Despite creating just a tiny number of pieces each year, Emmanuel Tarpin has built a cult following of clients. He explains how.
EDITORIAL
Editor-in-Chief & Co-owner
John Thatcher john@hotmedia.me
COMMERCIAL
Managing Director & Co-owner
Victoria Thatcher victoria@hotmedia.me
PRODUCTION
Digital Media Manager Muthu Kumar muthu@hotmedia.me
Welcome Onboard
APRIL 2025
NASJET is the leading private aviation operator and services provider in Saudi Arabia that delivers world-class services in aircraft management, charter, flight support, sales, and completions. Launched in 1999 in affiliation with US partner NASJET Inc, NasJet — originally NASJET Middle East (NJME) — demonstrated the highest levels of regional expertise by being the first private company in Saudi Arabia to be awarded an Aircraft Operating Certificate (AOC) by the General Authority of Civil Aviation (GACA). The company has since grown to managing/supporting in excess of 15 fixed-wing aircraft and employing 92 in-house aviation industry experts. We operate 24/7 from a state-ofthe-art flight centre in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, delivering superior levels of safety, service, and value.
VISION
To be the leading business aviation solutions provider in the Middle East.
MISSION
• Safety: Our clients’ and employees’ safety and security are the highest priority in all our operations and services.
• Standards: Our clients receive the utmost levels of service with world-class standards.
• Empowerment: Our employees are vital to our success and rewarded for outstanding performance and innovations.
• Profitability: We strive to ensure the full success and profitability of our organization.
• Responsibility: We pride ourselves on our work ethics and strive for the highest levels of professional standards.
VALUES
• Transparency: We are transparent with our clients and with each other.
• Efficiency: We achieve the highest levels of efficiency within our organization.
• Communication: We work as a team and communicate with each other to improve the success of our business.
Recently we have relaunched our company website to provide a more user-friendly, design-driven portal, which provides a full overview of our services and outlines the advantages of utilising them. You can visit it at nasjet.com.sa
We welcome the opportunity to serve you onboard one of our private jets.
Captain Mohammed Al Gabbas Chief Commercial Officer
Owning a private jet is certainly a pleasure, but it is also a significant capital investment. We can handle that hassle and give you peace of mind knowing that an established and experienced international operator is efficiently managing your aircraft. The company has grown to managing/supporting in excess of 15 Middle East-based aircraft.
Charter
NASJET has a dedicated fleet of ultra-modern aircraft available for immediate charter, including Airbus, Gulfstream, Legacy, and Citation Excel. We are also able to source any type of aircraft in the world if our fleet does not match your preference. Your requests and personal requirements are managed by a team of highly experienced charter experts focused on making your trip exceptionally comfortable and seamless. Remember, we are looking to exceed your expectations, with our Client Service team operating 24/7, 365 days a year, to ensure we are doing just that.
For frequent charter clients, we have a number of flexible and dynamic Block-Charter programs with all the usual benefits of the on-demand charter but with additional cost savings based on volume discounts and flexible payment terms. The charter programs allow you to take control of your flying requirements on a trip-by-trip basis. At the same time, it grants you access to the largest regionally managed fleet with seamless operations and a superior level of safety, reliability, and value. For Charter Broker inquiries, please contact our 24/7 charter department at +966 11 261 1199 or email charter@flynas.com.
Flight Support-Aircraft Owners Aircraft owners managing an aircraft internally can still benefit from NASJET's unrivaled level of international support and significant
'economy of scale' cost-saving benefits. The NASJET Flight Center, Client Service, Charter Team, and Engineering Teams operate 24/7, supporting owners with flight planning, overnight & landing permits, ground handling, fuel management, accommodation, catering, aircraft insurance, maintenance, and evaluations. NASJET will provide aircraft owners with 'back-up' aircraft at attractive prices when their aircraft is unavailable. The core management fleet includes Airbus, Boeing, Bombardier, Cessna, Dassault, Embraer, and Gulfstream aircraft.
Aircraft Sales
As a world-class owner, operator, and manager of corporate aircraft, we are in a unique position to understand the many advantages and disadvantages of aircraft ownership. We offer real-time pricing analysis, aircraft financing at preferential rates, aircraft inspections, sales/ marketing collateral, and assertive price negotiations. Close ties with the leading business aircraft manufacturers, operators, and international sales brokers further ensure the information presented is accurate and timely. Dedicated teams are able to handle legal and administrative documentation, including registration and licensing, as well as scouring the market to present you with the widest
possible choice of aircraft. We have the required experience to enter into negotiations on any aircraft model, and together with marketing and advertising experts, we can help you buy or sell your aircraft with cost efficiency and the utmost discretion. With NASJET, you can be assured that your aircraft sale or purchase is being managed by aviation experts.
Completions Advisory
If you are planning to purchase a new 'green' aircraft or refurbish your current aircraft, we have the capability and wealth of experience to ensure the completion and delivery of the aircraft is to the highest standard, protecting the future residual value of your aircraft. NASJET and appointed partners provide advice on the design, selection, and installation of the cabin configuration, layout, type of seats, carpets, sidewall treatments, and other furnishings, entertainment and communication systems, galley, and lavatory fixtures, avionics packages, exterior paint, and extended warranty programs. Operating business aircraft in extremely hot and humid climates can mean the finishing and preparation of materials must be of a specific requirement. Capitalising on our regional knowledge as an operator of over 15 fixed-wing aircraft with hundreds of thousands of miles flown across every continent in the world, we guarantee your aircraft will be finished to the optimum standard.
Fly Beyond Boundaries, Celebrate Without Limits.
Experience seamless luxury and unparalleled service with NASJET. Wherever your Eid journey takes you, we ensure you arrive in comfort, style, and exclusivity. Wishing you a blessed and joyous Eid.
Introducing Our Fleet
Over 19 fixed-wing aircraft are under our management
‘ We are also able to source any type of aircraft in the world if our fleet does not match your preference ’
Airbus Corporate Jet (ACJ) A318
In NASJET, we have two types of Airbus A318, an aircraft that combines Airbus reliability and intercontinental performance.
Airbus A320neo
Airbus A320neo is distinguished by its innovative technologies and the spaciousness of its cabin the widest in the single-aisle aircraft category. The aircraft is equipped with a new generation of engines that contribute to a 15% cutback in fuel consumption and harmful emissions and a 50% reduction in noise level.
Boeing (B767) and Boeing (BBJ3)
Boeing Business Jets bring the best of private air travel, offering customers a wide range of Boeing products. The robust characteristics of this aircraft also provide an excellent value proposition
when outfitted for more personalised space, unmatched reliability, and worldwide support.
Gulfstream (G450) and Gulfstream (GIV-SP)
NASJET is the longest-standing Gulfstream operator in the Middle East. You can fly in a spacious and comfortable cabin, which includes a full-service galley to serve your favourite meals.
Embraer Legacy 600 and Legacy 650
The NASJET Legacy 600 has installed an Ionization System that eliminates 99.9% of all microbes, bacteria, germs, bad smells, etc., in the cabin air during flight. This Legacy 600 is the first and only business jet to have this system installed during the Covid-19 pandemic and will significantly reduce the virus's spread within the cabin air.
Cessna Citation Excel
The Citation Excel aircraft combines transcontinental range and remarkable efficiency in a beautiful mid-size jet. The cabin offers a comfortable room and a spacious interior. The high-quality leather seats are extra wide with full reclining capabilities for optimal comfort.
Bombardier Challenger 850
The Challenger 850 aircraft is considered a mid-range aircraft which offers a spacious cabin and a large baggage area.
Dassault Falcon 900B
The Falcon 900B aircraft is one of the quietest three engine aircraft with an excellent transcontinental range and the ability to carry a greater number of passengers.
The much-loved Alserkal Art Week returns this month, bringing with it its usual engaging mix of exhibitions, artist talks, workshops and artists from the Middle East, North Africa, South Asia, and Latin America. Among the highlights is Vanishing Points , a collection of new works by Pakistani artist Imran Qureshi that are on show for the first time. Trained in the art of Indo-Persian miniature painting, Qureshi uses video, photography, painting and installation to share his view of the world as a miniature.
Alserkal Art Week, Alserkal Avenue, Dubai, April 13-20
OBJECTS OF DESIRE
Master craftsmanship, effortless style and timeless appeal; this month’s must-haves and collectibles
It was the late New York Times’ photographer Bill Cunningham who said that the best fashion show can be found not on the catwalk but on the streets. Channelling that same belief in individuality, Dolce & Gabbana turned the streets of Milan into one giant catwalk
to showcase its FW25 womenswear collection. Dubbed ‘cool girls’ in honour of the style that originates organically on the streets, it’s divided into two parts: outerwear and eveningwear, both underpinned by the house’s signature Sicilian glamour.
DOLCE&GABBANA FW25 WOMENSWEAR
By stating in his collection notes how Saint Laurent has always played on the idea of contrasts, creative director Anthony Vaccarello set out to prove it, cue a runway that saw models stomp in thigh-high black leather – and waderlike – boots that were paired with
sharply cut, double-breasted jackets, a look that could take you from the boardroom to the fishing lake, should the urge carry you. Other contrasts were a tad more subtle; soft and firm, voluminous and tapered, but always exceptionally tailored.
SAINT LAURENT MEN’S WINTER 2025
Since debuting the Clic-Clac (like almost everything, it sounds much better when spoken in a French accent) in 2021 – a portable objet d’art that houses an interchangeable solid perfume – Henry Jacques has engaged its craftspeople in a challenge to create ever more precious
pieces. Their latest offerings evoke designs prevalent during the roaring twenties and include the Art Deco-inspired Fleur, its petals fashioned from carnelian cabochons, its centre a sparkling mosaic of 46 diamonds, and its case crafted from 18-carat rose gold.
HENRY JACQUES
CLIC-CLAC SERTIS
HERMÈS WOMEN’S RTW FW25
Leather was everywhere as Nadège Vanhée trotted her models down the sand-covered runway in her beautifully tailored Fall 2025 collection – all sharp edges, shaped shoulders and accented waists. In a nod to Hermes’ equine roots, Vanhée spoke of using deep
brown and black tones to reflect a horse’s coat. Accessories wise, while the Birkin came dressed for the season with a wool body, it was the itsy-bitsy Petit Sac that was slung over the shoulder of many a model – expect it to be widely coveted.
These are exciting times for watchmaking at Louis Vuitton, the brand having fully established itself among the elite. And you can trace the root of its success to the Spin Time, a complication that kickstarted Vuitton’s relationship with La Fabrique du Temps, whom they would later acquire.
Sixteen years on, La Fabrique du Temps
Louis Vuitton has developed individual movements in-house for each limited edition piece in its new Tambour Taiko Spin Time collection, which includes this masterful combination of two major complications.
LOUIS VUITTON
TAMBOUR TAIKO SPIN TIME FLYING TOURBILLON
In line with spring symbolising joy, light and renewal, Chanel has introduced the Chanel 25, a bag that takes a novel look at many of the design codes emblematic of the maison’s seasoned handbags – quilting, the chunky, interlaced chain, and
multiple pockets – and reinvigorates them, birthing a new design that looks as fresh as it is practical. Available in small, medium and large sizes, it’s also offered in a range of colours and materials that run from grained calfskin to washed denim.
CHANEL 25 HANDBAG
Drawing on the distinct yet inseparable personalities of sisters – and co-creative directors – Camilla and Carolina Cucinelli, the subtle yet distinctive BC Duo bag has been revamped for spring/summer. It now comes in four sizes, a mini version added to small,
medium and large models, and a range of materials that run from a soft calfskin to suede, lamé leather and denim. Colours, too, run deep: neutrals, as you would expect, but also various shades of the season, including a pretty peach and sage.
BRUNELLO CUCINELLI
BC DUO BAG
OBJECTS OF DESIRE
Artistic License
Pablo del Val, artistic director of Art Dubai, provides the inside track on this year’s festival
WORDS: PAUL JAMES
Mirroring the rapid growth of the city as a whole, Art Dubai heads into its eighteenth edition as the most influential art fair in the Middle East, acting as a hub that showcases not only regional talent –this year sees the highest number of Emirati- and UAE-based artists – but one that draws it in from across the world, particularly artists from lessrepresented geographies. “This year’s line-up demonstrates the growing interest in this region’s art scene, whilst staying true to Art Dubai’s DNA as a place for discoveries,” says Pablo del Val, Art Dubai’s Artistic Director.
Exhibitors in Art Dubai’s Contemporary, Bawwaba, Modern and Digital sections number over 100, and have representation in more than 50 cities. It’s a section of the fair del Val is keen to highlight. “We take immense pride in the diversity of our gallery presentations. Art Dubai Digital, now in its fourth edition, remains a key destination for those interested in how artists and creatives are leveraging digital technologies to address contemporary challenges and envision the future. Meanwhile, our Modern section stands out as a uniquely positioned platform, expanding this year to include Latin American art for the first time. Bawwaba, dedicated to
works produced within the past year or created specifically for the fair, will feature 10 solo presentations this year.
“This carefully curated mix offers visitors an unparalleled opportunity to explore a wide spectrum of artistic expressions, discover new talents, and engage with narratives that often go underrepresented. With 31 newcomer galleries among the 120 participating, this edition reflects the fair’s continued growth and increasing global significance.”
Those first-time exhibitors include galleries from New York (Bortolami), Tokyo (Mizuma Art Gallery) and Mexico City (Galeria RGR).
Outside of exhibiting galleries, Art Dubai’s programmes and partnerships are designed to support and develop Dubai’s cultural ecosystem, “working in partnership with local institutions, business and government to create new opportunities for artists, and enhancing Dubai’s reputation as a centre of innovation and thought leadership,” outlines del Val.
In turn, this leads to significant commissioning opportunities for local and international artists, one of whom, Emirati artist Mohammed Kazem, will present Directions (Merging), a digital installation commissioned by Swiss wealth manager Julius Baer.
“In this installation, Kazem places the coordinates of Dubai at the centre of the space, drawing the visitors to converge as well – a microcosm of the city and the fair,” explains del Val.
“The viewer is then surrounded by three walls containing a collection of static coordinates lining every inch, placed against the backdrop of moving waves, highlighting the feeling of this convergence and borderless flow. The installation speaks to the seamless exchange of resources, the fluidity of nature, and the interconnectedness of distant shores, mirroring Dubai’s evolution as a future city and a hub for global communities.”
Another commission that del Val is keen to highlight is that of Mexican artist Héctor Zamora, whose arrival in the city marks the launch of a new multi-year co-commissioning partnership between Art Dubai and Alserkal Avenue, where he’ll home a site-specific installation.
“This is set to be a truly powerful and thought-provoking experience,” enthuses del Val. “The artist is bringing to the fair a performance that explores transformation and liberation, including new sculptural pieces and performative group actions that involve performers interacting with terracotta objects.”
The digital field also throws up a number of intriguing installations, many of them thought-provoking.
“Ouchhh Studio will return to Art Dubai, presenting Motherearth – a large-scale AI-driven data sculpture that transforms raw climate data, including air quality, CO2 emissions, humidity levels and temperature changes – into a vivid sensory experience,” shares del Val. “Retreat, a new work by Italian artist Jacopo Di Cera, reflects on the urgent need for climate action, capturing the melting of the Brenva glacier in the Italian Alps through an impactful four-metre-high piece with over 30 upcycled screens.
“New York-based data and kinetic artist Breakfast will present Carbon Wake, a digitally-controlled kinetic installation that transforms realtime energy data collected from cities around the world. Gathering energy production data from a new city every minute, the work visualises the impact
‘ We offer visitors an unparalleled opportunity to explore a wide spectrum of artistic expressions ’
of individual energy choices through motion and interaction. “Finally, Kahrabaa is a monumental site-specific installation by Ania Soliman that traces complex interconnections between technology, nature and memory. The work was created in response to Beirut’s ongoing energy crisis, and presents five-metre-high canvases that blend technological and organic motifs,
captured in a series of performative acts involving artificial and real plants being thrown onto the canvases.”
As del Val highlights, Art Dubai is a chance to learn, understand and think, as much as it is to enjoy its wide-ranging art.
Art Dubai 2025 takes place at Madinat Jumeirah, Dubai, from April 18-20. artdubai.ae
Opening pages: Hussein Madi, Untitled, 1976
Opposite page: Héctor Zamora
This page, clockwise from far left: Mohammed Kazem, Directions (Merging); Andrea Marco Corvino, Dominate The Disorder; an Ouchhh Studio instillation; Kate Newby, How Have I Never Seen Until Today; Héctor Zamora, Existence-Emitting Movements
The Boy Wonder
Despite creating just a tiny number of pieces each year, Emmanuel Tarpin has built a cult following of clients. He explains how
WORDS: JOHN THATCHER
In their quest to craft the sublime, it’s not uncommon for high jewellery designers to go that extra mile. In the case of Emmanuel Tarpin –variously labelled jewellery’s ‘new rock star’ and a ‘wunderkind’ on account of being only 32 years of age – it’s more a case of extra miles. Thousands of them.
Once a year, Tarpin embarks on a far-flung journey to the source of his remarkable creations, the mines that home precious stones, to not only meet the miners who unearth these gems but to live with them for weeks at a time, enriching his whole understanding of the journey from mine to market.
“It is quite rough, but the idea is to really understand the mine and to feel the experience, like an immersion. I want to understand all the issues, environmental and human. I believe it’s essential for me to meet all the different actors involved in creating a piece of jewellery. That just makes sense.”
Such trips have taken him to mines in Colombia and, most recently, Paraíba in Brazil, to see how tourmalines are extracted. “I studied gemmology as a student in Geneva and I’ve always been very passionate about the way gemstones are extracted.”
That passion was born from growing up in the French Alps, surrounded by nature. “I have a sensitivity to nature, and gemstones come from her. I used to go to the mountains with my father to look for rough crystals, and that’s when I started to collect gemstones.”
Tarpin’s other love is sculpture, the subject of fourteen years of study, and his mesmerising one-of-a-kind pieces are the purest form of his shared passions. “For me, jewellery is first a way of expression, like an art, and my vision of jewellery, like a sculpture or painting, is really a way to express myself and to share emotions.
“There has to be a dialogue between all the materials I use for each piece. I really feel the need for this. Everything has to work together and has to tell a story. That's why I do only one-ofa-kind pieces, because I put so much emotion into each piece that I would feel very bad to do the same thing for someone else.
"When a client sees a piece of jewellery they must know that the piece is made just for them. There has to be
‘ When I sell a piece of jewellery I'm sharing an emotion with the client’
Opening pages, from left to right: Emmanuel Tarpin; 'Lagoon' earrings in 18ct yellow gold, titanium, sapphires, aquamarines and Paraiba tourmalines
This page, clockwise from top: ‘Frog’ brooch in titanium, 18ct yellow gold, sapphires; ‘Ant’ earring in 18ct blackened gold, diamond; ‘Lily of the Valley’ brooch in 18ct white gold, rock Crystal and diamonds
Opposite page: 'Spider Orchid' brooch in 18ct gold with japanese lacquer and orange pear shape diamond
this deep connection. You only get this with jewellery.”
Nature is an enduring muse. “I don't like to stay stuck in one theme, but nature is for sure the number one. Nature allows you to create very realistic pieces, like flowers and animals, but at the same time if you focus on little details you can create very contemporary pieces that are inspired by nature. For example, I have created earrings inspired by a shell; the shape of the spiral. People will not directly see the nature inspiration, but it’s there and it's extremely rich. There are so many possibilities with nature.”
High jewellery can be serious business, the magnitude of the precious stones used often making for equally serious pieces. But whether in the form of an eggplant brooch, a chilli, some snails or a colony of diamond-studded ants, Tarpin likes to inject a touch of humour. “I always have fun when I create jewellery. In high jewellery, there is this very pretentious approach that you see most of the time with the big brands. It has to be very quiet. It has to be very serious. And I don't think so. I think high jewellery can be very fun, can be very sexy, and can be very fresh.
“I always tell my clients that when you buy a piece of jewellery, you don't want to look 20 years older. You want to look fresh, to look great, and you want to have fun. That's what I like.”
To add know-how to his creative vision, Tarpin spent time on the workbench at Van Cleef & Arpels. “In jewellery, especially high jewellery, if you want to design a piece of jewellery it’s best to know how to make it, because then you will know all the little details that can make a big difference. It makes the process very smooth with all the people at the workshop, because I know exactly what I want and how we can do it.
“But I have to be very involved in each step of the creation because it's impossible for me to just hand over a sketch and say, ‘Okay, do that’. It's absolutely impossible, because each piece is so detailed, and each detail is so important that everything has to be checked and validated.”
Tarpin’s annual production, around 30 pieces, is tiny. Hence the clamour to be one of his clients. Does he intend to keep it that way? “My dream
is definitely not to have shops or retailers everywhere. I love to meet my clients in person, to maintain this very intimate approach. I need this very direct relationship with people, because when I sell a piece of jewellery I'm sharing an emotion with the client, and nobody else could do it because I'm the designer of that piece, the idea comes from me, and I think I’m the best one to share it.”
From his head to his heart and through his hands, what Tarpin ultimately shares is his extraordinary gift.
‘ I think high jewellery can be very fun and very fresh’
This page, from top to bottom: ‘Orchid Sabot de Vénus’ earrings in 18ct yellow gold, Japanese lacquer and diamonds; ‘Snail’ earrings in 18ct white gold, shells and diamonds; ‘Sunflower’ earrings in 18ct yellow gold, titanium, ceramic and diamonds
Opposite page: 'Black Catlleya Orchid' brooch in 18ct gold, silver and antique oval cut diamond
It Takes Two
Richard Mille and Ferrari set the pace with their latest thrilling collaboration
WORDS: JOHN THATCHER
How do you follow the extraordinary? That’s the question asked of Richard Mille and Ferrari after their first collaboration in 2021 produced the eye-popping RM UP-01, a logic-defying, other-worldlylooking timepiece that will go down in watchmaking history. A daunting task? Not when you’re Richard Mille or Ferrari and your shared raison d’être is the daily pursuit of improvement. Those small gains that require a big commitment and even greater expertise. To feel the pressure that stems from this innate drive for excellence and still thrive.
600km may well separate Richard Mille’s factory in the Swiss Jura from Ferrari’s Maranello heartland, but the gap between their ideologies is as thin as that RM UP-01, and their latest harmonious collaboration has birthed another gem –the RM 43-01 Tourbillon Split-Seconds Chronograph Ferrari.
Limited to 150 pieces, 75 are in microblasted titanium, the other 75 in Carbon TPT, materials of extreme strength and lightness that are as prominent in Ferrari race and road cars as they are in Richard Mille timepieces. The functional details of the former are highlighted in red gold and striking red; the latter’s in anthracite and yellow. And it’s powered by the
‘ Why do you want to hide the beauty of a movement behind a dial, when you can actually share that beauty? ’
latest generation of the RM43-01 calibre, constructed from 500 components, which combines a split-seconds chronograph and tourbillon, alongside power reserve, torque and function indicators.
“A collaboration like this is as much predicated on similarities in values as it is on the visual similarities between a Ferrari engine or a component and the elements used in a watch,” says Flavio Manzoni, Chief Design Officer at Ferrari. Those components are what help define a Richard Mille watch. Because while other watch brands often choose to hide them, Richard Mille has always dared to flaunt them, skeletonizing all of its creations. Opening their very heart to share the passion. “Richard Mille always asked: Why do you want to hide the beauty of a movement behind a dial, when you can actually share that beauty?” says Tim Malachard, Richard Mille’s Chief Marketing Officer.
To enhance their beauty requires expert finishing, and with it the touch and precision of an artist: bevels are
hand-polished, milled sections sapphiremicroblasted, contact points lapped and polished and pivots burnished.
It’s a similar story at Ferrari. “We always take care of any visible part of the car,” outlines Manzoni. “There is a natural instinct to look for an aesthetic in everything Ferrari does.”
It is, however, function that’s the driving force for both brands, for whom performance is everything. Which, for Richard Mille, is what made the skeletonization of the RM 43-01 such a challenge. “For Richard Mille, performance means a movement that functions flawlessly in any conditions and withstands extreme shocks – pushing the limits of material resistance and horological innovation,” outlines Salvador Arbona, Technical Director at Richard Mille. “Creating a rigid calibre is relatively straightforward, but achieving the same stiffness with extensive skeletonization while using unconventional materials is an entirely different challenge. Add to this some flexibility in the components to absorb shocks, and we have the equation of performance according to Richard Mille.”
Arbona implores us to “grab a magnifying glass and spend some time looking at the quality of the finishing,
‘ We want to make sure nobody knows what to expect when it comes to Richard Mille and Ferrari ’
the aesthetics of the components and the kinetic ballet of the movement performance,” hailing the RM 43-01 as a piece that must be observed close up to fully appreciate it.
Do so, as we did during the watch’s launch in Paris, and you’ll also see an artful integration of both brands’ identities, right down to the minutest details: its barrel jewel setting is a nod to the clutch wheel of a F154 V8 engine; hexagonal socket-head screws are like those that secure Ferrari engine covers; and X-shaped structures on the movement bridges mirror the lattice on Ferrari crankcases. Just as the tachometer often dominates the dashboard of cars, so too does the chronograph’s counter sit at the centre of this watch.
“We also looked closely at the colours, materials and fabrics used by Ferrari,” says Arbona. “We were interested in the materials and finishing that would deliver a 3D aspect in the movement. The team experimented with surface treatments, machining and polishing. Ferrari was
very open to us taking inspiration from the mechanical engineering, as well as the pure aesthetics of the car.”
Such aesthetics, more overt to the naked eye, include the chronograph pusher, the lozenge shape of which mimics the rear lights on Ferrari’s SF90 Stradale.
It’s a true racing machine on the wrist. It’s also unmistakably a Richard Mille, which may surprise many on the back of the visually mind-blowing RM UP-01. But as Alexandre Mille, the company’s Global CEO explains, that in itself follows the same path of unpredictability. “We want to make sure nobody knows what to expect when it comes to Richard Mille and Ferrari. Everybody would have expected something like this (the RM 43-01) when we unveiled the RM UP-01, which nobody foresaw. This makes sure that from now on, when people hear there’s another Richard Mille and Ferrari collaboration in development, they will never know what to expect, and that’s very important for us.”
Our mind is already racing with thoughts of the next one.
The White Lotus star Michelle Monaghan on her ‘awkward and confronting’ role in the revered show, acting as a way to pay off her college loans, and the Tom Cruise cake
WORDS: ADAM WHITE
“Ican rattle off on one hand the movies I’ve worked on with women,” Michelle Monaghan laughs. As if to prove her point, she begins to count the sausage fests she’s been in and quickly runs out of fingers. Hollywood’s most prolific wife, girlfriend and partner-inperil, Monaghan has spent 25 years in film and television romantically involved with everyone from Tom Cruise and Adam Sandler to Woody Harrelson and Jake Gyllenhaal.
These were all different kinds of wife and girlfriend, I should add – tortured and restless while caught between Harrelson and Matthew McConaughy in True Detective; tough and resourceful when kidnapped by Philip Seymour Hoffman and averting deadly missiles in the Mission: Impossible movies. It’s not as if Monaghan has spent nearly three decades chopping vegetables in kitchen scenes and applying lotion to her hands before climbing into bed. But still. Even when you’re counting Gone Baby Gone – where she solved a missing persons case with Casey Affleck – or her star-making turn as a struggling actor in Shane Black’s frothy crime comedy Kiss Kiss Bang Bang… it’s been a hell of a lot of dudes.
“I don’t know if I even noticed it for a long time,” the 48-year-old says today, while dressed in a luxe power suit in a London hotel room, “When I started acting, that was just what it was. If you were in a movie, you had a lot of male co-stars. If you were watching a movie, you were watching a lot of guys. It was the culture. It’s what was served on a plate for us and what we ate up.”
She also didn’t notice it because it was never really an issue for her. Monaghan admits to being an eternal optimist, and says she’s led a very charmed life in the industry – there’s been no drama, no scandal, no attempts to undermine her voice on male-heavy sets. “[On Kiss Kiss Bang Bang], Robert Downey Jr was like my mentor, and so good to me and generous,” she says. “And then I went on to work with Tom Cruise, who I hold in such high esteem. Those experiences were the foundation of my career, you know? And only ever empowered me.” Later, when I blanch at yet another story of a divine male co-star (George Clooney, that time), she seems to clock my cynicism. “I
‘ So often things that on paper look like setbacks have ended up being really great for me in the long run’
know how I sound, but I’m telling you – they’ve all been so lovely!” she boasts. “I’ve had good fortune, what can I say?” Monaghan embodies an abstract kind of famous. “She was in that thing,” she once joked. “The romantic comedy we watched on the plane, maybe?” Her face is incredibly striking (she was, inevitably, a model before she began acting), but also chameleonlike – you could imagine her being the result of a lab experiment involving DNA pilfered from Jennifer Garner, Katie Holmes, Kate Beckinsale and Ruth Wilson. On screen, even in an underwritten role, she carries with her a strength and a grit, something likely fostered in her upbringing – she grew up in a tiny rural community in Iowa
with a population of just 772 people, her father worked in a factory, her mother in a daycare centre. Little-seen indie films such as 2008’s grimy yet hopeful Trucker fully lean into that mettle she has; a testosterone-heavy series like True Detective seemed to stumble upon it almost by accident. In everything, though, Monaghan inspires a whisper of comfortable familiarity rather than stone-cold recognition. Perhaps, that is, until her latest role. In the third season of The White Lotus, Monaghan gives what could be described as a star-reminding performance, at once radiant and completely unbearable. But then unbearable is a minimum requirement for The White Lotus. Mike White’s perceptive satire collects under-theradar character actors like infinity stones, flies them to the fictional holiday resort franchise of the title and provides them with prickly creations to play. This season, which wraps on screen this month, Monaghan stars as one of a trio of lifelong friends who
Above: still from The White Lotus (2025)
visit the Thai branch of The White Lotus for a week of sun, spirituality and latent passive aggression.
She, Carrie Coon and Leslie Bibb – yes, Monaghan has actual female co-stars here – play women who existed on an even playing field as teenagers but now have vastly different lives. Monaghan is a famous TV actor, Bibb has married rich, and Coon is a stressed single mum. All are irritable, exhausted and subtly mean, dressing up their cruelty about one another in faux concern.
“Mike had witnessed friendships in his life, and particularly female friendships, that just perpetuate comparisons, and the judgement that we put on ourselves compared to others,” she says. “He’s like, man, women have it rough out there!” She laughs. “But I was really heartened by that – that he can write these women in a very fun, heightened kind of way, while also making them feel very real and relatable.”
White wanted the friends to come off like “a big, blonde blob”, Monaghan remembers, with her audition consisting of lines of dialogue from each of the three characters, as if they were interchangeable. When she was hired, she was given all eight scripts for the season – a rarity in television – and read them front-to-back over the course of a flight from Los Angeles to Australia.
How did she feel about being a successful actor playing a successful actor? She winces. “I’m gonna be honest,” she says. “It was a little bit awkward and confronting. Like, page one: famous TV actress who lives in Malibu? That hits a little close to home, I’m not gonna lie.” But as she read on, she saw the differences between them. Jaclyn, her character, being sort of awful, for one. “She’s her own unique person, absolutely,” she says, which is putting it rather nicely. “And that was comforting.”
One of the major tensions underpinning the dynamic between Jaclyn, Bibb’s Kate and Coon’s Laurie is that Jaclyn – who has become infinitely wealthy over the course of their friendship – paid for the Thailand trip out of her own pocket. And while she promises it’s no big deal, you’re not quite sure if you believe her. It’s a gift. Maybe. It won’t require anything
‘ I can rattle off on one hand the movies I’ve worked on with women’
in return. Sort of. It’s a one-off. Ish. Inevitably, it becomes an issue.
I’m curious if Monaghan, given her working-class background, has grappled with those kinds of scenarios herself.
“It would be naïve to say there isn’t an awareness around where I came from and how I live now,” she says. “But I think the things that sustain you as a person, and in the industry I’m in, are the things that remain with you all the time. Your values, your relationships, and those very basic things. For me, those things have stayed the same. Those have been fundamental to me.”
If Monaghan’s career has always seemed to trundle along at a steady simmer, it may be because it happened by accident. “Becoming an actress wasn’t something I dreamt of doing,” she says. “It was just something I, honest to God, kind of fell into. I only thought of it as a way to pay off my college loans.” While studying journalism in Chicago, she modelled on the side to make ends meet, and slowly transitioned to acting on a whim.
In those early days, she had the awkward distinction of winding up on the cutting room floor with
eerie regularity. Her role as Richard Gere’s co-worker in the erotic thriller Unfaithful was reduced to a single line, while significant supporting turns in the Keanu Reeves comic-book movie Constantine and George Clooney’s Oscar-winning political thriller Syriana were completely excised – she had played Reeves’s demonic ex in the former, and a beauty queen married off to a wealthy Arab in the latter.
I tell Monaghan that I’d probably plunge into an existential crisis if I was new to acting and kept being cut from the movies I was cast in, but she admits she wasn’t too bothered by it.
“I think what was helpful was that I had a very strong sense of self by then,” she says. “I’d already travelled the world as a model, so I knew how to stick up for myself and advocate for myself. I’d developed such a thick skin by the time I started acting that I didn’t have an ego about it.”
She remembers being called up by Francis Lawrence, the director of Constantine, who was incredibly apologetic. “He said he had to cut me out of the movie, just because of how long the movie was getting, and my response was literally, ‘Do I have to give my salary back?’” She cringes.
“Like I was so green at that point that I genuinely thought you have to give back the money if you get cut from a movie, and I’d been paying off my loans with it already. So it was only super practical stuff that I was worried about.”
Credit: The Interview People
Monaghan has an uncanny ability to always look on the bright side of things. She got a lovely hand-written note from Clooney apologising profusely for her Syriana vanishing. And the cut footage from Constantine eventually got into the hands of filmmaker JJ Abrams, who then invited Monaghan to audition for his Mission: Impossible III. “Isn’t that crazy?” she beams. “I’m telling you –it’s the universe looking out for me. I firmly believe everything happens for a reason. So often things that on paper look like setbacks have ended up being really great for me in the long run.”
She remains a big fan of Cruise, who she’s worked with on three of the Mission: Impossibles. I wonder, though, if she receives the infamous “Tom Cruise cake” – the vaguely apocryphal coconut treat that Cruise reportedly sends to every one of his co-stars and collaborators on their birthdays and/or at Christmas.
“Of course I get the Tom Cruise cake,” Monaghan shoots back, as if I’ve asked the most ludicrous question in the world. “I get it every year and I love it.”
I’ve never met anyone who’s received one, I tell her.
“Oh, it’s annual and it’s so serious!”
Please, I insist, tell me absolutely everything about it.
“OK,” she begins. “Well, it’s coconut and it comes with a little ornament on it, because it’s sent during the holidays. And it says, you know, ‘warm greetings, Tom Cruise’.”
She’s not done.
“And it is so moist, so dense, and just the most unbelievably delicious cake you’ve ever eaten in your life.”
I believe her. But I imagine that even if it did taste horrible, Monaghan – of all people – would be able to put a good spin on it.
Opposite page: still from Mission: ImpossibleFallout (2018)
For its first-ever exhibition, Loro Piana pays homage to its history, heritage and masterful materials. AIR meets its curator, Judith Clark
WORDS: JOHN THATCHER
Over the course of the past century, the Loro Piana family has sought excellence. A quest that has taken it through six generations and across multiple time zones and terrain in its search for the finest materials on Earth. Its engaging tale is now the subject of a blockbuster exhibition – remarkably, given it’s a century old, the very first Loro Piana has staged – that tells of this enduring commitment to quality, elegance and innovation, and does so in a highly creative way – one such section comprises a white-tiled lab and a giant microscope pointing at a mound of baby cashmere, the images from which, magnified 35,000 times, are projected onto screens to showcase the surgical precision of the quality control process implemented by the brand.
Spanning three galleries and 15 rooms of Shanghai’s Museum of Art Pudong (MAP), If You Know, You Know. Loro Piana’s Quest for Excellence, is curated by Judith Clark, a Professor of Fashion and Museology at University of the Arts, London. “I listened to the archivists and the craftspeople at Loro Piana,” she says, when asked how she decided on the exhibition’s themes and sections. “I visited them to see where the priorities were – where there were ideas that I felt were being re-iterated more often. I knew there needed to be sample books, but that we also needed to have elements that were light-hearted, and it needed to morph into softness. These necessities started to form a list of priorities. I have been travelling to and from Milan and London for the last year, having these wonderful conversations.” Even so, trying to condense a century of rich history obviously brought distinct challenges. “I guess the challenges were around how to ‘perform’ the enormity of the quest; how to show fine fibre, softness and so on – things that are not usually qualities in their own right in exhibitions. And to do it in a way that felt like it would sit with the standards and policies of MAP, to show really remarkable collections of art, for it to have a real dialogue with museum practices. I focussed a lot on how it would be shown, how the concepts behind the show would become explicit.”
This deep dive into Loro Piana begins at its birth; historic photographs and important documents featuring alongside artworks that express the beauty of the family’s Italian homeland and those that reveal its ongoing commitment to art, including many mid-century masterpieces loaned from the Sergio and Luisa Loro Piana Collection. The first fabrics we see date back to this period. “The 1920s were so evocative in fashion that it is a lovely place to start – with textile samples that have something of Art Deco to their patterns – so it is situated in time. It is a time period that we can all picture but none of us have lived entirely, so it has that historic, endless quality to it as well.”
From there the viewer heads Into Fashion, where we find some of the brand’s iconic pieces. “Loro Piana has multiple priorities: to innovate in terms of the use of fibres, but also to create iconic garments that might change due to an almost invisible detail. It is difficult to ask an audience to see that –and to feel it,” says Clark. “Loro Piana’s textiles have a direct relationship with the elements (warm in winter, light in summer) but the museum is an interior space. It was important therefore to have both the drama of design – showing the spectacular beauty of complex weave and knits, as well as the iconic outerwear.”
In the next section, The Landscapes, the viewer gains both a deep
loom; Judith Clark
Above: Vicuña fibre check at the Loro Piana Roccapietra factory
Opposite page: Three-piece ensemble featuring a softlytailored coat inspired by Sergio Loro Piana over a feminine version of the Spagna jacket and classic trousers
Below: Image from If You Know, You Know. Loro Piana’s Quest for Excellence exhibition
‘You picture real knowledge and expertise being passed down and how each generation made it their own’
Opening pages, from left to right: ’Spagna’ jacket, oversized men’s pants and linen-lined beanie, all crafted from pure wide-wale cashmere corduroy woven on a shuttle
‘ Loro Pina looks to innovate in terms of the use of fibres, but also to create iconic garments that might change due to an almost invisible detail ’
Opposite page: Men’s Spagna jacket revisited with feminine fluidity worn over a grand hoop skirt and hat, all in intricately embroidered cotton and silk chine, featuring a delicate thistle motif
This page, clockwise from left: Gently draped floor grazing dress with bejewelled buttons in iconic Kummel red, crafted from exceptionally fine The Gift of Kings® wool in a diagonal weave and treated with the trademarked RainSystem® to make it waterrepellent; Images from If You Know, You Know. Loro Piana’s Quest for Excellence exhibition
understanding of the different territories from where Loro Piana sources its precious fibres – via hand-carved models of landscapes – and the innate quality of the gifts they bestow, with ten silhouettes crafted from the different fibres.
To feel the quality of these fabrics, visitors can touch them in an inventive way, with the walls of particular rooms and corridors padded with the likes of cashmere and matte quilted padded silk.
The thistle plays a prominent role in Loro Piana’s history, first in the guise of the thistle combing machine (used to alter the appearance and touch of the fabric) and, since 1951, as an emblem on Loro Piana’s Coat of Arms. As such, part of the exhibition is dedicated to its enduring influence.
One particularly striking tribute is a grand hoop skirt and hat, all fashioned from embroidered cotton and silk chine and adorned with a delicate thistle motif. To craft it took the work of eight embroiderers, 124,000 glass beads, 59,000 sequins and 1,000 hours. Exceptional.
The exhibition’s final segment, Restaging Valsesia, takes us back to Loro Piana’s homeland to reveal the behind-the-scenes processes in its distinctive savoir-faire. Here, a mannequin wears a billowing ensemble in silk satin, which features a delicate Lunéville embroidery that required 1,850 hours to complete.
“You expect stories around couture, historic references and motifs, the hours it takes,” says Clark. “At Loro Piana the processes are stretched over what they describe as a chain of hands – across territories and skills, refining, refining and refining – the fibre, the colours are so meticulously determined. It teaches you to look very carefully.
“Six generations of a family – you picture real knowledge and expertise being passed down and how each generation made it their own.”
And what they made was without equal, as this incredible, immersive and inventive exhibition showcases. If You Know, You Know. Loro Piana’s Quest for Excellence, runs until May 5, 2025 at the Museum of Art Pudong (MAP), Shanghai
As David Bailey releases a book devoted to his 80s images, his wife –and often model – Catherine Bailey discloses her life in front of the lens
WORDS: LAURA CRAIK
As one of the world’s greatest living portrait photographers – and one of the most feted fashion photographers of the modern age – David Bailey has shot everyone who is anyone, from Diana, Princess of Wales, to the Rolling Stones. Credited with ‘discovering’ the models Jean Shrimpton and Penelope Tree, his list of ex-wives (he has three) and girlfriends (countless) reads like a Who’s Who of the world’s most beautiful women, Catherine Deneuve, Marie Helvin and Jean Shrimpton included.
If it’s bad form – which it is – to start an interview with Catherine Bailey by lauding her husband, it’s only what she would want. Now 63, Bailey’s fourth wife seems as much a product of her own temperament as of her generation, which is to say that she’s content for him to have the spotlight while she quietly helps keep his legacy alive.
But while the world might opine that she’s lucky to have bagged Bailey, I’d argue that it’s the other way round. For a man who “could have had anyone” (as the narrative goes), how smart of him to have chosen a woman who’s clever and kind, with the equable good nature to nurture his talent while tolerating the onerous qualities that make him so talented. We should all be lucky to have a Catherine in our lives.
We’re speaking because Bailey (as she and everyone else calls him) has published a new book, Eighties, a glossy, weighty tome replete with that decade’s most defining images, including portraits of Tina Turner, Yves Saint Laurent and Diana, Princess of Wales. The fashion images provide a particularly piquant trip down memory lane, with Jerry Hall in Chanel, Naomi Campbell in Alaïa and Catherine in an array of 1980s clothes that look all the better because she’s wearing them. A rare beauty, she first met Bailey when she was a rookie model aged 19 (“he was fun and cheeky – I can’t resist someone who makes me laugh,” she says) and has been his muse ever since. Although with the word muse being as dated as the idea that any woman should be defined by her husband, I wonder whether she likes being described as such. “Being a muse is not something that I really think about,” she says. “It’s too simple just to call someone in a couple a muse, because
‘ He’s never liked fashionable hair or make-up. He just wants someone to look classic and beautiful ’
you’re with someone on many different levels, especially when you’ve got a family. It’s a complex experience that means being a source of inspiration for someone else’s creativity. It’s a balancing act. It’s flattering to be at the centre of someone’s artistic world. But it can sometimes feel like you’re seen more as a symbol than a fully realised individual. It involves a level of surrender to Bailey’s vision, which can be incredibly rewarding, but also a bit limiting.”
She agrees that not all 1980s fashion has stood the test of time. “I look at some of it now, and a lot of it is ridiculous. But not the way Bailey photographed it. It was over the top, the fashion, but Bailey always reduced it down. He’s never liked fashionable hair or make-up. He just wants someone to look classic and beautiful.”
She believes his dyslexia and dyspraxia contribute to making his photography unique. “His language is visual, so he will sit and talk to somebody for a long time, sizing them up. He’s seeing where their weaknesses and strengths are, what buttons he can push. So when he actually comes to take the photograph, he’s very quick. A lot of people can copy his so-called style of photography, but it’s more [about] the relationship he has with the sitter, the expressions he gets and what he can prod and poke out of them.”
Was he envious of anyone else’s work? “Nobody’s. He has people that he really likes as photographers, but a lot of things can make someone very careful in what they say,” she says, suggesting that Bailey wouldn’t have admitted to envy even if he’d felt it. “His upbringing was tough. He was brought up during the war [WWII], in the East End [of London]. There wasn’t much room for mental health issues or anything like that. He just got on with it and got clipped around the earhole if he didn’t. Bailey appears quite open. In fact, he’s got a lot of barriers up.”
In the 1980s, the Baileys were fashion royalty who hung out with all the famous names of the day, but she downplays this: “I wouldn’t call us fashion royalty. A typical day was me taking the kids to school, the dog for a walk, going to Sainsbury’s. Just normal life.” Or as normal as life can be when your children’s godparents are Jerry Hall, Manolo Blahnik and Jack Nicholson. “Jack is fabulous –such a flirt, as you can imagine,” she says, recalling an incident from her
‘ I look at some of the 80s’ fashion now and a lot of it is ridiculous’
son’s christening. “We were walking up to the church, and I heard this clatter of heels. A girl came belting down the road, asking for Jack’s autograph. He was delightful with her. He must have stood for 10 minutes chatting. It made her day.”
She says they weren’t really dinner party throwers. “Bailey doesn’t particularly like them, because people might not leave. Having children at home, I always thought it was more important that during the week, they go to bed when they should, since they’ve got school.”
It’s hard to believe that life was as low key as she’s making out, but easy to believe that her children – Paloma, 39, Fenton, 37, and Sascha, 30 – came first. “I wanted to do the best that I could, and hopefully bring up fairly well-balanced adults. But I was lucky. I didn’t have to worry about earning a living, so I could concentrate on the
children. It’s really hard to try and work while getting kids to school, and I don’t care what people say about equality being here with men and women – it doesn’t exist in the department of cleaning up. Dream on.”
What kind of dad is Bailey? “He’s a good father, but they need to fit in with what he’s doing.” Are they OK with that? “They haven’t got much choice. Fenton runs the studio now, and Paloma works at the studio. Sascha does stuff with bitcoins that I don’t understand, but he’s also been involved. I’m glad they’re involved [in the family business] because Bailey’s got an incredible legacy. I like the idea that it’s family members looking after it.” Fond as she was of the excessive 1980s, she doesn’t miss them. “I’ve never been somebody who particularly likes parties. I’m quite a quiet person, and happy in my own company.” Although she does miss the excessive
clothes. “Guess!” she says, when asked who her favourite 1980s designer was. “Azzedine, of course. He was fantastic.” Her most cherished pieces from the era are a velvet Alaïa coat dress, and a velvet Armani evening dress. “It’s all so changed, the fashion. I don’t think people like to dress up now. Certainly my life has changed. Being nearly 64, your priorities change. Now, I feel dressed up if I put on some make-up.”
It’s clear her gilded life hasn’t changed her. “I’m the same as I was as a kid, really. In the end, we all stay the same. I think as you get older, you revert to being how you were as a child, in a funny sort of way. All your insecurities come back. Although at least I’ve got through the menopause.”
HRT helped. “I have no intention of going off it,” she says firmly. “I’ll be on it for life. If I come off it, I will go [back] into full-blown menopause. I’ve got the level of hormones I need
‘ I am a fairly patient person until I lose my temper. Then I go all Will Smith’
to keep my bones strong and my mood a bit happy. Going through [it], I couldn’t understand why everyone was so irritating. The universe can’t be irritating. It must be me. That’s when I decided to go on it. I thought, ‘No, I can’t go through life being annoyed at everything.’”
Well done for managing to stay married, I say. “He works a lot and went away a lot,” she laughs. “My grandmother always said, ‘If you want a successful marriage, marry a sailor.’ That’s not quite what I’d want, but that was her advice.”
She’s not a jealous person. “As soon as you get into jealousy, it takes power away from you. There are things that do bother me, but I tend to ignore them.”
Her friend Marie Helvin, one of Bailey’s exes, appeared in a lingerie campaign for Bluebella last year aged 71, while Catherine last modelled in a 2023 edition of the fashion magazine Perfect (shot by Bailey, of course). She thinks the fashion world is a kinder place for older models now. “It seems to be. Jerry’s [Hall] doing a lot of old ladies’ modelling, as she likes to say. She’s great. There’s a big market out there.”
She currently lives between London and Devon, and her and Bailey’s life now is “pretty much the same as it was, I suppose. His creativity has always been the most important thing in our lives, because that’s what makes him, and keeps him vibrant and engaged with the world.”
Bailey has been living with vascular dementia since 2018, which he has described as “a bore”. “He’s not very well at the moment,” she says.
“And then with his mix of dyslexia and dyspraxia, it’s always been interesting, trying to communicate with him. He has his own way. It all depends on what day it is, [and] whether he’s tired or just got confused about something. But he’s still painting. The things that make him who he is feel well and truly intact.” It must be challenging for her. “It requires a lot of patience. We just get through it, really. It’s not easy. It’s not easy for anybody.” It sounds as though patience is not a quality she lacks. “Well, I’ve learnt that living with him over the years, you need it. I am a fairly patient person – until I lose my temper, like everybody. Then I go all Will Smith, but it takes a long time.”
AIR hits the track in Maserati’s hair-raising GT2 Stradale
Normally if you were to sleep through your alarm call and miss the hotel breakfast you’d curse your misfortune – at least until lunchtime. But by 10am I was thanking my lucky stars for the fact that my stomach had growled its displeasure at my tardiness.
That’s not to cast aspersions on the chefs at the W Abu Dhabi – Yas Island, who I’m sure whip up a wonderful spread of gourmet treats. No, I was thankful because at 9.59am I was strapped into the passenger seat of Maserati’s frightfully fast GT2 Stradale, being hurtled back and forth and from side to side as my Ayrton Senna-esque driver propelled us down the straights and through the twists and turns of an F1 race track, no doubt unaware that while he was grinning manically I was mid-prayer, vowing to become a better person if I could just be spared long enough for us to roll into the pit lane in one piece.
Tony Bennett famously sang that he left his heart in San Francisco. I left mine somewhere between turn seven and turn eleven of Yas Marina Circuit. Not quite as romantic sounding, but just as memorable.
At least it was for me. I’m not sure what Maserati’s professional driver made of my cowardly screams. Only the fact that I got to step out through the butterfly door of what is one very cool looking car allowed me to maintain a shred of credibility.
The magnificent GT2 Stradale, which was making its international debut in Abu Dhabi, is the road-legal evolution of the GT2 race car, a vehicle engineered for speed – a heart-stopping amount of it. It will hit – unless I was at the wheel, obviously – 324 km/h and can accelerate from 0-100 km/h in 2.8 seconds. The other figure you need to make note of is 914, the number of these cars that have been made available to buy, each one sporting a badge that bears the lettering ‘1 of 914,’ an additional nod to 1914, the year Maserati was founded.
Driven by the most powerful version of the V6 Nettuno engine mounted in a road-legal car, Maserati describe the GT2 Stradale as a combination of the MC20 and GT2, and it shaved a whole five seconds off the former’s achieved time when it was put through its paces at the historic Balocco test track. This is the car I want to blast past the other parents on the school run.
So that it’s useable on such mundane trips, you can lift the front of the car a whole 35mm on demand, while
‘ This is a car engineered for speed –a heart-stopping amount of it ’
there’s also a 100-litre boot to easily accommodate book-stuffed bags. Yet, looks wise, this is very much a race car at heart and it doesn’t hide from the fact.
Its front has been redesigned, Maserati’s familiar ‘shark nose’ broadened for aerodynamic reasons, as has the surface area of its spoiler, while also at the rear the car’s large extractor has been designed to ensure maximum downforce. As with the GT2, the number three – a reference to the Trident emblem – is thoughtfully accommodated into the design vocabulary: a trio of air vents in the bonnet, another three in the front wheel arches and near the rear window, and nine-spoke wheel rims, forming a Trident in threes.
Inside, the track references are even more pronounced. The design of the GT2 Stradale’s steering wheel – thick, sporty, and featuring the start and launch control buttons – is an update of the MC20’s, one which Andrea Bertolini, Maserati’s Chief Test Driver and former World Champion in the MC12, helped design. Totally new are the double shell seats in carbon fibre, which have been designed so that they can be adjusted to position you perfectly, whether high up for the road or low down for racing. Then there are the door handles, which feature ‘pull’ in yellow lettering, a nod to the feeling of being in the cockpit of an actual race car.
You can further enhance that feeling by switching through the drive modes. With GT as its default setting, you can move to Sport and Corsa, each setting further reducing the car’s electronic control while increasing the need for your own input. It takes half a second to change modes, but there’s a purposeful delay when selecting Corsa, to ensure that you haven’t selected it by mistake. Any drive mode that seeks to question your sanity is music to the ears of wannabe racing drivers.
That said, if such a mode isn’t quite enough to quicken the pulse of the daredevil in you, you can purchase a Performance Pack. This gives you the brand new Corsa Evo mode (no prizes for guessing what’s coming next), a four-level selection that sees the car progressively cede control to the driver. Level 1 switches off the traction control entirely.
Maserati has a long, proud and successful history of track racing. The remarkable GT2 Stradale is heartpumping proof that it has transferred those credentials to the road. Buckle up.
High-Flyer
WORDS:
JOHN THATCHER
Wassim Hallal takes his two-star Danish restaurant Frederikshøj to a whole new level in the Maldives
“It is a dining experience that is as unique as the setting itself,” claims Wassim Hallal of his exclusive residency at Soneva Fushi. Which is quite the billing, given that the setting is the resort’s playfully named Flying Sauces restaurant, to which diners arrive via dangling from a zipline across 200 metres of forest canopy, a trip that bestows unbroken views of the crystalline ocean that frames this unspoilt slice of Maldivian paradise.
But then this is not a chef who has to sweeten his offering with a sprinkling of hyperbole. As chefowner of Frederikshøj, Hallal has single-handedly put Denmark’s second city of Aarhus on the culinary map, taking its turn under a spotlight that seemed permanently fixed on Copenhagen’s powerhouse Noma.
In 2022, Frederikshøj was awarded its second Michelin star, seven years after it claimed its first, a moment that made history – it was the first restaurant outside of the Nordic capitals to gain a coveted star. “This moment reinforced my belief in pushing boundaries and striving for excellence,” he says, speaking from the Maldivian idyll that is home for the two months of his residency.
Home was once Lebanon, where he left when still a child because of war, but its food culture moved with him. “One of my most cherished childhood memories is sitting around the table with my parents and three brothers, enjoying the homemade Lebanese dishes my parents lovingly prepared. It was more than just a meal – it was a moment of togetherness, where food was at the heart of our family life. Those early experiences instilled in me a deep appreciation for the power of food to bring people together.”
But food wasn’t his only love. “As a child, I envisioned two possible career paths: becoming a professional footballer or a chef. However, it was during my teenage years, when I first started cooking in school, that I truly discovered my passion. I was captivated by the complexity of flavours, the interplay of textures, and the artistry of creating a dish from simple ingredients. From that moment, I knew I had found my purpose.”
‘ One of the most extraordinary locations I have ever cooked in. Breathtaking’
What captivated the young Hallal are the same things that now captivate guests – and Michelin inspectors – at Frederikshøj, where although the use of the finest local produce ensures exceptional flavour, it is the technicality of the dishes that sets it apart, a harmonious marriage of French haute cuisine and New Nordic cooking. A ‘bold, daring’ style, as Michelin notes.
“I am constantly thinking about new dishes – some ideas have been in my mind for years, evolving and refining over time. When I feel ready, I experiment with my team at Frederikshøj, testing and perfecting each element over an extended period. Sometimes, after countless trials, everything suddenly comes together and we have a new creation that meets our standards.”
So what constitutes the perfect dish?
“For me, it is the ultimate balance of taste, texture, and presentation. The flavour is paramount – it must be bold, refined, and memorable. Texture adds dimension and contrast, while the visual appeal ensures that the dish captivates even before the first bite. Every element must work in harmony to create a truly exceptional dining experience.”
That’s what Hallal promises at Flying
Sauces. “The menu at Flying Sauces reflects a fusion of Frederikshøj’s techniques and the finest local ingredients available at Soneva Fushi: freshly caught fish, handpicked herbs from the resort’s gardens, and other regional produce form the foundation of dishes that are both innovative and deeply connected to the surroundings.”
While those soul-stirring surroundings are an obvious draw – “One of the most extraordinary locations I have ever cooked in.
Breathtaking” – it is Soneva’s longstanding commitment to sustainability that chimes with Halla’s beliefs. “What truly intrigued me was the opportunity to bring my culinary approach to such a distinctive experience, where the connection between nature and dining is seamlessly integrated. Soneva’s commitment to natural and sustainable ingredients aligns very well with my philosophy as a chef.”
The New Nordic movement, which has birthed some of the world’s most talked-about restaurants, is bound by principles that stress sustainability, locality and respect for the natural world. “The Nordic region is incredibly fortunate to have access to outstanding natural ingredients, from pristine seafood to unique foraged herbs,” says Hallal. “Combined with an innovative mindset, a commitment to sustainability, and an ambition to be the best, Nordic chefs have redefined the culinary landscape in recent years. This dedication to authenticity and creativity has propelled Nordic cuisine to the forefront of the global food scene.”
It’s that dedication that Hallal hopes will deliver further success and, with it, maybe that highly coveted third star. “At Frederikshøj, our philosophy is centred on continuous improvement – striving to be better today than we were yesterday. If we maintain this dedication to excellence, refinement, and innovation, then perhaps, in time, that recognition will follow.
Achieving a third Michelin star would, of course, be an incredible honour.”
For now, the glory goes to those fortunate enough to snag a sitting at Flying Sauces.
Soneva Fushi, Maldives, hosts Flying Sauces x Frederikshøj till May 12
Karina Brez
JEWELLERY DESIGNER
The best piece of advice I’ve ever received is to trust my instincts. Whether in business or personal life, intuition often guides us before logic catches up. I’ve learnt that overanalysing can sometimes paralyse decision-making, but listening to my gut – especially when something doesn’t feel right – has rarely steered me wrong.
My greatest achievement is building something from nothing. Whether it’s a business, a brand, or an idea, taking something that only existed in my mind and turning it into something tangible and successful is what I’m most proud of. The journey is never easy, but seeing hard work, risk, and persistence pay off is incredibly fulfilling.
A lesson I learnt the hard way was that not everyone operates with integrity. I used to assume that people in business, or even in friendships, had the same level of honesty and commitment that I did. But experience
has shown me that some people take shortcuts, while others will take advantage of your hard work. It was a tough lesson, but it made me more discerning and, ultimately, stronger.
If I could have another talent I’d love to be able to sing. Not just in the shower or in the car – actually sing. Music has such an incredible way of moving people, and I think having the ability to create that kind of emotional connection would be amazing.
If I could change one thing about myself, it would be learning to slow down and enjoy the present. I’m always focused on what’s next, what needs to be done, or what could be improved. While ambition is a great driving force, I recognise the value of being present and appreciating the now instead of always chasing the next goal.
My idea of perfect happiness is balance. Success is important, but so is having the
time to enjoy it. The freedom to do what I love, with the people I love, without feeling the weight of constant stress or obligation –that’s my version of happiness.
If I could give my younger self advice, I’d say: “It’s all going to work out, but don’t rush it.” I was always in a hurry to get to the next level, prove something, or hit the next milestone. Looking back, I’d tell myself to trust the process, learn everything I can, and not be so afraid of detours – they often lead to the best destinations.
The living person I most admire is Sara Blakely. She built Spanx from the ground up with nothing but an idea, determination, and a willingness to bet on herself. She’s not only an incredible entrepreneur but also an advocate for women in business. Her ability to stay authentic, embrace failure as part of the journey, and maintain a sense of humour along the way is something I truly respect.
