71 1221@apollo.lv www.1221.lv

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Jauniela, one of Riga’s oldest streets, has never lacked in beauty. It has even “acted” in a number of films, doubling as London’s Baker Street, the home of Sherlock Holmes; as the Rue Dante in German-occupied Paris or as the fateful Blumenstrasse in Bern in a serial about Stierlitz, the fictional Soviet spy.

From whatever angle you catch it, the cobble-stoned Jauniela nearly never misses making a postcard out

PUBLICITY PHOTOS

of a photo. If you retrace your steps a little along the intersecting Krāmu iela, then behind a building with a flowery blue façade (which looks like a real treat), you’ll see the tower of the legendary Dome Cathedral. This beautiful building now houses 1221, one of the city’s best restaurants. A wooden edifice once stood on this same site some 800 years ago, serving as the home of the founder of Riga, Bishop Albert.

No matter how rich the presence of history in the three floors of the restaurant, which is visited every so often by guide-led tourist groups, 1221 puts it focus on the art of fine food. During the two years since it was founded, 1221 has achieved high rankings among Riga’s restaurants in Tripadvisor, earning the praise of local Riga residents, tourists and celebrities from both Latvia and abroad.

Receiving VIPs isn’t always simple. When 1221 began its operations, its staff didn’t know a great deal about the protocol for receiving important officials. Now, after having hosted such prominences as Herman van Rompuy, the President of the European Council, 1221 has learned all the tricks of the trade.

1221’s head chef Roberts Smilga has had the honour of serving numerous politicians, show business stars and other illustrious personalities. One of his observations is that unlike what people might think, famous people are often not overly choosy when coming in for a private meal. That’s one of the reasons why Smilga doesn’t overcomplicate his menu. It features a simple but thorough introduction to Latvian national specialties, and the same principles apply to 1221’s versions of Russian, Italian, French and other cuisines, featuring simple textures and flavours without overdone twists.

1221 has already announced its latest news: the opening of a second restaurant, Albert’s 1221, in the quiet centre of Riga. It is located on Antonijas iela 13 (entrance from Alberta iela) at one of the city’s main Art Nouveau arteries. When Baltic Outlook ran into Smilga, he was tossing ideas around for the menu of the new restaurant. Whether in Old Riga or in the quiet centre, at 1221 you can be sure of a special atmosphere, invariably high quality and friendly service at any time, including on public holidays. BO

TEXT BY LAURA KENINS AND KATE KRUMINA | PUBLICITY PHOTOS

Restaurants, bars and cafés

Fly to 5 cities in the Baltic states with airBaltic from

€29*

3 pavāru restorāns, Riga When we first wrote about this newcomer to the Riga restaurant scene in 2011, it looked incredibly creative, colourful and promising – three things which, taken together and applied to the restaurant business, rarely last. Well, we’re happy to announce that this place has gotten only better. 3 pavāru restorāns translates as “three chefs’ restaurant” and really is staffed by a team of three top Latvian chefs – Ēriks Dreibants, Mārtiņš Sirmais and Jānis Sproģis – who give each each other a helping hand to ensure that no one burns out in this fast and demanding business.

Set on two floors in Riga’s old town, this is a solid platform for culinary pleasures, with a short and quickly rotating menu.

For starters, think of a creamy topinambour (i.e. Jerusalem artichoke) soup or a Camembert cheese from a place that you may have never heard of before (from Rucava, a town in Latvia’s southwest corner). For the mains, try something from the wide selection of seafood and fish, as the same chefs also work at the nearby fish bistro 3 zivis (three fish). Among the exotic combinations is a fillet of flounder with ox tails. As

for classical options, 3 pavāru restorāns offers excellent duck breast and marble steak.

The chefs prefer local and seasonal products, and have perfectly mastered the sous-vide or vacuum cooking technologies, under which food is heated at lower temperatures

and over a longer period of time. This preserves its colour, flavour and taste much better than ordinary cooking methods.

Hours: Mon.-Fri. 12:00-23:00, Sat.-Sun. 11:00-23:00 Torņa iela 4, Jēkaba kazarmas 2 B (+371) 20370537 www.3pavari.lv

* Price available for bookings at least 5 months in advance

FOOD & DRINK

FOOD & DRINK Boheem, Tallinn Although properties in Tallinn’s Kalamaja neighbourhood were already being bought up by artists as far back as the late 1980s, for nearly two decades the area lacked eateries to serve its residents. Boheem changed that when it opened five years ago.

“Everyone said I was mad, that there was no point in opening a café or restaurant here”, manager Harry Randma recalls.

He had been living in the neighbourhood and lamenting the fact that there was nowhere to go for a cup of coffee. It took just a few months before his restaurant was “really busy”, and other restaurants have since cropped up.

With a low-key but sophisticated atmosphere (the building won an award for its renovation the year after the restaurant opened), the establishment is an ideal spot for either lunch or an evening glass of wine.

Everything is made on site and from scratch, including preserves and desserts. Luckily for those who’ve lived abroad, Boheem offers that most elusive

meal in Europe – brunch – with a full selection of crêpes, eggs and bacon, frittatas, potatoes and porridge for late mornings or lazy afternoons.

The menu changes twice a year, but pancakes and Caesar salad, the most popular items, are always available. The rest of the menu offers mostly lighter fare, with a range of salads, soups, quiches, wraps and pasta dishes. The chefs throw in some interesting Estonian twists, like a black bread quiche with ham and sun-dried tomatoes, or “fiery dumplings” in jalapeno and cheese sauce. They continually experiment and try new things.

Although it’s a convenient distance from the market and train station, as well as a short walk from the old town, Boheem is not the spot for a quick lunch because everything is made from scratch. Allow enough time for the chefs to do their thing and for a second cup of coffee.

Mon-Fri 9:00-23:00, Sat 10:0023:00 (kitchen closes 21:45) Kopli 18, Tallinn (+372) 6311 928 www.boheem.ee

WINTER HOME ACCESSORIES COLLECTION

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* Seasonal flights. ** Operated in cooperation with tour operator Tez Tour.

Hurghada**

Sharm el-Sheikh**

Welcome aboard airBaltic!

78 airBaltic news / 80 Behind the scenes / 82 Booking classes / 83 Meals 84 BalticMiles / 88 Fleet / 89 Flight map / 92 Contacts

airBaltic / NEWS

Publicity and Corbis / Scanpix photos

Prague

New flights to Prague starting in January airBaltic is opening a new route from Riga to Prague in the Czech Republic, starting from January 2013.

Prague is one of the most beautiful and picturesque cities in Central Europe, with a vibrant cultural scene and great restaurants.

The old town is particularly enchanting, with many churches and other historical sites, not to mention Old Town Square – the heart of Prague since the 10th century. There is no shortage of cultural events to suit all tastes, including performances by the world’s leading

pop music and opera stars. Prague is also known as a gastronomic destination. From tasty street food to fine dining, there is no shortage of variety in the food on offer. After a good meal, head out to enjoy the city’s lively night life. airBaltic now flies three times per week to Prague. One-way ticket prices from Riga start from 41 EUR. Transit flights from the Baltics and Scandinavia through Riga start from 59 EUR.

Check in or drop the baggage at Business Class counter with Economy Class ticket.

airBaltic / NEWS

New attractive destinations coming next summer Larnaca, Cyprus, from April 6 Sun, white sand and the sparkling blue Mediterranean Sea. It’s hard to imagine a better place for a beach holiday. Cyprus offers a fascinating underwater world to discover for snorkellers and divers. However, if you’re more interested in history than in sand and surf, then you’re also in luck, as there are lots of ancient archaeological sites to visit. Cyprus has been nicknamed the island of Aphrodite or island of love, as it is the location of various myths surrounding the Greek goddess of love and beauty. This legendary background, along with the island’s inviting and relaxed atmosphere, draws many young couples to choose Cyrus as the place for celebrating their nuptials.

Heviz-Balaton, Hungary, from May 4 Nicknamed the Hungarian Sea, Lake Balaton is known for its silky green-yellow waters in the middle of Transdanubia.

The 77-kilometre-long lake is one of Hungary’s most precious natural treasures and a popular resort, offering a wide range of thermal spas. The southern shores of the largest lake in Central Europe are ideal for small children because of the shallow water, while on the north shore the water gets deep much more quickly. Picturesque vineyards in the region produce an assortment of excellent wines that go very well with the delicious local food.

airBaltic will fly from Riga to Larnaca on Saturdays, with one-way ticket prices starting from 84 EUR.

airBaltic will fly from Riga to Balaton on Saturdays, with one-way ticket prices starting from 41 EUR.

airBaltic will fly from Riga to Malta on Saturdays, with one-way ticket prices starting from 84 EUR.

Malta, Marsaxlokk Port

Olbia, Sardinia, from May 4 Sardinia is known for its turquoise sea, white sandy beaches, mountain peaks, valleys of citrus groves, wine and tasty food. The island is a popular destination for boating, windsurfing, hiking, climbing and camping. And of course, one cannot fail to mention Sardinia’s simple yet tasty Italian cuisine, with seafood, pasta and lots of local delicacies for you to enjoy. airBaltic will fly from Riga to Olbia on Wednesdays and Saturdays, with one-way ticket prices starting from 84 EUR.

Balaton

Malta, from May 11 From its North African and Arabic influences (listen carefully to the local language) to its Sicilian-inspired cuisine, Malta is a microcosm of the Mediterranean. Its rich historical heritage beckons at practically every step, with unique prehistoric temples and various museums worth visiting. No holiday in Malta is complete without a visit to its beaches, which are not as large as on other islands, but no less charming. The numerous small coves that dot the shoreline are particularly charming.

Sardinia

Croatia

© Mladen ŠCerbe, Croatian tourism board

Rijeka, Croatia, from June 6 The clear blue waters of the Adriatic Sea make Croatia a beach lover’s paradise at the crossroads of Central Europe and the Balkans.

The country boasts family beaches with gentle coves of pebbles or stones, well-hidden romantic sandy beaches, tidy town beaches and beach promenades for partying and having fun. Furthermore, Croatia offers a lot to discover for history buffs (with several sites on UNESCO’s World Heritage List). Don’t forget to try out the local cuisine, which features many seafood specialties prepared in various ways, thanks to Greek, Italian and French influences. airBaltic will fly from Riga to Rijeka on Thursdays, with one-way ticket prices starting from 55 EUR.

BALTIC OUTLOOK / JANUARY 2013 / 79

airBaltic / BEHIND THE SCENES

Dace Bērziņa-Zalpētere, Assistant to the CEO Text by Ieva Šmite Photo by Lauris Viksne, f64

If you have a meeting arranged with Martin Alexander Gauss, airBaltic’s Chief Executive Officer, then the first person you will meet at his Riga Airport office is Dace Bērziņa-Zalpētere, his personal assistant. Her bright smile and peaceful demeanour are sure to make you think that any problem is just a small hitch that can quickly be resolved 80 / AIRBALTIC.COM

The idea for this interview came from Dace’s colleagues, who often come to her with one request or another.

“Dace is a very good colleague. She is optimistic, openminded and has proved herself as someone we can rely on. Her capabilities, knowledge and positive attitude make Dace not only a wonderful person, but also a pleasure to work with,” says Ingus Bērziņš, airBaltic’s corporate account sales manager.

Dace’s main task is to ensure that her boss’ day runs smoothly. Besides organizing Mr. Gauss’ calendar and meetings, she is sometimes responsible for his correspondence and also helps out airBaltic’s two other board members.

It’s hard to top the praise that Mr. Gauss has for his personal assistant: “With Dace at my side, I can work effectively and lead the company. She knows how to take care of things. I don’t even have to assign tasks to her, as Dace herself knows what has to be done and organizes it so that I don’t have any unnecessary worries, and I can concentrate on my work. I value Dace very highly, both as a professional and as a sincere and pleasant person.”

Dace has worked at airBaltic since February of 2004, when she started out as a flight attendant. “Before that, I worked at an export agency for wood products. It was a successful company and I had a good position there, but I wanted to change something,” says Dace.

“So I left the company. I was 26 years old and sent an application letter to airBaltic, which seemed like an attractive place to work. I didn’t have the faintest idea of what I might do there and was quite surprised when someone from the company contacted me the next day.

I was invited to an interview, as a vacancy had come up in the sales department. The interviewer was a lady from the human resources department. The job in question involved business trips and being away a lot, but I had a family and my son was only two years old. We both agreed that that position wasn’t really for me. When I got up out of my chair to leave, she looked at me and said, ‘You know, I started my career here as a stewardess, and we are putting together a new group of flight attendants.

There’s one free spot left and training starts next week.

Would you like to join the others?’

“There hadn’t been any discussion about a stewardess’s position and I hadn’t even considered such an option. Maybe because it was so unexpected, I told her that I’d think about it. I thought it over during the drive home and said: why not? Initially, my husband wasn’t happy about my decision, but I went ahead with it and started working at airBaltic as a flight attendant.

I discovered many things about myself while in that position. I was continually helping people and really liked that. We agreed that I’d initially work for six months and try it out, but I stayed on for three years, and for the last two as a senior flight attendant.”

airBaltic / BEHIND THE SCENES

Dace’s colleague Inese Peinberga, a senior cabin crew member, worked together with her as a flight attendant.

“You cannot fail to notice Dace – tall, beautiful and always composed. However, her main quality is the magical way in which she can make any dispute between colleagues or customers end with a win/win result. Flying together, you get to know a person in the most unusual situations, and I have to admit that she emerged from all of them as a graceful soul.”

However, Dace’s health began to suffer due to her irregular schedule, so she was offered a place in office administration, where she worked for a year-and-a-half.

Then the CEO at the time, Bertolt Flick, invited her to become his personal assistant.

“Obviously I’ve been lucky to find and to do work that I truly like,” she says. “There are people who do their work and do it very well, but don’t feel entirely satisfied. It’s a fantastic feeling to get up in the morning and head off to the office with a smile on your face. A new day with new challenges, events and people awaits me. Each day offers something new. Sometimes things don’t flow very smoothly and the position can be stressful. There may be precious little time to get something done, or due to some external, unpredictable circumstances, my seemingly perfect plan for the day falls to pieces. You just have to get on with it and reorganize things.”

Michael Grimme, airBaltic’s chief commercial officer, says that Dace provides the office with an extra positive atmosphere. “That not only works to the benefit of the CEO, but also to airBaltic’s other employees and of course, Mr. Gauss’ visitors.”

Dace can now be seen in airBaltic’s new calendar for the year 2013. Her photo accompanies the month of January. “The shooting took place at

photographer Aleksandrs Sokolovs’ studio. The make up, hairdressing and photography took several hours to complete. I was a little worried in the beginning, as I was being photographed at a professional studio for the very first time. I didn’t know how to move and what to do, but the end result was quite good and I enjoyed it.”

The airBaltic calendar features creative photos of the airline’s stewardesses and other employees. Mr. Gauss also supported the idea, intensively taking part in the selection and evaluation of the final photographs. This year’s calendar is a little bolder than previous issues, leaving no one indifferent.

The new airBaltic calendar can be purchased at www.airbalticshop.com in either wall or desk format. BO

Latvia +371 67207121 I Lithuania +370 52395636 I Estonia +372 6058148 I International +49 1805 23 22 22

on Promoti: e d Co

9848219

The best gift for the winter holidays in Baltics comes from Sixt.

(Between 1 Dec 2012 and 31 Jan 2013 rent eg. a VW Golf (or similar) in Latvia, Lithuania or Estonia for only 29g/day.

For more information and bookings, please visit www.sixt.com/airbaltic)

sx07768_AZ_AirBaltic_Bordmagazin.indd 2

09.11.2012 14:20:55

airBaltic / BOOKING CLASSES

A class

to suit your needs Each passenger is unique and each has different demands. In order to help you better design a trip that suits your individual needs, we are now offering five different ticket types on airBaltic flights. Compare the travel conditions and services offered and choose the class that suits you best.

Business Flex One-way ticket price example Riga – Budapest Travel date/time change Cancellation with refund Advance seat reservation Hand baggage Checked-in baggage

Sports equipment

from EUR 585

Business

Economy Flex

Economy

Basic

from EUR 395 (available no later than 10 days before departure)

from EUR 385

from EUR 125

from EUR 45

EUR 50 per direction EUR 100 per direction from EUR 3 2 pieces

2 pieces

3 pieces, 30 kg total

3 pieces, 30 kg total

1 piece

from EUR 3

1 piece

1 piece

1 piece, 20 kg

1 piece, 20 kg

EUR 30 per piece per direction if purchased at www.airbaltic.com

EUR 30 per piece per direction if purchased at www.airbaltic.com

1 piece EUR 19,99 per piece per direction if purchased together with flight ticket at www.airbaltic.com EUR 30 per piece per direction if purchased at www.airbaltic.com

EUR 10

EUR 10

EUR 10

EUR 36 access to lounge in Riga Airport from 9 EUR for hot meal, preorder or buy on board

EUR 36 access to lounge in Riga Airport from 9 EUR for hot meal, preorder or buy on board

EUR 36 access to lounge in Riga Airport from 9 EUR for hot meal, preorder or buy on board

Front cabin

Economy cabin

Economy cabin

Economy cabin

10 Points for each EUR spent

from EUR 50 5 Points for each EUR spent

from EUR 50 5 Points for each EUR spent

from EUR 50 1 Point for each EUR spent

1 piece

Priority check-in Security Fast track Business lounge Meals and drinks

International press Seating Free seat next to you

Front cabin

BalticMiles Points earned from ticket purchase

10 Points for each EUR spent

Available free of charge

82 / AIRBALTIC.COM

Not available

airBaltic / MEALS

Onboard menu Business Class

On airBaltic flights, Business Class customers enjoy a complimentary full meal that includes an appetizer, a main course, dessert, and a wide range of beverages and alcoholic drinks.

On flights from/to Barcelona, Istanbul, Helsinki, Lappeenranta, Palanga, Turku, Tallinn, Vilnius, Kaunas, Tampere, Vaasa, Bergen, Billund, Aalesund, Stavanger and Chisinau Business Class customers are offered food and beverages from a special menu.

Economy Class

Economy Class customers can purchase a selection of snacks, sandwiches, paninis, croissants and drinks (soft and alcoholic) from the airBaltic Cafe. Hot meals are also available on flights longer than two hours.

Order your meal before the flight Chef ’s offer

EUR 15

• Prosciutto ham with Emmentaler cheese • Venison roulade with grilled vegetables • Pear cake • Red wine or orange juice

If you would like to choose from a much wider selection of meals than available on board, then order your meal before your flight.

Our extensive pre-order menu offers more than 20 different meals, including

special dietary and kids’ dishes.

You can pre-order your meal while you book your flight ticket or anytime later, up to 24 hours before the flight, under the Manage booking section at www.airbaltic.com.

Breakfast

Cold meal

EUR 9

• Omelette with mushrooms, with home fries and vegetables • Yogurt and croissant • Orange juice

EUR 9

• Chicken roll with mushrooms, paprika and yogurt sauce • Fruit dessert • Red wine or orange juice

BALTIC OUTLOOK / JANUARY 2013 / 83

airBaltic / BalticMiles

airBaltic / BalticMiles

Ask the flight attendant for your BalticMiles card and start earning straight away!

Register your card online after the flight at register.balticmiles.com and get 50 bonus Points.

Keep earning Points for everyday things like travelling, shopping, eating out and having fun and spend them on free flights and other great rewards – that easy!

BalticMiles is the airBaltic frequent flyer programme and the leading multipartner loyalty programme in the Nordics.

Fly airBaltic and earn

Membership levels

10 Points for each EUR spent on a Business Class ticket

Basic

5 Points for each EUR spent on an Economy Class ticket

VIP

1 Point for each EUR spent on a Basic Class ticket Claim Points later If you have forgotten to show your card, or maybe didn’t know that you’ve shopped at a BalticMiles partner, BalticMiles offers you the option to retroactively claim your Points – even get Points for fights you’ve flown up to 30 days before becoming a member! Just contact a BalticMiles Member Service and we’ll sort everything out.

Executive

The more you fly, the greater the privileges, which include a free luggage allowance, no queues, reserved seats and much more to make travelling easier.

Earn Status Points and enjoy a whole new world of comfort and convenience!

Spend Points on airBaltic flights Exchange your Points for free flights from just 4200 Points Upgrade your ticket to Business Class from just 8000 Points

BalticMiles Member Service In Latvia: (+371) 6728 0280 In Estonia: (+372) 630 6660 In Lithuania: (+370) 7005 5665 info@balticmiles.com www.balticmiles.com

BALTIC OUTLOOK / JANUARY 2013 / 85

airBaltic / BalticMiles

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The Latvian National Theatre The Latvian National Theatre has established a unique position on the Latvian theatre scene and in the heart of the audience by offering a versatile repertory and glamorous atmosphere for over 90 years. Earn Points by expanding your theatrical horizons!

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Attirance

Earn 50 Points

Feel the touch of nature in an exquisite setting, recreating 18th century France in the very heart of Riga, at Attirance Spa, as well as bring that feeling into your own bathroom with a wide range of natural cosmetics made exclusively

by Attirance.

Earn 10 Points

for tickets priced LVL 1 – 7

for each LVL spent

Earn 100 Points

for tickets priced LVL 8 – 20

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Thomson Furniture One of the most important players in the office furniture market in Latvia, Thomson Furniture is the official representative of Narbutas Furniture Company, a leading furniture manufacturer in Eastern Europe providing functional and elegant office furniture of high quality.

ew

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Kin Leaves scratch resistant vinyl skins protect and enhance your gadgets and send a powerful message about their owner. A wide range of designs, available for virtually any device out there – order online easily and get free shipping worldwide!

Earn 1 Point

Earn 10 Points

for each LVL spent

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for each LVL spent

X-dental

ew

Enthusiastic professionals at X-dental love smiles and will take excellent care of yours. Have all dental issues solved effectively and use the great discount system to save money.

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Earn up to 10 Points for each LVL spent

for each LVL spent

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INRE

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Located in the very centre of Riga, at Radisson Blu Hotel Latvija on Brīvības Street, INRE scandinavian design store offers a wide range of design interior items for home and office as well as the best selection of Latvian design souvenirs.

Earn 2 Points

for each LVL spent

86 / AIRBALTIC.COM

ReCure Health recovery and education centre ReCure offers treatments, yoga and exercise as well as advice on improving health in the long term. Reduce stress, solve back issues, improve skin health, detox the body and reduce headaches.

And earn Points!

Earn 7 Points

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Kin Leaves

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ekopreces.lv The first organic goods online store in Latvia, ekopreces.lv provides convenient shopping for everything organic – certified quality items with clearly indicated origin and ingredients. Earn Points for your green and healthy lifestyle!

Earn 5 Points

for each LVL spent

airBaltic / BalticMiles

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Great to spend

Rinno Located in a quiet street in Vilnius Old Town, hotel Rinno has a cosy and home-like atmosphere to which guests love to return, as well as a lovely location, reasonable prices, delicious breakfast buffet, free internet and professional service.

There are more than 3000 rewards to choose from the shop.balticmiles.com and more than 40 000 digital records in BalticMiles Music shop.

Elīna Garanča — Romantique Album

Earn 300 Points for each stay

1 700 Points ew

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Hotel Vyturys Hotel Vyturys is an economy class two-star hotel near Palanga seaside resort Botanical Park, away from the city noise. Also numerous wellness programmes are provided here, including over 60 medical procedures and prophylactic treatment and recreation.

Earn 1 Point

Pica LéLa Necklace “Crown”

11 105 Points

Earn Double Points till May 31.

for each LTL spent

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Tommy Hilfiger “tommy” EDC 100ml

Žilvinas Hotel Žilvinas is situated in a pine wood near the sea, at the very heart of Palanga seaside resort. It also has its own aesthetics and beauty centre and a restaurant for grand celebrations or nice evenings with friends, family, or alone.

12 840 Points

Earn Double Points till May 31.

Marley GET UP STAND UP™ Audio System

Earn up to 2 Points for each LTL spent

57 247 Points ew

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Rehabilitation Center Baltija Rehabilitation Centre in Palanga seaside resort provides supreme specialized inpatient rehabilitation services (rehabilitation II), supportive rehabilitation and ambulatory rehabilitation, as well as sanatoriumcommercial treatment.

Earn Double Points till May 31.

Pippi Longstocking Backpack

7 302 Points

Earn 1 Point

for each LTL spent All the prices displayed include shipping costs to Latvia. Prices and availability of rewards are subject to change and may vary by delivery country.

BALTIC OUTLOOK / JANUARY 2013 / 87

airBaltic / FLEET NEWS

Boeing 737-300 Number of seats 142/144/146 Max take-off weight 63 metric tons Max payload 14.2 metric tons

Boeing 737-500 Number of seats 120 Max take-off weight 58 metric tons Max payload 13.5 metric tons Length 29.79 m

Length 32.18 m

Wing span 28.9 m

Wing span 31.22 m

Cruising speed 800 km/h

Cruising speed 800 km/h Commercial range 3500 km

Commercial range 3500 km

Fuel consumption 3000 l/h

Fuel consumption 3000 l/h

Engine CFM56-3C-1

Q400 NextGen 76 29.6 metric tons 8.6 metric tons

Fokker 50 Number of seats 46/50/52 Max take-off weight 20.8 metric tons Max payload 4.9 metric tons

32.83 m

Length 25.3 m

28.42 m

Wing span 29.0 m

667 km/h

Cruising speed 520 km/h

2084 km

Commercial range 1300 km

1074 l/h

Fuel consumption 800 l/h

P&W 150A

airBaltic codeshare partners

88 / AIRBALTIC.COM

Engine CFM56-3

Engine P&W 125 B

Kittila

Rovaniemi

Lulea

Kuusamo Oulu

Skelleftea

Umea * Seasonal flights. ** Operated in cooperation with tour operator Tez Tour.

Kristiansund

Kuopio

Vaasa*

Sundsvall

Chicago

Borlange

Bergen Karlstad

Tartu

Gothenburg Halmstad

Jonkoping Vaxjo

Visby Oskarshamn

Kristianstad

Westerland Gdansk Dublin

Hanover

Dresden Prague

Cologne/Bonn

L’viv

Saarbrucken Karlsruhe/ Baden Baden

Ivano Frankivsk

Budapest Geneva

Dnipropetrovsk Donetsk

Chisinau*

Heviz-Balaton

Odessa*

Trieste Rijeka Venice*

Simferopol*

Belgrade La Coruna

Oviedo

Santander

Bilbao

Bucharest

Nice*

Vigo

Burgas

Olbia

Madrid

Pescara Naples

Menorca Valencia

Ibiza

Bari* Brindisi

Palma de Mallorca

Alicante Seville

Granada

Athens*

Malaga

Antalya

Malta

Santa Cruz de Tenerife Las Palmas

Heraklion

Larnaca Beirut

Casablanca

Amma

Doha

Sharm el-Sheik Hurghada**

Arkhangelsk

Dnipropetrovsk Donetsk

Simferopol* Almaty

Tashkent*

Yerevan

Dushanbe

naca

*

Baku*

Beirut

Amman

Sharm el-Sheikh**

Tromso

* Seasonal flights. ** Operated in cooperation with tour operator Tez Tour.

Kittila

Rovaniemi Kuusamo

Lulea

Oulu

Skelleftea

Umea Kristiansund

Kuopio

Vaasa*

Sundsvall

Borlange

Tartu Visby Gothenburg

Oskarshamn

Halmstad

Kristianstad

Tashkent*

Westerland Gdansk

Baku*

Dublin Hanover

Dresden Prague

Cologne/Bonn

Donetsk Dnipropetrovsk

L’viv

Saarbrucken Karlsruhe/ Baden Baden

Simferopol*

Ivano Frankivsk

Budapest Geneva

Chisinau*

Heviz-Balaton

Odessa*

Venice* Trieste Rijeka Belgrade Santander

La Coruna Vigo

Bilbao

Bucharest

Nice*

Oviedo

Burgas

Olbia

Madrid Valencia

Ibiza

Pescara Naples

Bari* Brindisi

Menorca Palma de Mallorca

Alicante Seville

Granada Malaga

Athens* Malta

Sharm el-Sheikh** Larnaca Hurghada**

Antalya

airBaltic / CONTACTS

Country/City Ticket offices

Airport Ticket Offices

AUSTRIA Vienna airBaltic Germany Hauptstrasse 117, D-10827 Berlin ☎ 0820600830 local calls (EUR 0.17/min) service@airbaltic.de

Airport Schwechat Terminal 2 Airport Ticket Office Celebi Ground Handling ☎ +431 700736394

Country/City Ticket offices

Airport Ticket Offices

Country/City Ticket offices

Hamburg

Airport Fuhlsbuttel Terminal 1, Departure Hall Airport Ticket Office AHS ☎ +49 (0) 4050753672

RUSSIA

Munich

Airport Munich Terminal 1 Airport Ticket Office AHS ☎ +49/89 975 92553

Moscow airBaltic Russia 28 Tverskaya Str., Building 2 Business Center “Amerop” 125009 Moscow ☎ +7 (495) 2217213 moscow@airbaltic.com

International Airport Sheremetjevo Terminal E Airport Ticket Office DAVS ☎ +7 (495) 9564661

St.Petersburg airBaltic Bolshaya Morskaya Str. 53/8 190000 St.Petersburg ☎ +7 (812) 5700597 F: +7 (812) 5718654 zam@airbaltic.com

Airport Pulkovo Terminal 2 Airport Ticket Office LTD North-West Transport Agency

Kaliningrad

Airport Khrabrovo Airport Ticket Office airBaltic / Aviapartner

AZERBAIJAN Greece Baku Improtex Travel 16. S. Vurgun Str. Baku AZ1000, Azarbaijan ☎ +994 124989239 info@improtex-travel.com booking@improtex-travel.com

Athens Tal Aviation 44 Ihous str.

17564 - P.Faliro ☎ +30 210 9341500 F: +30 210 9341620 airbaltic@tal-aviation.gr

BELARUS Minsk airBaltic Belarus 19 Pobeditelei Av., 6 ☎ +375 172269043 tat@airbaltic.com

Airport Minsk 2 3rd floor Airport Ticket Office airBaltic ☎ +375 172792568, ☎ +44 7792568

BELGIUM Brussels Air Agencies Belgium 153 A Vilvoordelaan 1930 Zaventem ☎ +32 (0) 27126427 airbaltic@airagencies.be

ISRAEL

Vaclav Havel Prague Airport Terminal T2 Airport Ticket Office Air Dispatch s.r.o. ☎ +420 220117540

ITALY

DENMARK Copenhagen

Budapest Airport Airport Ticket Office Celebi Ground Handling Hungary

ESTONIA Tallinn ☎ 17107 (0.51 EUR/min, local calls only) tallinn@airbaltic.com FINLAND Helsinki

Helsinki-Vantaa Airport Terminal 1 Airport Ticket Office airBaltic / Havas

Lappeenranta

Lappeenranta Airport

Linate Airport Airport Ticket Office A.R.E. SrL

Rome

Leonardo de Vinci – Fiumicino Airport Terminal 3, Departure Hall Airport Ticket Office A.R.E SRL

Riga ☎ 90001100 (0.37 LVL/min, local calls only)

Airport Tampere-Pirkkala Airport Ticket Office Airpro OY

Turku

Airport Turku Airport Ticket Office Airpro OY

Vaasa

Vaasa Airport Airport Ticket Office Airpro OY

FRANCE Paris

Airport Charles de Gaulles Terminal 2D Airport Ticket Office Swissport Services CDG

GEORGIA Tbilisi Discovery Travel Ltd/airBaltic GSA 72 Paliashvili st. Tbilisi ☎ +995 32 2 900900 airbalticgsa@discovery.ge

Palanga

Palanga Airport Airport Ticket Office Orlaiviu Aptarnavimo Agentura ☎ +370 46052300 F: +370 46056401 Kaunas Airport Airport Ticket Office Litcargus ☎ +370 37750195

MOLDOVA Chisinau Moldavian SRL - AirService Bd. Stefan cel Mare 3, MD-2001 Chisinau ☎ +373 22 549339 ☎ +549340, 549342 F: +373 22549341 agency@airservice.md

Chisinau Airport Airport Ticket Office Moldavian Airlines Departure Hall ☎ +373 22525506

NETHERLANDS Amsterdam

Amsterdam Schiphol Airport Air Agencies Holland Ticketdesk Departure Hall 3, opposite checkin 22 ☎ +31 20 3161945 / 46 Fax: +31 20 316 1998

NORWAY

Berlin airBaltic Germany Hauptstrasse 117, D-10827 Berlin ☎ 0900 124 7225 (EUR 0.69/min German landline – mobile calls may be different) service@airbaltic.de

Airport Berlin-Tegel Main Terminal Airport Ticket Office GlobeGround Berlin Opposite Gate 4/5

Dusseldorf

Airport Dusseldorf Terminal B Airport Ticket Office AHS ☎ +49 (0) 2114216275 Airport Frankfurt Airport Ticket Office AHS Terminal 2, Hall E, Desk 939 ☎ +49 69 690 61465

Oslo

Oslo Airport Departure Hall Airport Ticket Office SAS

Aalesund

Aalesund Airport Airport Ticket Office Roros Flyservice 6040 Vigra ☎ +47 70 30 25 60

Bergen/Stavanger

Bergen Airport – Flesland Stavanger Airport Airport Ticket Office Aviator

POLAND Warsaw

Warsaw Airport Airport Ticket Office BGS

If there is no local ticket office phone number indicated and you would like to contact airBaltic reservations, please call ☎ +371 67006006.

92 / AIRBALTIC.COM

Stockholm Arlanda Airport Airport Ticket Ofiice airBaltic / Havas International Terminal 5 ☎ +46 (0)8 797 93 23

Zurich airBaltic Germany Hauptstrasse 117, D-10827 Berlin ☎ 0840600830 local calls service@airbaltic.de

Airport Zurich (Kloten) Departure Hall Airport Ticket Office CGS Terminal 2 ☎ +41 438166739

TURKEY Istanbul Airmark Gumussuyu Is Merkezi No:11/4, TR-34437 Taksim ☎ + 90 212 444 1472 F: + 90 212 245 4486 BTreservations@air-mark.com

Airport Istanbul Ataturk Airport Ticket Office AirMark International Terminal, Departure Floor ☎ +90 212 5797951

UKRAINE Vilnius International Airport Airport Ticket Office Litcargus ticketing@litcargus.lt

Airport Tbilisi Airport Ticket Office Discovery Ltd ☎ +995 32433155 ☎ +995 32433188

GERMANY

Frankfurt

Riga International Airport Main Terminal Airport Ticket Office airBaltic / Havas

Vilnius ☎ 890015004 (2.12 LTL/min, local calls only) vnoreservations@airbaltic.com

Kaunas Tampere

Airport El Prat de Llobregat Terminal 1 Airport Ticket Office Lufthansa Ticket Desk

SWITZERLAND

LITHUANIA Airport Tallinn Main Terminal, Departure Hall Airport Ticket Office airBaltic /Tallinn Airport GH

Barcelona

Ben-Gurion International Airport Airport Ticket Office Laufer Aviation GHI Level 3, Terminal 3 ☎ +972 39754076

Milan

Airport Copenhagen International Terminal 3 Departure Hall Airport Ticket Office SAS Billund Airport Departure Hall Airport Ticket Office ☎ +45 76505205

SPAIN

Stockholm Tel Aviv Caspi Aviation ltd 1 Ben Yehuda st. Tel-Aviv 63801 ☎ +972 3 5100213 /4 F: +972 (3) 5108365 bt@caspi-aviation.co.il

LATVIA Billund

International Airport Domodedovo Airport Ticket Office DAVS Ticketing counters no: 177, 185

SWEDEN

Airport Zaventem Departure Hall ☎ +32 (0) 27230667 Airport Ticket Office Avia Partner

Czech Republic Prague

Hungary Budapest Tensi Aviation Kft. Komjadi Bela utca 1. ☎ +36 1 3451526 F: +36 1 9991466 aviation@tensi.hu

Airport Ticket Offices

Kiev airBaltic Ukraine 52 Bohdana Khmelnytshkoho Str. 01030 Kiev ☎ +380 442382649/68 kiev@airbaltic.com

Airport Borispol Terminal D Airport Ticket Office Swissport Ukraine LL ☎ +380 445 916 902

UNITED KINGDOM London

USA New York airBaltic USA 1 Penn Plaza, Suite 1416 NY 10119 ☎ +1 - 877 359 2258 ☎ +1 - 646 300 7727 nyc@aviaworldna.com Chicago 101 N.Wacker Dr Suite 350 Chicago, Il 60606 ☎ +1 - 877 359 2258 ☎ +1 - 312 269 9333 F: +1 - 312 269 0222 chi@aviaworldna.com Los Angeles 16250, Ventura Blvd Suite 115 Encino, CA 91436 ☎ +1 - 818 990 9215 ☎ +1 - 855 284 2967 F: +1 - 818 501 2098 lax@aviaworldna.com Houston 3050 Post Oak Boulevard Suite 1320 Houston, TX 77056, USA ☎ +1 - 713 626 0134 ☎ +1 - 855 284 2967 F: +1 - 713 626 1905 hou@aviaworldna.com UZBEKISTAN Tashkent APG CENTRAL ASIA Kichik Beshagach str.,104 A Tashkent 100015 ☎ + 998 71 1209012

Airport Gatwick Airport Ticket Office Skybreak Terminal S

A Christmas Rich in Tradition Restaurant   

Delicious meals Cold delicatessen buffet Live music

Reservation: + 371 67700000

Bistro · Pub    

500 different types of Latvian and international dishes Lido beer Lido brewery Live music

Open daily 11-24

Krasta street 76, Riga, Latvia · Phone +371 67504420 · www.lido.lv