AIR_June'13

Is su e t w en t y FI v e | Ju ne

2013

Produced in International Media Production Zone

n i k r i B e n a J

latin fever Celebrity chef Richard Sandoval on why Dubai continues to inspire him

debbie harry Meet the woman whose edgy style and attitude made her a feminine icon

on the road One man’s journey to Iraq in search of the country’s artistic talent

licence to thrill Why the new Aston Martin DB9 makes grown men squeal

It takes years to become a real Barista.

But there is a shorter route.

Every Barista has their secret. What will be yours? www.nespresso.com/maestria

Contents / Fe atures Forty Eight

Rolling Back the Years A never-before-seen archive of Sixties London images capture some of the world’s most stylish stars off duty

Fifty Six

Atomic Bombshell Iconic songstress Debbie Harry talks fashion, feminism and that hair with designer Luella Bartley

Managing Director Victoria Thatcher Editorial Director John Thatcher Advertisement Director Chris Capstick chris@hotmediapublishing.com Editor Leah Oatway leah@hotmediapublishing.com Contributing Editor Hazel Plush hazel@hotmediapublishing.com Writer Grace Hyne grace@hotmediapublishing.com Senior Designer Adam Sneade Designer Andy Knappett Illustrator Vanessa Arnaud Production Manager Haneef Abdul Senior Advertisement Manager Stefanie Morgner stefanie@hotmediapublishing.com Advertisement Manager Sukaina Hussein sukaina@hotmediapublishing.com

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Contents / regul ars

Fourteen

Radar

The 44th edition of Art Basel counts Warhol among its many big-name draws

Twenty Five

Timepieces Historic Swiss watchmakers Vacheron Constantin celebrate the art of dance

Thirty Two

Jewellery British jeweller to the stars Theo Fennell on finding inspiration in the everyday

Thirty Six

Art & Design Works by Iraqi artists set to steal the limelight at the 2013 Venice Biennale

Forty Six

Interiors A new collaboration between fashion house and artist ticks the right boxes

Sixty Two

Sixty Six

AIR falls for the ample charms of the new Aston Martin DB9

Meet the restaurateur making Latin cuisine popular in Dubai

Seventy Two

Seventy Six

Looking for an unforgettable holiday experience? We have five...

DesirĂŠe M. Bollier, the CEO of Value Retail, shares her life lessons learned

Motoring

Tel: 00971 4 364 2876 Fax: 00971 4 369 7494 Reproduction in whole or in part without written permission from HOT Media Publishing is strictly prohibited. All prices mentioned are correct at time of press but may change. HOT Media Publishing does not accept liability for omissions or errors in AIR.

Travel

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Gastronomy

What I Know Now

Gama aviation

June 2013

Welcome onboard

I’m delighted to welcome you to the June edition of AIR, Gama’s in-flight magazine.

I hope you’ll enjoy learning more about our global business aviation group and the services we provide as you browse through the pages.

Gama is one of the world’s largest business jet operators – we have nearly 80 business jets operating all around the globe. Established in the United Kingdom in 1983, we’ve grown to have bases throughout the Middle East, Europe and North and South America as well as operating licences issued by the UAE, UK, US and Bermudan Authorities.

In addition to providing aircraft management and charter services, the group also provides aircraft maintenance, avionics design and installation, aviation software, aircraft cleaning and leasing services to a wide range of clients.

Gama’s expansion in the Middle East continues to progress well; our regional fleet has grown significantly over the past 12 months with the arrival of a number of aircraft, along with the continued development of our regional footprint and services. This includes the opening of our Jeddah office and Abu Dhabi base. Also, Gama is now operating the only business aviation FBO at Sharjah International Airport, which is proving to be a very popular facility for Sharjah and the Northern Emirates, as well as a practical alternative to Dubai International Airport.

Business aviation remains one of the best tools available to corporations and individuals who want to make time for themselves and it’s been pleasing to see a continued resurgence in charter flights – the world is travelling for business again and developing much needed revenue for the global economy.

Thank you for choosing Gama – welcome onboard.

Dave Edwards Managing Director Gama Aviation

Contact details: charter.mena@gamagroup.com gamagroup.com

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Gama aviation news Gama Aviation expands Sharjah FBO offering

Gama Group, the global business aviation services provider, is delighted to announcethat its Middle East based business unit, Gama Aviation FZE, is significantly expanding Gama’s customer offering at Sharjah International Airport. Gama’s Sharjah FBO has established itself as the preferred gateway to Sharjah, Dubai and the Northern Emirates, posting a remarkable 75% increase in corporate aviation movements in the last twelve months alone. To meet this customer demand, Gama has added a further five team members to its Sharjah based ground handling and concierge team.

This success has been achieved due to Gama’s close working partnership with Sharjah Airport Authority and the Sharjah Department of Civil Aviation and builds on Gama’s award last year by the United Arab Emirates General Civil Aviation Authority of its CAR Part 145 Aircraft Maintenance Approval.

Gama’s new maintenance and storage hangar at Sharjah is large enough for Boeing BBJ and Airbus ACJ aircraft, both of which are already in Gama’s managed fleet. The facility also has significant space to expand Gama’s regional headquarters. “We are delighted that our customers are recognising the value of Sharjah International Airport for business aviation, which is enabling us to commit to further investment to support and grow services in the region,” said Dave Edwards, Managing Director, Gama Aviation FZE. “Our Sharjah FBO has established itself as the ‘stress-free’ gateway for business and private visitors to Sharjah, Dubai and the Northern Emirates and is one of the first choice technical stops for business jet operators travelling from East to West. I’m confident that our current and future customers

will appreciate the additional support services we are now able to provide.”

Safety in numberS

Gama Group launches bespoke Safety Management System Pre-empting business aviation regulatory requirements, Gama Aviation’s investment in its Safety Management System (SMS) initiative is aimed at further enhancing the levels of both safety and service delivery. The Gama Aviation team operates and delivers services in some of the world’s most challenging locations and environments.

Gama’s commitment includes on-going investment in enabling its employees to deliver an even safer and supportive operational environment for its customers. One of the first of these new initiatives is the launch of Gama’s ‘Safety in Numbers’ campaign. This programme highlights 10 areas of safety, operational and environmental risk, providing a structured and risk-focussed approach for the Gama team to explore opportunities for improvement.

“Meeting and exceeding our business aviation regulators requirements has been an integral part of our business since we began operating nearly 30 years ago, “ said Hannah Smith, Safety Manager, Gama Aviation. “Our innovative and fully integrated campaign ensures everyone in the team can respond to the challenges that face us all in the industry and further demonstrates our commitment to enhancing our safety culture. The campaign is one way to ensure our team understand the risks that exist within our industry, so that we can support them to make the smartest and safest decisions.” www.gamagroup.com/safety

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500,000 Hours 200,000 Flights 28 Years

Gama Aviation Limited Business Aviation Centre Farnborough Airport Farnborough Hampshire GU14 6XA United Kingdom Tel: +44 1252 553000 Email: charter.eu@gamagroup.com Gama Aviation FZC Building 6EB Office 550 PO Box 54912 Dubai Airport Freezone Dubai United Arab Emirates Tel: +971 4 609 1688 Email: charter.mena@gamagroup.com Gama Aviation, Inc. Airport Business Center 611 Access Road Stratford

www.gamagroup.com

CT 06615

Business Aircraft Management, Charter,

United States

Maintenance, Design and Installation,

Tel: +1 800 468 1110

FBO Services, Valeting and Aviation Software.

Email: charter.usa@gamagroup.com

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Gama aviation news Gama aviation adds new aircraft to its middle east fleet

Gama Aviation FZE is significantly expanding both the number and diversity of its managed and charter aircraft fleet.

Over the course of the past few months Gama has added another Embraer Legacy 600 and a Challenger 604 to its UAE charter fleet and an Embraer Legacy 650, Hawker 800XP and a VIP Boeing 737 to its growing management fleet in the region.

Although Gama is firmly established at Sharjah International Airport, with an additional base in Dubai, this major fleet growth marks the company’s expansion into the UAE’s capital, Abu Dhabi, where an Embraer Legacy 600 will be based at Al Bateen Executive Airport. The Legacy 600 type has proven to be a popular charter aircraft for Gama’s charter clients in the Middle East thanks to having two separate cabin zones that allow for increased privacy for up to thirteen passengers as well

as the largest baggage compartment in its class at240ft3 / 6.8m3.

“To have started our fourth year of operation in the Middle East on such a positive note is very rewarding.

The market in the region for business aviation remains positive but slow, so it’s pleasing to see that the hard work and customer service ethic of our entire team here at Gama is producing strong results and gaining significant traction. Whether it’s our executive aircraft handling and maintenance services at Sharjah, the opening of our Abu Dhabi and Jeddah bases, the on-going growth of our managed aircraft fleet providing our charter customers with more aircraft choices, Gama Aviation is totally committed to providing a complete range of business aviation products and services to our Middle East-based clients,” said Dave Edwards, Regional Managing Director, Middle East and Asia, Gama Aviation.

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Gama’S all clear for all weather Gama Group has made further enhancements to its winter season charter operations with approval from DGAC (the Directorate General for Civil Aviation in France) to be able to operate in all weather conditions to Chambery Airport, France. Gama Group’s Falcon 2000 and Challenger 604 aircraft and flight crew are now fully approved and suitably trained for IFR operations at Chambery, reducing many of the limiting weather factors usually associated with flights to and from this popular gateway to numerous Alpine ski resorts, including Courcheval, Meribel and Val d’Isere. The Dassault Falcon 2000 is the most recent addition to Gama Aviation’s European based charter fleet. This addition is based at Farnborough, along with a number of the company’s charter aircraft, including Learjet 45’s, Learjet 60XR, Hawker 800 and 1000 as well as a Challenger 604.

Gama Aviation’s large charter fleet ensures that its customers are able to benefit from reliable, efficient and effective flight operations.

“Chambery Airport has long been a favourite airport for our clients wanting the best access to the ski slopes during the busy winter season,” said Paul Cremer, Commercial Manager, Gama Aviation. “With our Falcon 2000 and Challenger 604 wide-bodied business jets we are now approved to operate in the vast majority of challenging weather conditions at this popular destination for our winter sports customers.”

RadaR

Images: Portrait Joseph Beuys, 1986, by Andy Warhol, Galerie KlĂźser, courtesy of the artist and gallery.

> This 1986 Warhol portrait of German artist Joseph Beuys is one of many exceptional exhibits at the 44th Art Basel. Between June 13 and 16 some 304 international galleries from 39 countries and territories spanning five continents will exhibit 11 decades of work – including, for the first time, galleries from the Philippines and Singapore. artbasel.com

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RadaR > Jazz music’s arrival in New York in the 1920s brought with it cultural awakening and incredible performances. Attempts to document the Jazz Age don’t come more stylish than Jazz: New York in the Roaring Twenties. This award-winning tome, illustrated by Robert Nippoldt, pays tribute to an incredible era. taschen.com

> From Elizabeth Taylor’s first wedding dress to the eye patch John Wayne donned in the 1969 Paramount picture True Grit: an impressive selection of memorabilia will go under the hammer on June 26 at Christie’s Pop Culture auction in South Kensington, London. Also among the historic items on offer is a British quad cinema poster for Jailhouse Rock, 1957, signed by Elvis Presley, and this watercolour and pencil costume sketch of Marlene Dietrich as Amy Jolly in Morocco, 1930. The role earned Dietrich her only Oscar nomination and signalled her arrival as a Hollywood screen and style star. christies.com

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CRITIQUE

Film

Unfinished Song

Dir: Paul Andrew Williams When the beloved wife of grumpy pensioner Arthur falls ill, he reluctantly

takes her place in the unconventional local choir.

At best: “This is a sweetnatured, charming, if modestly conceived picture

which is much better than recent oldie-song drama Quartet.” The Guardian At worst: “Writerdirector Paul Andrew

Williams plucks at our heartstrings with the sensitivity of Mike Tyson singing a love song.” Daily Mail

Passion

At best: “Passion is a serpentine, gorgeously orchestrated gathering of all of De Palma’s pet themes and conceits.” Slant Magazine At worst: “As a movie, quite frankly, it stinks. As an ‘entertainment object’, it will no doubt find its boosters.” Film.com

Dir:Brian De Palma Rachel McAdams and Noomi Rapace star in this crime thriller that explores the ruthless depths of female rivalry, ambition, and what happens when a career-driven employee meets a manipulative boss head on.

Wish You Were Here

A Hijacking

Dir: Kieran Darcy-Smith Four friends head to South East Asia but only three return. Do they know what happened to Jeremy?

At best: “Kieran DarcySmith’s debut feature maintains a vice-like grip that reaches maximum intensity as the mystery is solved.” Hollywood Reporter At worst: “A slickly made but unfortunately distracted debut that squanders a compelling premise and a talented cast with a mishandled plot.”

Moviedex

Dir: Tobias Lindholm A cargo ship is hijacked by Somali pirates, sparking a psychological drama between the pirates and the company’s CEO. At best: “A slow burner; intense, utterly engrossing and believable.” Empire At worst: “Lindholm... infuses every frame of his... film with the slow-burn, high-tension pungency of a particularly addictive DVD box set.” Daily Telegraph

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Art

Even the most avant garde art is alltoo-often produced with a sale in mind – the artist knows their audience, the trends, the taste of the people most likely to fork out for their creation.

But what if the artist has no care, or concept, of their critics’ palate?

Enter Souzou: Outsider Art From Japan, the newly-opened exhibition at London’s Wellcome Collection. All of the artwork is created by artists with cognitive and developmental illnesses, who are living on the margins of society. “Approaches to art therapy in Japan are ‘completely different’ from those in the West,” writes New Statesman’s Charlotte Simmonds; “since a redirection in the 1950s they have lacked strict endpoints or an emphasis on ‘getting better’. Several exhibiting artists have attended these agenda-free programmes for decades.

If anything, go to see Norimitsu Kokubo’s fictional cityscapes: imagined maps of composite metropolises built from memory, fantasy, sounds, stories, and images gleaned from newspapers and the web.

Kokubo, just seventeen, works in a tiny apartment where he can unfurl only a small portion of his ten-metre

paper scroll at a time. The result, chaotic and cluttered and beautiful and strange, simply has to be seen.”

For Brian Sewell, writing in London Evening Standard, the exhibition is notable mostly for its comment on Japanese art: “To the Japanese it must seem to record the fall of their historic culture, for in none of its many sectors is there any reference to the arts and crafts of the past; even the pseudoprimitive clay pottery sculptures seem to lie between Gormley and Perry on the one hand and Black Africa on the other. This is a landmark exhibition in the short history of Outsider Art, too interesting and important not to have been developed into a serious book (and it has not).”

This month, Canberra’s National Gallery of Australia is host to Stars In The River – a gathering of rare etchings and prints by Jessie Traill.

Traill is famed for her haunting images of early 19th-century Australia, a land which she grew up in and loved until her death in 1967. Her works reveal a landmark period of industry – a captivating insight for The Australian’s Christopher Allen: “Ultimately her greatest achievement [was] the series of images devoted to the building of the Sydney Harbour Bridge. She was not the only person to perceive its significance, of course. Undertaken in the middle of the Depression, this enormously ambitious project could not but be understood as a symbol of hope and of reaching beyond the dismal present into a brighter future.

She is able to reduce the complexity of the design, simplify the masses and create memorable images that, in the manner of a synecdoche, encapsulate the whole extraordinary enterprise.”

After a wildly successful showing at London’s Victoria and Albert Museum, Diaghilev and the Ballets Russes has moved to Washington, to the National Gallery of Art. The exhibition reveals the heart of the daring Russian ballet company – and, in doing so,

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Images: courtesy of the Wellcome Collection

Critique

lays bare the life and passions of its master Serge Diaghilev. From Firebird stagecloths to costumes designed by Coco Chanel herself, every inch of the company’s feted repertoire is on show here – and it’s captivating stuff. “The National Gallery’s take on Diaghilev brings together design, costume, music, art, photography, and historical context to offer a thoughtful and comprehensive tribute to the company more than a century after it debuted,” writes The Washingtonian’s Sophie Gilbert. “It’s a tantalizing glimpse into a remarkable manifestation of genius, regardless of whether you count the founder in that category.”

Philip Kennicott of Washington Post wrote: “Any intelligent person today would happily forgo a year in the opera house for one night of time travel back to the heyday of the Ballets Russes,” he writes. “We might be shocked to discover how pretentious and raggedy it was, but at least we could say we were there. And that’s the difference between performance and the plastic arts. The allure of the former is all about the moment, the luck of being present, the willful illusion that magic is happening. Diaghilev sold that dream, perhaps more effectively than any impresario before or since.”

Books

You may not be able to tell a book by its cover, but you can usually tell a lot by the period in which it is set. Look to 19th-century British novels, for example, for prim tales of petticoats and parlours. What, then, of a modern narrative set in an ancient world?

The Romans wrote very little prose fiction, so author Lindsey Davis decided to do it for them – from the comfort of the 21st century. The Ides of April, the latest of Davis’s Detective Falco mysteries, fuses a classical setting with the modern trappings of crime fiction; Falco and his daughter Albia must catch a serial killer, whilst facing suspicion themselves.

“Falco himself, for all his togas, is a thoroughly modern detective,” writes Tom Holland in The Guardian.

“Indeed, it is hard to imagine what a credibly ancient detective might be like, since the genre of the whodunnit is a thoroughly modern one. It is the mark of Davis’s literary skill that she not only recognises this, but turns it to her own advantage.” Barry Forshaw of The Express is also enthralled: “Life is cheap and political corruption is absolutely endemic, but Davis conjures up this teeming, vigorous era with such verve that the trip in time she offers is irresistible.”

Lionel Shriver made a return to the bookshelves last month with Big Brother, much to the critics’ delight.

Pandora, a wealthy entrepreneur, is reunited with her long-lost brother Edison – only to discover that he is obese. When he moves in with her family, the strains soon show, and Pandora’s quest for a ‘normal’ life is thrown irretrievably off-course.

Writing in the Financial Times, William Leith finds the tale reflective of contemporary society: “On several levels, [Edison] is a metaphor for America. He’s too big. But not, as we can see, too big to fail. I liked this novel. Shriver writes well, and with empathy.” The Telegraph’s Elena Seymenliyska sees a more humble

theme: that of a failed marriage, failed relationships, and the quest to ‘fill’ those holes with food. “Edison’s jazz talk never ceases to grate, fatally distancing us from someone who is already deliberately hard to love. For all his heft, he remains insubstantial, serving as a spectre from which others recoil or as a challenge to which they rise. […] The conclusion is piercingly bleak in tone and formally original in execution. It takes the reader by surprise, reminding us, not a moment too soon, that Shriver is a novelist as well as a polemicist.”

Eduardo Mendoza’s An Englishman in Madrid transports its readers to Civil War-era Spain, in an entertaining cross-country caper. Anthony Whitelands, a foppish art historian, is summoned to Madrid by an aristocrat with a collection of paintings. The artworks are disappointing, but the

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aristocrat’s daughter is not – although Whitelands must battle the leader of the local fascist party for her affections. For Christian House, of The Independent, it’s an irresistible premise: “Take one clueless Oxbridge chap, throw him into this sizzling paella of intrigue and watch him hop… The result is a funny, gripping and perfectly balanced blend of P G Wodehouse, Evelyn Waugh and Graham Greene.” The Civil War setting lends the plot a refreshing twist, finds Eileen Battersby in The Irish Times: “Eduardo Mendoza makes effective, if ultimately hazy, use of the [Spanish Civil War] conflict’s well-documented chaos and intrigue… There are so many knots and bumps along the way that only the prevailing good nature of this burlesque, instantly forgettable performance will hold a reader hoping for more cohesion.”

Critique

The stage adaptation of Legally Blonde burst onto Australia’s theatre circuit last month, treating Melbourne to a musical extravaganza. Elle Woods, a student lawyer, is more Barbie than barrister, but as she struggles to prove herself in the Harvard clique her aesthetic talents prove essential to a high-profile case.

The film, starring Reese Witherspoon, received massive acclaim – but can the show live up to the hype? “On a scale of 1 to 10 for perkiness, Legally Blonde is an 11 on the perk-o-meter,” writes Kate Herbert in The Herald Sun. “[Lucy] Durack is perfectly cast as the ditzy, vivacious, seemingly brainless blonde, who emerges as a clever, capable young law graduate. There’s plenty of high voltage song and dance numbers… if you thought Glee was chirpy and saccharine, wait until you see this show.” Writing in The Sydney Morning Herald, Cameron Woodhead is equally charmed: “The music is an insatiably bubbly parody of everything from varsity chants to boy bands; the lyrics are fun too...”

Gemze de Lappe first danced in Oklahoma! in 1943, as a member of the Broadway hit’s first national touring company. This year, at the grand age of 91, she has choreographed a production of the musical at the Lyric Opera of Chicago. “[Producer Gary] Griffin has unselfishly framed de Lappe’s work as the visual centerpiece of his production,” writes Chris Jones for WSBT News.

“As lit by Christine Binder, it all looks simply magnificent — it’s hard to over-praise the narrative precision, emotional honesty and delicacy of the choreography.” The musical, set in 1906, betrays the turmoil of late adolescence, as naive young farm girl Laurey Williams embarks on a turbulent romance with cowboy Curly McLain. “It is so refreshing to see and hear Oklahoma! being done completely similar to the 1943 original,” writes a Chicago Critic reviewer. “All the songs, all the respires, all the underscoring from Robert Russell Bennett’s original orchestrations are used as conductor

Image: courtesy of the Lyric Opera of Chicago

Theatre

James Lowe has 37 musicians in the pit to give Richard Rodgers’ score its due.”

A Public Reading of an Unproduced Screenplay About the Death of Walt Disney isn’t your average biography.

In fact, it isn’t a biography at all – it’s a fictional depiction of Disney’s plans to make a movie about himself, a wholly unflattering presentation of the director as a tyrannical control freak. Set designer Mimi Lien has transformed the stage of New York’s Soho Rep into a charmless office, in which an increasingly unhinged Disney reads the screenplay of his proposed film to family members. Elisabeth Vincentelli of The New York Post is captivated: “[Larry] Pine makes a mesmerizing Walt, puffing on cigarettes and coughing up blood in handkerchiefs in between increasingly patchy thoughts. By the end, he sounds like a cross between Yoda and Gertrude Stein, railing against a Florida man who dared to get ‘in the way, of my liberty, what I want, not free to do, not

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like America, not right to change the plan, plans and change in plans.’ This aggressively stylized approach can make Public Reading too self-consciously arty. But in its roundabout way, the show’s a devastating portrait of a man for whom make-believe was more real than reality itself.” The New York Times’s Charles Isherwood comments: “[Disney’s] real ambition is to solve the problem that most glaringly symbolizes life’s imperfection, namely the hard fact of death. It’s a bugbear that you can feel itching at Walt whenever he is not barking out commands or, in another of the play’s stylistic gimmicks, speaking the ‘slug lines’ and other nondialogue elements of the screenplay.

Ignoring the copious amounts of blood he keeps coughing into handkerchiefs, Walt believes himself to be the living embodiment of the can-do spirit of American optimism that he promotes in his works, and cannot quite grasp that he won’t be able to cheat death too.”

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Timepieces

Frederic Watrelot Christie’s gears up to sell another unique watch find The last time I wrote to you I was unpacking a treasure-trove in Dubai ahead of our exhibition at Emirates Towers of highlights from our Geneva watch sale. That subsequent sale was tremendous, totaling more than $22 million. The salesroom was packed and there was great energy as the bids kept coming in from buyers representing 40 different countries across five continents, including the Middle East. Christie’s also reaffirmed their predominance in the field of Rolex wristwatches by setting a new world record price for a timepiece by the renowned Swiss manufacture.

The best moments for me are when I am bidding for a client, and in Geneva I did this on behalf of people who had come to see the watches in Dubai. Though we only showed a small selection in Dubai, it made all the difference to spend time with clients and better understand what they are looking for. One client whom I met was keen to have a Rolex but wanted one from the year of his birth, and I managed to find one.

Rolex and Patek continue to be the most favoured brands by my clients from this region, and rightly so. The top selling lot in the sale was the highly anticipated, newly discovered and historically important, white gold perpetual calendar wristwatch with moon phases and leap-year, ref. 3448, manufactured by Patek Philippe in 1981. It sold for $1.7 million as, besides prototypes, it is probably the first ever wristwatch

by Patek Philippe featuring a leap year indication. The price made it a world auction record for this reference in white gold. Next for me was an oversized stainless steel split seconds chronograph wristwatch, ref. 4113, manufactured by Rolex in 1942. Confirming its rarity, it sold for $1.1million, setting a new world auction record for any Rolex wristwatch and beating the previous record achieved by the same reference sold at Christie’s Geneva in May 2011.

This month, we have another great story from the watch world…the first ever watch specially adapted for James Bond. It was bought for

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about $35 at a car boot sale and is now included in our Pop Culture auction on June 26 in London with an estimate of $60,000-90,000.

It is a Breitling Top Time and was worn by Sean Connery during 007’s mission to find two NATO atomic bombs stolen by SPECTRE in the 1965 movie Thunderball. It was the first watch to be modified by the famous Q Branch and is equipped with a ‘Geiger counter’, which in the film detects the emission of nuclear radiation. Made by in 1962, it was adapted by the James Bond art department and was the only example produced for the movie.

Watches don’t come cooler than this.

Timepieces

1933 model

> With this, the Grande Reverso Ultra Thin Duoface Blue, JaegerLeCoultre returns to its sporting roots. In honour of the atelier’s 180th anniversary, which falls this year, the famous watch with the swivelling case has slimmed down and now also boasts a dual-time zone display feature on the back.

Since its original design in 1931 the Reverso has been reinterpreted in many guises, including in 1994 when the Duoface concept was introduced – a single movement driving indications shown on two back-toback dials.

Today’s model references the original with a number of nods to its

celebrated design: its blue-lacquered dial matches the exact shade of the 1931 model and features rhodiumed dagger-type hands and baton-type hour-markers. Meanwhile, in the upper part of the dial, the Reverso inscription is detailed in the very same font as that used in 1931. jaeger-lecoultre.com

> Chopard celebrates 20 years of its groundbreaking ladies watch collection Happy Sport with this unique creation. A combination of high jewellery and fine watchmaking, the18carat white gold Happy Sport Diamantissimo is set with 958 baguette-cut diamonds and 1,978 brilliant-cut diamonds, totalling 65 carats in all. This exquisite piece took 4,500 hours to perfect - 1,700 of which accounted for gemsetting alone.

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Timepieces

Keeping time

Vacheron unveils one-ofa-kind tributes to the beauty of dance…

W

hen historic Swiss watchmakers Vacheron Constantin became patron of the Opera National de Paris six years ago two historic and creative worlds united.

With precision, renewal, passion and timeless beauty as shared values, it was almost inevitable

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that the synergy would lead to great things. And it has. Unveiled on the tricentenary of the Ecole Francaise de Danse, the new Metiers d’Art Hommage a l’Art de la Danse collection is a stunning celebration of dance and the work of the 19thcentury artist Edgar Degas.

The art of Grand Feu grisaille enamelling is highly skilled and involves the time-sensitive heat-firing of each enamel layer. Crafted in the famous Vacheron workshops in Le Sentier, in Switzerland’s Vallee de Joux, ballerinas glide within the white gold frame of the three timepieces.

The enamel artist took inspiration for the design from three paintings said to portray important elements of dance: learning, practice and performance. The intricate art of Grand Feu grisaille is hugely timeconsuming and requires incredible concentration and patience. Yet, it enables the artist to include the finest details – from the fold of a tutu to the shadows the dancers cast on the parquet floor. Traditional monochrome grisaille is replaced by translucent brown, allowing depth and softness – all framed in a 40mmdiameter case.

The dancers move to the sound of the self-winding Calibre 2460 and the pieces meet the new standards of the Hallmark of Geneva.

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JEWELLERY

The ‘King’ and I

AIR catches up with jeweller to the stars Theo Fennell, whose incredible key and heart-shaped pendants have earned him the nickname the ‘King of Bling’…

F

ine jeweller Theo Fennell’s first memory of jewellery takes him back to The Ritz London, aged 11, where he and his father were enjoying a leisurely lunch.

“My father pointed out a lady: she was wearing a plain cream-coloured, silk I presume, pleated skirt and blouse, collar up, with this brown crocodile belt and shoes – everything beautifully matched,” he tells me, as we sit amid the bustle of Bloomingdale’s, The Dubai Mall – where he is launching his latest collections. “She was wearing, and you could see it from the other side of the room, this bright emerald ring, which sort of flashed [in the light]. I remember my father saying, ‘Have a look at that ring. Isn’t it wonderful?’ He was the last man you’d expect to ever say such things but it really did ooze chic. I remember thinking, ‘How powerful is that?’ Just one statement [piece].”

Despite retaining this memory so vividly, a young Fennell had no aspirations of becoming a jeweller. Etonschooled, he studied portrait painting at England’s finest art school before almost accidentally beginning his career

‘Some of these pieces are made by 11 different craftsmen... You’re producing almost a mini-building’ as an apprentice and designer at Edward Barnard – an historic, family-run silversmiths in Hatton Garden, London’s famed jewellery quarter.

“I went to art school to become a portrait painter, so when I got a job with these silver people, by mistake, I was surrounded by jewellery and found myself intrigued – because I’d always painted on a miniature scale.”

Today, this fascination with the miniature translates into incredibly intricate art-jewellery pieces – a prime example being Fennell’s new Castle Ring. Handcrafted

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in 18-carat gold with a 23.88-carat black diamond mounted on a miniature brick castle, complete with opening drawbridge, its production, Fennell says, took six different skill sets.

“What we’re trying to do is produce a really good piece of jewellery,” he said. “Some of these pieces are made by 11 different craftsmen, including a stone craver, a goldsmith, a setter, an engraver, enameller, polisher… It sounds a bit pretentious but you’re producing almost a mini-building. If you imagine a great palace of the 17th century or 18th century, the number of guys involved from the stone carvers to the wood carvers, the stained glass window makers, the gardeners, the masons… It’s rare that [people know who made them], they just know it’s a brilliant thing and that thing will last forever. They all worked together at the height of their skills to produce this thing: to me, that’s the important thing – that your team is able to assimilate its own egos into the common cause.”

His ‘Arts [hearts] and key pendants are arguably his signature designs. Among the most intricate of the design house’s newest pieces, already sold, was a one-off, handcrafted Rainforest Opening Key Pendant in 18 carat gold that opened to reveal a tiny 18-caratgold frog on a branch.

Asked what inspires these ornate creations, the welldressed entrepreneur reaches down to retrieve a small notepad from his briefcase. Inside, its pages are filled with intricate black and white sketches of everything from people through to flora and fauna. They are beautiful.

“I draw wherever I am, whatever I’m doing, little drawings of…” he trails off as he turns the pages by means of explanation. “And then they sort of become ideas. So these things [I create] come out of little sketches…When I see something I like, it becomes an idea – either the visual becomes an idea or the idea becomes a visual.”

Fennell’s fan base is large and spans the globe, encompassing some of the world’s most famous women as well as those on these shores.

“The Middle East is an educated and adventurous market and certainly I’ve found the more unusual things have been just as popular here as in London,” he said.

The designer’s latest collections are inspired by marine

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JEWELLERY

life and nature: think beautiful Koi Carp pendants, elegant drop earrings with hummingbird and flower details, and a Paraiba and pearl ring with mermaid tail. I wonder what prompted these themes?

“A few years ago I got really involved in portraiture, I started doing rings of people’s faces, and this led me to more figurative work. I started doing flora, fauna,

simple, to go back to the sort of jewellery that most people wear, and can wear, but that had a bit more of a story to it, rather than just being a row of diamonds or being a diamond pendant.”

It is this level of creativity that has seen Fennell remain at the top of his game for the past 25 years. Through this passage of time, his pieces have remained playful, elegant but with a youthful edge that has ensured a worldwide, age-spanning appeal. How does the husband and fatherof-two continue to keep things fresh and relevant. “I have daughters from their early 20s to a wife in her late 20s,” he jokes, “so I ask myself, ‘What would they wear?’ And I tend to have, muse is much too misused a word, but different people in mind [when I create something]. I like to think that that anyone could wear it at any age, that it’s well made and has a story and that, however inconsequential it may seem, it is going to be something important to someone.

Even if they become the grandest woman in the world, with crown jewels, they have a little bracelet or a pair of earrings that their grandmother gave them or that their boyfriend gave them, that will always be important to them. It will last forever.

‘I like to think that that anyone could wear it at any age, that it’s well made and has a story and that it is going to be something important to someone’ animals, birds… I always thought they’d been badly used in jewellery. Then, with the marine life, I did some work for a friend who is mad about scuba diving. I saw his photographs and thought, ‘There’s an amazing amount of stuff down there in the sea’. [Again, I had] this idea that [such themes] have been shabbily treated [in jewellery, in the past]… so we just started to [design] something very

“It doesn’t matter if it’s abstract, it doesn’t matter whether it’s classic, over the top, whether it’s representative or figurative, it has to be something that has a little bit extra that makes it proper jewellery and will in time become granny’s brooch,” he added. And in a thousand years, it will still be being worn.” theofennell.com

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Pearly Queen

Rediscover the magic of the birthstone of June...

Fine pearls are endlessly elegant and timelessly chic. Providing a subtle summer shimmer sure to prompt admiring glances is this exquisite, one-off necklace by Paspaley. Twelve button South Sea pearls are set alongside 68 of the finest white diamonds and 29 pink sapphires, leading the gaze to the rare, hero 15mm drop pearl. Simply beautiful. paspaley.com

Life’s a charm Aaron Basha’s playful designs have been delighting discerning jewellery lovers, young and old, for years... aaronbasha.com 18-carat rose gold & pavé diamond bracelet; 18 carat gold & diamond charms

18-carat gold &pavé diamond bracelet; gold, enamel & diamond charms - 35 -

18-carat rose gold & pavé diamond bracelet; 18 carat gold & diamond charms

ART & DESIGN

THE ROAD LESS TRAVELLED A British curator has travelled the length and breadth of Iraq under armed escort to root out the country’s creative talents – and he’s bringing them to the Venice Biennale

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s a patron of the arts, Saddam Hussein was unrivalled. Like many an eastern potentate or Roman pontiff, he encouraged painting and sculpture. Under his 30-year regime, the study of art flourished. There were a few provisos, however. Artists had a completely free hand — just as long as they glorified life under their munificent dictator.

Ten years after the invasion of Iraq and the removal of Saddam, artists are awakening from decades of repression. Monuments celebrating his magnificence and military prowess have been destroyed, and that uniquely florid style of Saddam kitsch no longer rules.

Now, not only painting and sculpture but also film, photography, textiles and furniture are burgeoning — from Kurdistan in the north to Basra in the south. All this will be evident when Iraq participates in the Venice Biennale, the world’s largest contemporary-art fair, this month. It will signal the country’s artistic liberation to the world.

For the first time in more than three decades, artists from Iraq will take part in the Biennale — often described as a cultural counterpart to the Olympic Games. The last Iraqi entry featured the work of exiles. But this time, thanks to the efforts of a 55-year-old British art historian and curator, Jonathan Watkins, all the work comes from within the country. “This isn’t the art of a diaspora,” he says. “This is home-grown.”

Visitors to Venice will see the work of a shepherd turned photographer and a children’s book illustrator turned satirist. Travelling across Iraq, Watkins met hundreds of artists in order to select a final 11 to show in Venice. What he witnessed was not so much a renaissance in the

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arts as a resurrection from the dead, as artists came out of the shadows to show him their work. More than six years after the execution of Saddam, many are still fearful of drawing attention to themselves. One Baghdadi portrait painter, too frightened to step outside his house, was loath to be photographed. Society is fragile: under a coalition government, Iraq remains fragmented by political and religious differences.

As Watkins comments, a good week in Baghdad, for instance, is one in which only two or three car bombs explode.

Watkins travelled throughout the country in a convoy of three armoured cars, in the company of machinegun-toting guards. The danger of these artefact-finding journeys didn’t deter him in the slightest; indeed, it only served to increase his resolve. One wonders how many art historians, who inhabit the rarefied world of the Quattrocento and the Florentine school, could have taken to flak jackets and bulletproof vehicles with the alacrity of Watkins. “I wanted to meet as many artists as possible,” he says.

“But you can’t just show up and move around under your own steam. We have to remember there is no infrastructure for the arts in Iraq, no formal networks or meeting places. People often just show their work in small galleries in their homes. And there are no art experts.”

In short, there is no one quite like Watkins, who has spent the last 20 years mounting grands projets. A former curator at the Serpentine Gallery in London, he has worked on festivals in Turin, Milan, Guangzhou, Beijing, Shanghai and Sydney. He currently runs the Ikon Gallery in Birmingham.

Security for Watkins was provided by the Ruya Foundation for Contemporary Culture in Iraq, which commissioned the Iraq Pavilion in Venice. Its chairman is the author and historian Tamara Chalabi, daughter of the controversial former deputy prime minister of Iraq, Ahmed Chalabi. As Watkins acknowledges, the political and historical links of the Chalabi family were crucial in raising money for the Iraqi entry, which has received no government funding. “It would be difficult to do the project without what the Chalabis can offer in terms of security and contacts,” he says. By day he travelled at high speed, sirens blazing, through Baghdad and further afield; by night Watkins embedded with the Chalabis, slept in the heavily guarded family compound in Baghdad.

Tamara Chalabi, who also travelled in the convoy, describes the enterprise as a “miracle” that demonstrates the resilience of the human

Images: 1,2 and 5 - Hareth Alhomaam, Buzz, 2012, courtesy of the artist and Ruya Foundation; 3 - Jamal Penjweny, Saddam Is Here, 2010, courtesy of the artist and Ruya Foundation; 4 - A blast wall in Iraq with a painting by an unknown artist and graffiti, courtesy of Ruya Foundation

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spirit in adversity. She likens artists in Iraq to those emerging from the Soviet bloc after decades of repression and censorship: “It is a huge endeavour to open Iraq to the world.” Given the lack of government subsidy, it fell to Chalabi to raise money for the pavilion from both local and international sponsors. She hopes to fund some of the artists so that they can see their work in Venice. Whether their art itself finds favour on a world stage is almost irrelevant, she adds. “Pulling this off from Iraq is a success in

‘I didn’t want to be bouncing around Iraq imposing a set of universal standards or my view’ itself. There is so much enthusiasm at all levels.

I’ve learnt that, given the right international support, people can achieve good things in this chaotic country.”

Watkins agrees. From the Kurdish territories of the north to the marshlands of the south, he met with “improvisation and ingenuity”. “It’s touching and hopeful and optimistic. Artists have been so cut off and the pavilion is a conduit

for them into the outside world. You have to proceed with the idea that you can make a difference.”

Art has certainly transformed the life of Jamal Penjweny, a notable photographer. Born in 1981 in Kurdistan during the Iran-Iraq War, he worked as a shepherd as his father had done.

With his first simple camera, he started taking pictures of children and the elderly. His project Saddam is Here, featuring people holding up photographs of the ousted dictator, illustrates how Saddam’s presence as oppressor is still felt.

Meanwhile, 27-year-old Bassim Al-Shaker, one of the youngest artists, chose to depict the life of the Marsh Arabs living in the delta of the Tigris and Euphrates, whose wetlands were drained by Saddam during the 1990s. After decades of displacement and death, this area is now regenerating and its population returning.

By 2003, the town of Qaryat Jubaysh had shrunk to 6,000 inhabitants, with only 10 water buffalo.

Now it supports an estimated 67,000 people and 10,000 buffalo — one of many heartening stories.

As curator, Watkins is particularly suited to oversee the Iraqi entry. Known for his championship of the everyday in art, he says: “I don’t like the idea of a separate ‘art’ that is higher than ourselves — I’m interested in

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subtlety and understatement. I didn’t want to be bouncing around Iraq imposing a set of universal standards or my world view. I didn’t want to be the ‘arts inspector’.” As a result, he adds, “The show won’t be the Greatest Hits of Iraq. It’s what I feel is right and appropriate, like choosing your favourite records for Desert Island Discs.”

Watkins’s oblique approach means that there will be no art that deals directly with the American-led invasion of March 2003 — nor its much-discussed consequences. “I wasn’t trying to be overtly political,” he says. “It’s not about making work about checkpoints and

‘The show won’t be the Greatest Hits of Iraq. It’s what I feel is right’ bombs. Nothing I have selected sets out to wring emotion. Much of what I’m interested in is about artists making do and getting by, about ingenuity.”

Watkins cites the example of 33-year-old Akeel Khreef, who lives and works in Baghdad.

He creates furniture from recycled material, including bicycles and generators. One of his pieces, for example, cannibalises the kind of domestic generator that many families use to compensate for the country’s frequent power cuts. During his visits to Iraqi homes, Watkins became well acquainted with the constant refrain, “Al Kahraba rahat” [the power has gone off]. Conducting interviews, he would be frequently plunged into darkness. Disconcerted at first, he soon grew used to conversing in pitchblack conditions. Khreef also uses discarded traditionally woven carpets, adding them for decorative effect. For Watkins, each chair is a perfect example of the casual beauty inherent in “making do”. Necessity has made artists become increasingly environmentally conscious: a pair of sculptors, Wami, who will show in Venice, also use recycled material, particularly cardboard.

All the work will be displayed in a 16thcentury palazzo, the Ca’ Dandolo. “It’s never been used as an exhibition space before,” says Watkins. “I didn’t want to present it in a white cube. It’s a Venetian house, with Iraq insinuated into it.” Hence the domestic title of the show — Welcome to Iraq. Watkins certainly wants visitors to feel comfortable: they will be offered strong black tea, brewed Iraqi-style in a samovar, and biscuits filled with dates (“Tamara’s recipe”).

They can also browse books and photographs,

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on loan from the Iraq National Library. This will serve as a reminder of the country’s ancient heritage as Mesopotamia and its renowned archeological sites, including Babylon and Ur. All the better, then, to take in the work of the oldest participant, 62-year-old Abdul Raheem Yassir. Under Saddam, he worked as an illustrator for a children’s magazine. Now he has a thriving career as a cartoonist and his witty comments upon Iraqi society are published in the newspaper Al-Sabah. One of his drawings features an artist standing at his easel. In front of him is a sea of grim concrete roadblocks. Yet the picture on his easel shows a beautiful palm tree. A comment on appearance and reality? Or the power of art to transform life? One to ponder over the tea and biscuits.

The Iraq Pavilion at the Venice Biennale, commissioned by the Ruya Foundation for Contemporary Culture in Iraq, opens on June 1.

For more information, visit theiraqpavilion.com

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ART & DESIGN

Mueller’s Tale

AIR catches up with the young Viennese artist whose star is ascending…

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s a child, Philip Mueller had just one desire: to paint.

Armed with art supplies bought by his ever-supportive parents, he did just that – and has yet to stop.

Now in his early twenties, the acclaimed Austrian artist is preparing to unveil the third and final part of his exhibition, My Father was Many and I am Happy as a Sailor, at Dubai’s Carbon 12 gallery. “[Painting] is the only thing I ever wanted to do,” he told AIR. “Because no one tells me what I should do and how it should be done, I already feel quite free.”

In the case of his latest, three-part exhibition, that freedom translates into vibrant, sometimes macabre, always thoughtful works that seek to explore “our schizophrenic handling with our past, our heroes or antiheroes and what they left us behind”.

The gallery states that Mueller’s studio “is his dungeon, where the act of painting becomes a shamanistic ritual, and where every canvas initiates a rite of passage”.

In his latest works, Mueller searches through history for his ancestors and other great

characters of the past, including Emperor Franz Josef, US performer Grace Jones, Austrian artist Hermann Nitsch and Chilean-French filmmaker/ actor/author, Alejandro Jodorowsky.

Mueller is the sailor referred to in the exhibition title, travelling through space and time in search of “the miraculous” and, along the way, exploring themes of Greek mythology and German romanticism, among others.

“Every painting tells a story,” he said. “The viewer has to figure out the stories by himself by watching the painting, and everyone should see something else based on their own history.”

The first part of the exhibition took place at Art Cologne, the second and third at Carbon 12.

The final installment will run until September 6.

For one so young, the body of work Mueller has produced in the past five years alone is impressive. For inspiration, he looks to great artists and creative thinkers of bygone years.

“There are many artists throughout history that I look up to: some in a romantic way, others in terms of the wish to take up correspondence with them,” he said. “But most of them are dead.

For instance, I would really like to paint some pieces with Hieronymus Bosch, or go for a walk with E.T.A. Hoffman.” carbon12dubai.com

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Image: Hercules Just Killed Beethoven by Philip Mueller, courtesy of Carbon 12 Dubai

ART & DESIGN

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The Making of an Icon AIR discovers the intricate design details of one of Ralph Lauren’s most iconic accessories…

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he stylish silhouette of the Ralph Lauren Ricky bag has charmed discerning fashion lovers and A-listers since its creation in Fall 2005. Named after his wife, to whom he has been married since 1964, Lauren wanted to create something chic and timeless that reflected her character.

“I didn’t like the girl with all the makeup and high heels,” he once said. “I liked the girl in jeans and a white shirt with rolled up sleeves, wearing her boyfriend’s jacket. That’s the girl I am attracted to. That’s the girl I married – Ricky.”

Drawing its inspiration from 19th century

saddle carriers, every inch of its gently curving shape is a feat of craftsmanship: each handbag is hand-drawn, hand-measured, hand-cut and hand-stitched in a creative process that can take, in total, up to 12 hours per piece. It also involves fashioning 50 separate pieces of leather together (alligator handbags require approximately four skins) – each handpicked and treated for the best possible result and to ensure it retains its beauty as it ages: testament to Lauren’s passion for detail.

Three layers of leather are buffed, stained and hand-skived to form the bag’s gently curving, robust edge; bombe detailing mirroring the folds in the fabric. The handles, meanwhile, are

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ART & DESIGN reinforced with wax cord and specially shaped to ensure they’re comfortable to hold. Hand stitching can be found both there and on the top edge of Lauren’s ever beautiful Saddle Bag Collection Ricky bag.

And the attention to detail doesn’t stop there. In addition to its exquisite material, the Ricky bag features nine pieces of hardware, all custom made in Italy, including its famous front

‘The Ricky bag features nine pieces of hardware, each custom made in Italy, including its famous lock’ lock, which is fitted by hand and stamped with the Ralph Lauren logo (the key for the lock is shipped inside the bag). You can even make it personal by getting it engraved, embossed or monogrammed.

When it comes to the careful process of joining the bag’s separate elements, two artisans work together, turning the design inside out before fitting its various pieces whilst ensuring its shape is well preserved. After it’s been turned the right way around again, it is hand-shaped using special tools.

While its classic look helps maintain its relevance, season after season, a plethora of hues and materials (think bold orange and black alligator skin) have ensured it retains a playful and youthful edge: just ask Jessica Alba or Jessica Chastain, whose bright pink Ricky sent the paparazzi into overdrive at the end of last year. And a refined bespoke service means those looking for an exclusive colour, size or fabric can do so. worldofralphlauren.com

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Images Courtesey of Ralph Lauren Text :Leah Oatway

InterIors

Sara CoSgrove With summer upon us, there’s never been a better time to embrace the best of Brazil I think it is important to recognise the cultures and world events that influence the industry and the key trends that can be blended seamlessly into my own designs. A recent visit to Milan filled my senses and one particular cultural influence that was clear for all to see was Brazil.

I talk a lot about the way that fashion influences interior design but I have also realised that global

economic and cultural trends inevitably impact it too. Brazil has always been popular with international trendsetters, and has emerged as an exciting new destination for leisure.It can now be counted amongst the world’s hottest influencers in fashion and design.

Think carnival, think tropical, think vibrancy and colour.

This seductive lifestyle trend has even influenced restaurants and bars.

Look at the success of restaurant brand, Sushi Samba – a fashionable fusion concept with branches in New York, Miami, Chicago, Las Vegas and now, London, where you will find a unique blend of Japanese, Brazilian and Peruvian cuisine, music and design. You can absorb the culture while taking in the incredible views across the city.

Back to interiors and the trends that were presented in Milan and are already being introduced in new furniture collections. I noticed a lean towards the use of tropical woods such as rosewood and teak, usually associated with outdoor use, which

>Bentley is renowned for its elegance, style and prestige, and these are all qualities that translate beautifully into its new home collection. In collaboration with Club House Italia, the distinguished car marque will launch its fine furnishings range next year, combining 90 years of experience producing the finest car interiors with the British driver’s spirit and a contemporary twist. Judging by the Bentley suite at the St Regis hotel, New York, the use of leather, precious wood veneers, steel, wool, silk and glass works perfectly.

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were fused together with unexpected materials like bamboo, straw, rope, leather, fibreglass and metals to create some really original pieces. Earthy tones that reflect a more laid back approach, juxtaposed with bursts of tropical colour, create a melting pot of styles.

At the show in Milan, Italian furniture brand, Giorgetti took the theme to the maximum by presenting their new collections within a lush jungle-fever inspired stand with Brazilerostyle furniture in bright colour ways and other interiors brands that have embraced this Brazilian flavour are Porada (whose woven walnut bench with a sunshine yellow cushion really stood out) and Lema with their interesting use of timbers.

Tropical-print fabrics from Rubelli Donghia and crystal and bamboo lights by Brazilian duo and renowned product designers, the Campana brothers for Baccarat accompanied the overall theme. I can’t wait to dive in and start selecting Brazilian-inspired pieces for my future projects. Why not dip a toe in too?

> For that unique showpiece, head to the 41st Olympia International Art & Antiques Fair, in London. Between June 6 and 16 you’ll find an incredible array of fine furniture, art and objects that span the centuries: from prehistoric fossils to contemporary art. A tightly-run vetting process means you’re guaranteed high-standard pieces and, as the 180 exhibitors tend to keep their best pieces for this show, you’ll also see some really special items - like this pair of 19th century chairs, from Lennox Cato and covered in faux Ocelot fabric. olympia-art-antiques.com

These exquisite boxes are the captivating result of a new collaboration between Bottega Veneta and renowned artist Nancy Lorenz.

Entitled Skies and Beyond, the collection of 25 one-off leather and suede creations, which debuted at this year’s Salone del Mobile in Milan, feature an array of materials and techniques, including inlaid mother of pearl, silver, white gold, blackened silver, palladium, caplain and moon gold leaf. The designs are influenced by traditional Asian art - Lorenz, now based in New York, lived in Tokyo for five years.

Bottega Veneta has a longstanding tradition of working with exceptional artists, combining its meticulous craftsmanship with their creative flair to produce intriguing, functional art.

It is not the first time it has worked with Lorenz either. Skies and Beyond follows two earlier collaborations – Lunar Landscapes in 2003 and the Botanical collection in 2002.

Each captivating box measures 28 x 20 x 10.5 centimetres and is made of wood covered in crafted leather or suede. Signed and numbered, they will be displayed at Bottega Veneta boutiques around the world for the rest of the year.

“I’ve always followed Nancy Lorenz’s work and felt the time was right for us to introduce this long-awaited third collection,” said Bottega Veneta’s creative director Tomas Maier. “I appreciate her refined technique, textural work and overall artistic sensibility, and am delighted to work with her again on this unique project.”

Bottegaveneta.com

Box clever When art and fashion collide, wonderful things can happen...

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When Tom Swayne discovered a box left by his late father, photographer Eric Swayne, he had no idea just how significant its contents would be‌.

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Words: Leah Oatway

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… Inside, amongst the ephernelia, he found negatives of images taken by his father in the midst of Sixties London.

The subjects were all part of Swayne’s social circle at that time and they read like a who’s who of some of the decade’s biggest and most fashionable stars: from Mick Jagger and Keith Richards through to Jane Birkin and Catherine Deneuve. What’s more, none of the black and white images had been seen before.

“As he knew he was dying he threw away 90 per cent of his archive, including his contact sheets and notes,” recalled Tom. “He left one box and inside was this archive. I had no idea what was on [those negatives] but I certainly didn’t think I would find these intimate moments.”

Among the most beautiful shots are those of Pattie Boyd, who dated Swayne before she married Beatle George Harrison. There are also snaps of Mary Quant fitting a miniskirt on former model turned creative director of American Vogue, Grace Coddington, in her flat in the King’s Road; of Vidal Sassoon styling a fivepoint bob; and of newlyweds David Bailey and Deneuve in Normandy.

All were friends of Swayne, a handsome and popular East Londoner who struck up a friendship with renowned photographer Bailey while working as a barista at one of Soho’s trendy coffee houses in the early Sixties.

His friendship with Bailey and Brian Duffy not only opened doors to London’s counter-culture but, at the age of 29, also introduced him to photography – a passion that would continue until his death in 2007.

‘A lot of what’s great about this particular Sixties work is that they were friends’

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“What is fascinating about the archive to me is that we’re a part of it,” said Tom. “As a child I certainly didn’t know what that meant culturally and I wasn’t all that interested because I was born in 1970 and hearing your parents talk about their heyday as a teenager is quite boring. There were lots of stories of Keith [Richards] and Mick [Jagger] doing this and that in clubs on the King’s Road but my brother and I just used to roll our eyes.”

Swayne’s rise to success was a short and star-studded one. By the mid-Sixties, despite having no formal photographic training, he was one of the hottest fashion photographers around – shooting for Vanity Fair, Italian Vogue and Harpers [known then as Queen].

Large advertising campaigns followed and, during the late Sixties and Seventies, he was often away on shoots.

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As Swayne’s success grew, the shots later discovered by Tom became more of a personal archive – which explains why they went all but forgotten for decades.

“A lot of what’s great about this particular Sixties work is his relationship with the sitter – you can tell they’re friends,” he said. “He was hugely charismatic. There are shots of him with Keith and Mick where they’re just laughing together. They’re not staged or art directed, they’re just spontaneous and intimate in a way that a lot of other rock star memorabilia isn’t.”

It took two years before Tom felt ready to open the box left by his father. He knew instantly

when he was Bailey’s assistant, and who [I knew] could [do] it exactly the way dad would have done it. They’re bespoke and authentic. I used to sit in his dark room when I was a kid and watch him printing. It’s about respecting the authenticity, and the quality, and feel of the print, which is why the images seen are really fabulous.”

He is not alone in this view: response to Swayne’s Sixties archive has been overwhelming.

London’s Proud Galleries in Chelsea is hosting an exhibition of the shots from June 13 to July 28; there is also talk of a book by Christie’s head of photography Philippe Garner and London’s National Portrait Gallery has six images.

‘Whenever dad picked up a camera he’d shake with excitement’ the images were special – perhaps a result of a childhood spent surrounded by the very best of the photographic world: not only was his father a hugely successful photographer by the time he was born but his mother is Shirley Ann, a former Vogue model, and the man who would later become his stepfather, Willie Christie, was a renowned Vogue photographer who had previously been married to Coddington.

“That was my world and I totally knew it,” he said. “I didn’t know quite how cool my dad was though. I knew Grace (Coddington) when I was a kid, she used to use my brother and I to shoot sometimes...”

Despite enjoying significant success, and making serious money, as with many creatives Swayne’s star eventually waned. Later in life he struggled financially – at one point filing for bankruptcy – but at no point did the Londoner look to do anything with his archive.

“He just didn’t have the confidence,” said Tom. “He wasn’t a particularly business-minded guy, he just wanted to have fun and be with nice people – his life in the Sixties certainly reflects that. I think he knew the images were important and beautiful, but I don’t think he realised that there was a business there.”

In sharing the images with the world, Tom hopes to create a lasting posthumous legacy for his father, while remaining respectful of his craft. “People sell archival digitals but dad was very much a purist, old school, black and white photographer, so I worked with the printer that still works with David Bailey, who knew my dad

Would Swayne have been excited about the response to his work? “He would be absolutely delighted,” said Tom. “When organisations like the National Portrait Gallery take six images it’s very heartwarming for me because it’s reestablishing his reputation and getting him some respect. That he threw away everything and left one box… I think that he knew [there was something special there].”

Swayne continued taking pictures until his death. No dip in success or financial difficulties ever dampened his enthusiasm for photography.

“I remember shortly before he died he told me that whenever he picked up a camera he’d shake with excitement. It wasn’t about the money but about the process of taking pictures. He loved it.

“I’m really proud of him. It’s just nice to do something for my dad. And I know the work is beautiful. When people such as Philippe Garner, at that level, that are that respected and deal with the best of the best, want to do a book about my father, it sort of makes my heart sing.”

The Stones and their Scene: Eric Swayne, at Proud Chelsea, 161, King’s Road, London.

June 13 to July 28. proud.co.uk ericswayne.com

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Mick Jagger, 1964 Grace Coddington modelling Vidal Sasson’s five point bob, 1964 Patti Boyd, 1963 Jane Birkin on he banks of the Thames, 1965 David Bailey and Catherine Deneuve as newlyweds, 1965 Keith Richards, 1964

Im ag e s: c ou r te sy of Pr ou dG all er i es Š Er ic S wa yn e, 2 01 3

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Atomic

BOMBSHELL What is it about Deborah Harry – the voice, her attitude, that hair?

Everything, says fashion designer Luella Bartley. She meets her icon in the flesh

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here is a simple reason why I love Deborah Harry, the reason why, when I’m nearly 40, she still makes me want to write her name in neon marker on stuff. As my good friend Katie so eloquently surmised, when I asked her what she thought: “Well, she’s just really cool, isn’t she?”

What I mean to say is: there are thousands of cogent reasons and convincing arguments for her cult status, starting with her band’s name, Blondie, and climaxing with outfits consisting of sailor collars, sequined jersey T-shirts with bare legs and stilettos and that shameless peroxide hair. Add to that her natural attributes of crazy, china-doll-like cheekbones, a hypnotic mouth that blends Elvis’s scowl with Marilyn’s pout in excessive lip gloss, and an extraordinary voice that Rolling Stone magazine niftily termed “bombshell zombie”, and they all boil down to the same fundamental crux — attitude. The kind of attitude that gives you a surge in your own feminine prowess, the kind that manifests itself in bleached hair, pink graffiti and pillowcase dresses, kicking hard and looking at the world with an ironic smirk that doesn’t feel in any way superior.

Did that ideal stick to me? Like glue. And when my adolescent dream finally comes true and I get to meet her in New York, up close she still emanates the same essence of spaced-out, cool sassiness — and wearing a more grownup version of the bleached hair, cute black dress, high-heel boots, smoky-eye combo she’s known for — that I always dreamt she would. At 67, like a few other contemporaries from the punk/new-wave scene, she’s still touring, still being creative, still writing and recording. She even still makes her own clothes, demonstrating that creative energy doesn’t have to have a shelf life. An inspiring thought, although it seems record companies are less open to this concept — there is no record deal for new material, “because we’re old”.

Highlighting the punk-meets-girl attitude that Harry created may seem an obvious statement these days, when Topshop sells the stuff in litre bottles, but before Harry, attitude and femininity in popular culture didn’t like each other very much. The girl groups of the 1960s sent the wretched message (albeit in a wonderful beribboned sound) that it was OK to sit by the phone for days, waiting, hoping, fearing, pleading that he would ring.

would join her, the likes of Tina Weymouth, Cherry Vanilla and Laurie Anderson. “There were a lot of great characters and a lot of them are gone, sadly.” But Harry led the way with a bottle of bleach in hand and wearing a pillowcase that had been pulled out of a rubbish bin — a pillowcase that would inspire me to design a fashion collection nearly 30 years later.

“I don’t think I tried to be an important feminist, I didn’t have that kind of clarity, but I had a stubbornness and an independence and that came across. So that was good. I think that it was an idea that was bound to happen, I was just in the right place at the right time.”

The time was 1973 and the place was CBGB, where a load of achingly eager, sweaty, dishevelled boys in black were getting high on being outsiders, screaming amps and the stench coming from the infamous lavatories. And out of this now-fabled mire rose a mythical goddess.

“You couldn’t be a wallflower in that scene, you had to be a character. What was great about New York at the time was that it was a smaller downtown thing. The city wasn’t popular. New York was like a separate country — people always said that, New York was a separate world. It was this

‘I don’t think I tried to be an important feminist, I didn’t have that kind of clarity, but I had a stubbornness and an independence and that came across’ Cue Harry, first in her own version of a girl group, the Stilettos, already hinting at an aggressive punk irony, and then, once she had found her musical anti-Prince Charming, the guitarist Chris Stein (with whom she got together musically and personally; they split romantically in the 1980s), as the lead singer of Blondie.

Imagine this obnoxious, gorgeous, slightly dazed and unhinged woman singing/growling, “I’m in the phone booth, it’s the one across the hall. If you don’t answer, I’ll just ring it off the wall…”, dealing with the same, age-old phone issue, and one couldn’t help but feel imbued with her confidence. As Harry says: “That was one of the things that was really clear. I think I can take credit for having clarity about that. I was dead sick and tired of all of these songs by the R&B girls, the trios and stuff. They were all victimised by love. I was sick of it. I didn’t want to portray myself or women as victims.”

In the same way that David Bowie was changing the way we looked at boys, Harry provided a perverse light-bulb moment for girls, and she did it in a dirty club full of filthy machismo in the Bowery in New York.

Harry gave femininity an attitude and was unapologetic about her sexuality. It wasn’t highbrow or bookish, it was astute and witty and just a bit sardonic. More women

little island, and the federal government had just tossed us politically, and so the economy sucked here. We were doing it because we had to do it, doing it to fulfil our dreams and obsessions and to be a part of the whole thing that was going on in New York. Everybody was paying attention to what was going on in London with all the Brit bands. I remember Malcolm [McLaren] came over in the early 1970s and he was working with the New York Dolls; at the time he and Vivienne [Westwood] were doing all that rubber. It was so fantastic. I remember one day Malcolm showed up at a friend’s house on 13th Street, and he had rented a station wagon and was selling rubber clothing out the back of it.”

At the time, did it feel like you were part of something that would become history? “I don’t think anyone in the business world was terribly interested at first, so we had a lot of freedom and we could be an ass if we wanted.

We could be as catty to each other as we wanted, and we certainly were, and then all these independent managers and people from little labels started coming around and everybody became conscious, which changed the complexion.”

It does seem different now, much more calculated, and the internet means, sadly, that you don’t have to lock heads with like-minded people in clubs to get your music heard.

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“I think the idea of physical contact and chemistry is important, that personal electricity — and not just this sort of big electricity — I mean the small charge on a personal level is important. A good shot of smelling somebody’s stinking sweat or their lovely perfume, there’s something extra to that. John Waters did that movie in Smell-OVision. That scratch-and-sniff thing, they ought to do something like that, so that you scratch and sniff your computer — that would be so funny.”

Blondie was to exceed both the parable of CBGB and the punk/new-wave scene, incorporating elements of various creative associations into their music, with an everperceptive eye on what was bubbling underneath them.

“Chris has it musically and I have it spiritually or energywise. I do love the idea of cross-pollination, which was unheard of at the time.”

Harry sang songs that were visceral and bubble gum all at once. It may seem like a simple idea — to take Hollywood glamour and shamelessly soil it with rock’n’roll — but she effortlessly honed the perfect New York statement of independence — hard, sexy, ironic, sharp and canny. She was New York. She looked like the living embodiment of pop art.

Images: Getty Images; Corbis / Arabian Eye

‘We were doing it because we had to do it, doing it to fulfil our dreams and obsessions and to be a part of the whole thing that was going on in New York’

Of course, the music was pivotal — the faultless riffs, the feisty narratives — but, as with Bowie, what gave the music its sharpness, its iconic standing, was Harry’s character, a character that made up in intuition what it lacked in high art — her clothes, her mannerisms, her gait, her hair.

Oh yes, the hair. To own the term Blondie was always going to make you an icon. Hair that, again like Bowie, shaped a zeitgeist and summed up a moment in pop culture that words could not. Even her hair was the perfect contradiction between punk and old-school glamour — the dark side of the moon.

“Think about what went before, because historically everything was clean-cut. Then there was counterculture hair; there was a rebellion in having extreme hair. People had long hair, but it was dull. Then there was a period of the 1960s when beehives were popular.” (Debbie went on to play Velma Von Tussle in the John Waters film Hairspray, in which her ever-expanding platinum locks eventually blow up.) She turns to my hair, which has a fresh coat of pink, especially for this day. “I like the colour of yours. A lot of those colours are from Manic Panic, created by Tish and Snookie, who started off as backing singers in Blondie, two little girls from the Bronx.”

And what of the clothes, the partnership with the artist and designer Stephen Sprouse that propelled them both into the fashion history books. Sprouse said of Harry: “She’s the reason I want to make dresses.” They were a match made in a grimy New York fairytale, a perfect marriage of attitude meets outfit.

“In the Stilettos, I wanted my clothes outrageous and funny and sexy — disgusting spike heels, peddle-pushers, drop earrings and big plastic purses,” Harry says. “I used to wear millions of things. With Stephen and Blondie, it became concise, more of an organised identity.”

So, which was the one, the one outfit that made you think, damn? “Well, I think when Steve put me in the black minidress. It was very plain, but I felt good in that, I felt assured. I loved the way the dress hung — it was made out of matt-black silk jersey. It just moved. He had been working for Halston for all those years, and he could really cut a beautiful shape. And with the high black boots, it was so simple and so striking. That was it, one little black dress.

And the zebra pillowcase dress, that was a good thing. That got a lot of mileage.”

I tell her about the Bowie exhibition at London’s V&A — couldn’t she do a similar thing? The Sprouse clothes, the graffiti artwork, the CBGB posters, the album covers, Hairspray, Videodrome — I don’t know, everything!

Harry is offhand and modest. “Oh God, I certainly don’t have that stuff. Bowie was smart in that he had costumes made really well. My stuff, I’d sew it myself. It came out of the trash and it was fragile — imagine pinning up those scraps. I still have most of it, though.”

I guess some legends are just meant to stay that way.

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MOTORING

Beauty BEAST AND A

Jamie Merrill eats up the road in Aston Martin’s shark-like DB9

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ow on earth do you begin to pass judgement on the new Aston Martin DB9?

Unquestionably it’s a thing of beauty with a monstrous 510hp engine to propel you all the way to 295kph, but what does that mean on the road? And what does this kind of supercar performance and luxury really feel like?

Perhaps I could start with a clever riff about trying not to get carried away with the firm’s connection to James Bond before bemoaning its lack of ejector seat and machine guns. Or I could focus on one particular aspect of highoctane performance, beautiful racing lines and obsessive attention to detail. Perhaps its addictive exhaust note or the detailed stitching on the sumptuous red-leather dashboard of my test model.

Equally it would be easy for me to castigate it for its difficult-to-use handbrake.

All these points were running through my head as I drove the DB9. What struck me most, though, was the child-like excitement of the friends and

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MOTORING

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‘A list of performance figures misses the boyish thrill of opening the throttle and hearing your passenger squeal with delight’

Images: Supplied

colleagues I took for a spin along the way. The DB9 can’t really be examined on a rational basis, but on the emotional reactions it causes.

A rational appraisal of its design would point out that’s it’s an update of a familiar Aston Martin style, which divides opinion between those who think the firm has lost its way and those who see it as the perfect embodiment and gradual evolution of an iconic British marque.

Both views fail to explain the thrill its shark-like beauty and its endearingly long, but menacing low-slung bonnet brings to the driver.

Take a look under the bonnet at the gusty V12 and a rational analysis of its performance would welcome its cosseted ride – it gets new adaptive damping – staggering acceleration and the rapid stopping power of its new carbon-ceramic brakes. This is where the DB9 earns its keep, of course, but a list of performance figures misses the boyish thrill of opening the throttle and hearing your passenger squeal with delight.

Finally a more forensic comparison reveals that its slightly ponderous six-speed gearbox is a little whispery, and that the firm’s rivals are ahead in in-car technology and refinement. The reason for this is that unlike, say, Bentley, which is owned by VW, Aston Martin isn’t owned by a major car manufacturer. This means there’s no research centre of clever bods working on luxury saloon technology it can co-opt for its supercars.

For my money, though, the new DB9 is still the best Aston Martin I’ve driven, and a step in the right direction for the firm before investment brings new models in the years ahead. Some will disagree but if you opt for a car that is essentially a weekend warrior (the rear seats are only for show) I doubt you’ll worry about the lack of a seat massage. What you’ll worry about is how that it makes you feel. Or at least I think that’s how you judge an Aston Martin…

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GASTRONOMY

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R

MEX AND THE CITY

AIR catches up with one of the world’s most prolific restaurateurs to find out why Dubai’s burgeoning dining scene continues to inspire him…

ichard Sandoval is a happy man. When we catch up with the award-winning Mexican restaurateur, his popular Dubai restaurant Toro Toro has just opened a sister branch in Miami – making it the first Dubai-born restaurant brand to open in the US city.

Despite already having a hulking portfolio of renowned restaurants to his name (30 to be exact), the Latin American chef is clearly over the moon about his latest gastronomic venture.

“This is very exciting for me,” he said. “Only a select few of my concepts have various locations around the world and it is always a gratifying feeling when I can expand these to other markets.”

It is perhaps more gratifying given that the decision to open Toro Toro at Dubai’s Grosvenor House in November 2011 had been a somewhat risky one: the small-platesdesigned-for-sharing concept had not been tested before in the city and Sandoval had no idea how that approach to dining would be received. He needn’t have been concerned, though: the restaurant has been a runaway success.

“We were totally surprised by the reception, which exceeded all of our expectations,” he admitted. “Dubai’s response to Toro Toro has been nothing short of astounding.” It was this reaction that convinced him to take the idea to Miami.

“The positive reaction that we have had to Toro Toro in such a melting pot, if you forgive the pun, showed us that Toro Toro is most in its element in a metropolis that boasts such diversity and excitement. From that perspective, Dubai and Miami mirror each other.”

It is unlikely Sandoval’s latest venture will fail. It has been 16 years since the chef opened Maya, the New York restaurant that launched his career. Since then he has gone on to open 30 more Latin-inspired eateries, each a success in their own right and several having spawned sister restaurants elsewhere – including Dubai’s Maya Modern Mexican Kitchen + Lounge at Le Royal Meridien Beach Resort & Spa. He attributes his success, in part, to his grandmother, who he grew up watching cook family feasts, and to his father, himself a successful restaurateur with two worldrenowned eateries to his name - Madeiras, in Acapulco, and Villa Fiore, in Mexico City.

“My grandmother used to cook everything from scratch and it’s here that I learned to really appreciate fresh authentic ingredients,” he said. “This is something that has stayed with me and I tend to mimic her style and passion in my cooking. I find that when you are cooking for a large number of people, it’s not necessarily the most fancy or complicated dishes that are most popular, rather, it’s the ones full of flavours that are most appreciated.

Having learnt the basics, and with a passion for food

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GASTRONOMY

firmly instilled by watching his father at work, he headed to The Culinary Institute of America to learn “excellence, leadership, and professionalism, amongst so many other skills that made me the chef I am today”.

Success followed in New York with his contemporary French restaurants Savann and Savann Est before he inevitably reverted to his Latin American roots.

“Not only do I love Latin American cuisine personally, I thoroughly enjoy creating new variations of the traditional dishes, allowing people all around the world to discover the unique tastes of our culture,” he said.

Sandoval opened his flagship Mexican restaurant Maya in New York in 1997. Its success led him to Denver where he opened Zengo, his first Latin-Asian restaurant.

Today, Richard Sandoval Restaurants is one of the

world’s leading international restaurant groups, with an ever-expanding portfolio that includes eateries in Washington, DC, Las Vegas, Mexico, Dubai and Qatar – all of which offer a fresh take on Latin American cuisine that takes into consideration its diverse history.

“Initially, Mexican cuisine was heavily influenced by the Mayan Indians and contained ingredients that included tortillas, wild game, tropical fruits and fish,” explained Sandoval. “As history progressed, chilli peppers, honey, even chocolate, found its way into Mexican cuisine, as a result of the Aztec Empire. And then, when Spain invaded Mexico, they brought with them a range of other ingredients including different herbs and spices, wheat…

This is really when Mexican cuisine became influenced by many other cuisines, from Carribean and South American,

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Images: Supplied Text: Leah Oatway

‘Before I was a restaurateur, I was a chef. Cooking delicious cuisine for people will always be my ultimate passion’ to French and West African, and more. This is why Mexican food is so diverse and varies from region to region.”

Passion for Mexican cuisine is growing internationally: in the 2013 list of The World’s 50 Best Restaurants, two of the establishments hail from there – Pujol and Biko.

“It is encouraging and very exciting,” the chef said.

“Mexican food is rapidly gaining popularity because it is bold and full of unique, vibrant flavours. Diners are just beginning to discover the variety of Latin American chillies and the earthy taste of local herbs and spices.”

As if testament to this, Sandoval is preparing to open his third restaurant in Dubai before the end of the year – Zengo, again at Le Royal Meridien Beach Resort & Spa. He is unabashed about his love for the city: “Dubai pulsates with an infectious energy and it is clearly reflected

in the culinary scene. The rich diversity of cuisines and styles is unlike anything that can be found in the region, or in many parts of the world for that matter.”

Despite an increasingly busy and jet set life, Sandoval insists his love for cooking remains his driving force.

“Before I was a restaurateur, I was a chef,” he said.

“Cooking delicious cuisine for people will always be my ultimate passion.

“Food is a huge part of Mexican culture – gathering around the table and enjoying a meal together is the highlight of the day. I feel the same way about eating. It is my connection to my family and friends and allows me to strengthen the bonds between us. That is why, whenever I am at home, we try and get the whole family to enjoy a great meal together.”

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Gastronomy

Russia

Sweden

Belgium

Finland Denmark

France

Germany

The top 3 UK El Celler de Can Roca Girona, Spain

Austria

Noma Copenhagen, Denmark On the menu Seasonal Scandinavian Food for thought Noma.dk

On the menu Modern Spanish

Netherlands

Food for thought cellercanroca.com

Osteria Francescana Modena, Italy On the menu Modern Italian Food for thought osteriafrancescana.it

Switzerland

Monaco

Japan Greece

Portugal

UAE Italy

Thailand China

Spain

Singapore

Australia

South Africa

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Awards per country 1

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8 13

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The world’s Top Tables Last month’s annual ranking of the world’s best restaurants saw a change at the top, with the family-influenced food of Catalan brothers the Rocas, at Spain’s El Celler de Can Roca, beating the much-lauded Noma. As our graphic of awarded restaurants shows, France remains the country serving the finest fare. But what emerging trends does the list reveal? Well, for the first time a category was devoted to awarding the restaurant with the highest level of environmental and social responsibility which, in cooking terms, means sourcing local produce.

It’s a trend that has encouraged hotels to get in on the act. At Manhattan’s Nyma hotel, guests can embark on a foraging tour led by ‘Wildman’ Steve Brill, who hunts out edible bark, berries and leaves in New York. At Villa La Massa in Florence, guests can join the hotel’s trufflehunting dog in its search for the elusive white truffle, while in London, St Ermin’s Hotel keeps its own bees and their honey is used in the hotel bar’s cocktails. theworlds50best.com

USA

Mexico

Peru Brazil

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TRAVEL

INCREDIBLE JOURNEYS Looking for a truly unique holiday?

AIR rounds up once-in-a-lifetime experiences‌ Words: Leah Oatway

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hen it comes to holidays with an extravagant twist, there are few experiences more out of this world than a 10-day tour of the Russian space programme.

In Moscow, after touring the Yuri Gagarin Cosmonaut Training Center (GCTC), the prestigious training facility for both Russian and foreign cosmonauts/astronauts, there’s an opportunity to participate in the training. Take an exhilarating zerogravity flight at GCTC while fellow tour participants take in the Monino Aviation Museum, just outside the city - a most pleasurable close encounter.

At Baikonur, in Kazakhstan, join the press, military, cosmonauts and their family, as the Soyuz rocket is rolled out for launch; attend the ensuing press conference as a VIP before taking your seat for the launch.

Meanwhile, a very different Russian experience awaits at Ponoi River.

the Guest House for a home-cooked dinner at sunset in the Great Room, which boasts stunning views across the river.

Those seeking a more traditional, and less sporty, waterfront experience should head to the cliffs of Italy’s Amalfi Coast. Overlooking the bright blue waters of the Mediterranean, on the outskirts of Sorrento, the 19thcentury architectural wonder that is Villa Tritone offers a spectacular destination to gather loved ones or friends. The seven-bedroom house (all but one of the rooms overlook the sea) is filled with antique furniture and rare art and boasts Roman columns and beautiful gardens filled with incredible plants (some ancient).

Swimming here is a joy: aside from the house’s pretty pool, you can also climb down the steep steps that lead to a platform on the sea, where tunnels made by the Romans and swimming grottoes are still accessible. Sorrento is on the doorstep

‘Take an exhilarating zero-gravity flight while fellow tour participants take in the Monino Aviation Museum – a most pleasurable close encounter’ Home to a thriving wild salmon population, and some of the most beautiful natural scenery in the world, book the Guest House on the river banks for a simple, but luxurious, break from city life. Able to accommodate up to 12 guests in its six generous rooms, the Guest House offers privacy and is perfect for anglers keen to hone their skills in what is statistically the world’s most productive river. Having flown in from Murmansk by helicopter, loan waders and jackets from the large tackle room at the lodge and spend your days fishing in the wilderness under the watchful eye of expert guides (operating on a strict catchand-release policy). When the day is done, retreat to the comfort of

and the coast’s quaint hillside villages make for heart-warming discoveries.

Italians are renowned for their incredible cuisine: Villa Tritone comes with an incredible family cook, Gracia, who created a reputable Italian cookbook with the lady of the house, and a head waiter called Antonio – both of whom have been serving the family of the house for many years.

Expect hearty, authentic and aromatic food served with a solid helping of local knowledge.

Scotland’s dramatic scenery has enthralled visitors for centuries. From Felix Mendelssohn, who wrote the Hebrides Overture following a trip there in the 1800s, to George Orwell, who found solace and a writing retreat on Jura, an island within the Inner

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TRAVEL Russian space programme Scottish highlands Sugar Loaf mountain, Rio De Janerio

Hebrides: some of the world’s most illustrious composers, artists and writers have found inspiration among its rugged Highlands.

There are few more luxurious, or romantic, ways to experience Scotland’s pine-clad granite peaks and glassy lochs than aboard The Royal Scotsman train. More than 700 miles of the UK’s finest scenery is explored on its Classic Journey fourday tour, which begins and ends in the picturesque capital of Edinburgh.

Charter the train and you and 35 guests will find yourselves heading north across the 1.5-mile-long Forth Railway Bridge, enjoying afternoon tea in cosy armchairs as you pass through beautiful villages and marvel at ancient castles. By night, enjoy a peaceful night’s sleep in one of the luxurious cabins: resplendent with elegant green leather and tartan touches, private bathrooms with hot running water, fluffy towels and all you could need for a restful stay.

When you’re not winding through beautiful countryside, you’ll be taking a boat trip to see wild seals, walking through woodland for enviable loch views, fishing, clay pigeon shooting, or visiting Glamis Castle – the childhood home of the late HM Queen Elizabeth, the Queen Mother.

Finally, for those seeking a wild adventure (albeit in luxury surrounds) there is Frontiers Travel’s Epic South America, a 38-day, eight-country cruise that leads curious travellers on an incredible journey along the coastlines of northern and eastern South America. Before you even set sail from Trinidad and Tobago, you’ll see the return of hundreds of scarlet ibis at dusk to Caroni Swamp, on

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Images: courtesy of Frontiers Travel; The Travel Collection All packages available through Frontiers Travel

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‘When you’re not winding through beautiful Scottish countryside, you’ll be taking a boat trip to see wild seals’ the west coast of Trinidad, and spot hummingbirds and toucans among the beautiful birds at Asa Wright Nature Center. Discover one of the world’s richest ecosystems at Venezuela’s Orinoco River, home to river dolphins and spider monkeys among others; witness the vast and powerful 822foot Kaieteur Falls in Guyana; find out why Suriname’s capital Paramaribo is a Unesco world heritage site; discover

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the haunting remnants of the penal colony on French Guiana’s Devil’s Island. In Brazil, among the many highlights of your experience will be a cruise down the Amazon River; the historic architecture you witness in Uruguay will prove unforgettable and, before travelling home, you’ll discover why Buenos Aires remains one of South America’s most popular cities. frontiersej.com

The

Piano A new addition to an already awardwinning romantic resort offers couples a paradisiacal hideaway‌

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et amid the turquoise waters of the Indian Ocean, with nothing surrounding it save for a sparkling Maldivian lagoon, this small wooden deck offers couples the ultimate romantic setting.

Named The Piano because of its unique grand piano shape, the newest addition to the Baros Maldives resort offers endless possibilities for usage: enjoy a couples’ massage under a full moon, dine under the stars or just relax in the sun knowing you have complete privacy.

Just 20 minutes by speedboat from Male International Airport, Baros Maldives is a small, award-winning, luxurious resort framed by a white, sandy beach and verdant tropical gardens.

LIFE LESSONS

What I KnoW noW Desirée M. Bollier CEO, Value Retail

Know your limitations; know what you’re good at; and know what you’re not good at. That was the first thing I learned when studying at design college, and it’s something I continue to adhere to.

Always hire people who are far smarter than you are, and don’t ever holdback knowledge. The smarter your staff, the more success you have.

I’m passionate about what I do, and regardless of whether I’m hiring an accountant, janitor, or head of design, each of those people must share that passion. It has to be a common thread that runs throughout the company, and if it doesn’t, then somewhere down the line you’re going to deliver a lukewarm product. I’m not a lukewarm person.

The DNA of the company is set. We address one another on a first name basis; we encourage entrepreneurship – if anyone in the company, including the security guard - has a fantastic idea there is a bucket into which they can drop it, and we’ve had some fantastic customer-centric ideas from those security guys.

With age you start to realise that you can’t take life for granted and you become a lot more socially aware. We have an obligation to be more aware of what’s happening in the world, and to try and give back. We have to be more generous with our time so that we can somehow help make a difference to the younger generation coming through.

I have practiced yoga for 12 years.

It has helped me immensely. I think if a lot of people were true yogis then the world would be a better place.

Although I speak to my children via Skype, I do also write letters to them when I’m travelling.

Skype is for the moment, but a letter is forever and for keeps. You can tell stories in a letter. I think it’s important, as a parent, to keep traditions such as this alive, not because they’re simply traditions, but because they convey value and ethos.

We live in such a fast-paced world that deciphering between what’s noise and what’s important is becoming the conundrum of our time. And the people who are constantly running, who take no time to stop and contemplate, are the ones having a hard time.

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R E F I N E D BY OU R H E R I TAGE .

INSPIRED BY THE FUTURE. THE ALL NEW BENTLEY MULSANNE.

Power with refinement. Racing with style.

Only Bentley combines these seeming contradictions into a refined driving experience at the pinnacle of British motoring. May we present the all-new Bentley Mulsanne – the opposite of

mass production. Hand crafted and engineered in Crewe, England, this all-new grand tourer elevates motoring to a whole new level. Find out more at www.bentleymotors.com.

BENTLEY EMIRATES - Al Habtoor Royal Car, Tel: 02 - 6423114, Fax: 02 - 6423118 www.bentleymotors.com, Al Habtoor Motors, Tel: 04 - 2944492, Fax: 04 - 2944422, Bentley Marina Boutique, Tel: 04 - 4475365 www.habtoormotors.com • The name ‘Bentley’ and the ‘B’ in wings device are registered trademarks. © 2013 Bentley Motors Limited. Model shown: Bentley Mulsanne.