17 minute read
THE BRIEFING
THE LATEST NEWS FROM THE WORLD OF LUXURY
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THE CAR
An automobile that’s
more than meets the eye
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THE YACHT
The technology making yachts greener
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THE RESORT
When five stars
isn’t enough
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THE PHOTOGRAPHY
Are smartphones the new cameras?
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THE PROPERTY
Park-adjacent apartments pending
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THE VILLA
A secluded bolthole
for art-lovers
The soon-tobe-completed Park Modern development from Fenton Whelan offers uninterrupted south-facing views thanks to its proximity to Hyde Park and Kensington Gardens
01
THE CAR
Rolls-Royce Boat Tail
A MYSTERY CLIENT HAS COMMISSIONED A £20M BESPOKE ROLLS-ROYCE, COMPLETE WITH TELESCOPIC PARASOL AND CAVIAR FRIDGE
Words: Jeremy Taylor Earlier this summer, in a distinctly unglamorous warehouse in Leighton Buzzard, Rolls-Royce pulled the covers off its most audacious model to date – a bespoke £20 million motor called Boat Tail.
The hand-painted Azur blue bonnet, which graduates to a softer, lighter blue on the car’s side panels, was by far the most eye-catching feature – until a concealed parasol popped up at the rear of the car.
Indeed, much of what makes the Boat Tail so special is hidden from prying eyes. At the back, twin side-opening compartments are hinged in the middle and open like a butterfly, revealing an Aladdin’s cave of treasures. On one side is a pair of twin champagne coolers, designed to fit the owner’s favourite Armand de Brignac vintages.
Elsewhere, there’s crockery by Christofle of Paris – hopefully dishwasher safe – matched to bespoke salt and pepper grinders, all engraved with the car’s name. Caviar is kept cool in a proper fridge, rather
than a chiller, with various other food compartments that have been tested in temperatures that range from 80°C to -20°C.
As mentioned, however, the Boat Tail’s crowning glory is a parasol that slots into the rear of the car to provide extra shade. With a stainless steel shaft and aluminium coupling, the high-tensile fabric is stretched over carbon-fibre stays, which were tested in Rolls-Royce’s wind tunnel.
In the cabin, the company has worked with Swissbased House of Bovet to create reversible ‘his and hers’ watches. The centrepiece of the minimalist dashboard is a slot to insert one of the watches, which then becomes the Boat Tail clock.
The secrecy surrounding this car is extraordinary. Luxury London received a tip off about who commissioned the project, but at the risk of upsetting the Rolls-Royce legal department, we’ll keep schtum – except to say that trailing the Cote d’Azur with an eagle eye is probably your best bet of ever catching a glimpse of this stately machine in the wild.
The shape of the Boat Tail was inspired by the RollsRoyce Sweptail, a unique convertible unveiled in 2017 Sharing the same chassis as the Rolls-Royce Phantom, the Boat Tail is 5.9 metres long and houses a 6.75-litre V12 engine
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THE SUPERYACHT
M/Y Artefact
NOBISKRUG YACHT ARTEFACT PICKED UP SEVERAL WINS AT THE RECENT DESIGN & INNOVATION AWARDS FOR ITS GROUNDBREAKING HULL AND PLANET-SAVING TECHNOLOGY
Words: Anna Solomon
Some truly trailblazing vessels gained recognition at Boat International’s award ceremony this year. One such vessel was 80 metre Artefact, which won awards for her interior, naval architecture and onboard innovation.
Artefact’s owner had a very specific brief. The yacht needed to feel spacious – cavernous even – which Nobiskrug achieved with a floor-to-ceiling glass section in the hull (comprising nearly 8,000 square feet of curved glasswork and weighing almost 120,000 pounds).
This acutely modern feature should not, however, make the interior feel cold or harsh – interior designer Reymond Langton was tasked with delivering ‘cosiness’. The result was custom-made furniture, including a stunning Silverlining table, and the integration of artwork throughout.
But Nobiskrug’s latest superyacht is not only remarkable for its design – it is also an impressive feat of technology. Artefact’s DC grid-based hybrid power system by ABB means that various energy sources can be optimised according to the ship’s needs, resulting in energy saving. Plus, the use of solar panels and a large battery storage system allows the yacht to operate for a limited time without the use of its internal combustion engines.
Artefact has also been designed so that it might be upgraded with future technologies – for example, the integration of fuel cells in the place of generators – and also boasts a dynamic positioning system which keeps it steady without the use of an anchor, preventing damage to the sea floor.
These innovations mark a shift in the yachting industry, which has historically garnered a reputation for putting hedonism before environmentalism. The last few years have seen a change of tack in not only builders but owners, who want their yachts to be as environmentally friendly as possible. Artefact is one of the first superyachts to meet IMO Tier III emissions regulations.
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THE RETREAT
The Evian Resort
THE STATELY FRENCH SPA ESCAPE, WHERE THE GRASS REALLY IS GREENER
Words: Richard Brown
The Evian Resort is your smartphone camera with HDR mode turned on. So green are the manicured lawns, so blue is the Alpine sky, so radiant the ranks of rosebushes and rows of rhododendrons, that whenever you whip out your phone to capture the prismatic panorama – which stretches from the Haute-Savoie mountains to the waters of Lake Geneva – your exposure settings are sent into a state of paralysis. LG should shoot a promotional video for its OLED TVs here. They can play them on loop in the home tech department of John Lewis. #Nofilter. No way. It’s true!
There are two ways of getting to Évian-les-Bains, the famous French belle époque spa town that’s been inviting high-society pilgrims to take the waters since the middle of the 19th century.
The first is on-board Evian One, a state-of-the-art catamaran that looks like something the prop department of Interstellar dreamt up. Thanks to some cutting-edge aerodynamics, the water-bound space-cat is capable of whizzing up to 10 people from a gangway near Geneva airport to the shores of Évian-lesBains in just 45 minutes without creating so much as a ripple. Guests staying at the Evian Resort, which ranges across 245 acres of verdant mountainside some 500 metres above, are invited to make use of the boat throughout the duration of their visit.
The second, more conventional, method of arrival is by car; a journey that takes only half-an-hour longer from the same starting point. The route snakes the perimeter of the lake through a series of medieval villages, and the Swiss-French border, before arriving at the source of what is, supposedly, the world’s most evenly-balanced mineral water.
Both methods of arrival terminate at the end of a stately driveway, which winds through towering cedar trees and grass that would make the groundsmen at Augusta jealous, before delivering you to a human-sized Evian water logo illuminated by spotlights and encircled by international flags. Even before you enter its high-domed, cathedral-like lobby, Hôtel Royal, the resort’s flagship hotel (there are two) feels like somewhere that would host the heads of state during an international convention. Funnily enough, in 2003 the resort helped accommodate the lead delegates of the G8 summit.
Nine years later, the hotel having recently celebrated its centenary, interior-design guru Francois Champsaur and historical architect Francois Chatillon were charged with overseeing a head-to-foot refurbishment. I’ve no idea what the hotel looked like previously, but if Coco Chanel had designed a hotel (she may well have, I have no idea), you’d imagine it would’ve looked something like the revamped Royal – all white-marble floors and statement chandeliers.
Rooms – there are 150, and 32 suites – are a little more relaxed; turn-of-the-century furniture fraternising with canaryyellow armchairs; a navy-on-white-on-light-wood colour palette creating a nautical quality. Indeed, with the shimmering lake a constant companion, the hotel’s long, linear layout makes it feel as though you’ve run aground on the kingliest of cruise ships.
All rooms, apart from those on the fifth floor, have balconies large enough to accommodate a table and chairs. You can drink in views of the lake for free, or sip Aperol Spritzs for around £20 a pop. While we’re on that subject, you might expect bottles of Evian to be provided gratis, given that we’re sat on the mountain that spits out the stuff for free. Not so. While 33cl bedside bottles are replenished every night, each additional 750cl bottle you request adds €8 to your bill.
It’s easy to stay cocooned in the Hôtel Royal, with its indoor and outdoor swimming pools, and industry-leading spa (complete with hot tubs, hammams and an open-air hydrocircuit). But the Evian Resort is far more than its flagship hotel. The four-star Hôtel Ermitage, located a few hundred metres uphill, has its own pool and spa. There’s a concert hall, a kid’s club, streams of garden trails and a championship golf course – the only course to host a Major in Continental Europe – just a short drive away. Down in Evian town, the resort even has its own casino. A vintage wooden funicular will take you there for free.
The resort’s pièce de résistance is the fabled, white-tableclothed Les Fresques. Artist Gustave Louis Jaulmes hailed from across the water in Lausanne. In 1909, fresh from working on Paris’ Palais de Chaillot, he traversed the lake to apply his handiwork at the Royal. His monumental, hand-painted frescos were painstakingly restored during the hotel’s overhaul and now cap what must be one of the world’s most elegant dining rooms.
Dishes are the work of veteran head chef Patrice Vander, who’s been with hotel for more than 20 years. Fish comes from the lake; beef and cheese from the mountains; tomatoes and herbs from the hotel’s square-kilometre vegetable garden. It’s top-tier food served in a fairy-tale setting. You can’t help but feel that Michelin was a little bit stingy when it chose to award Les Fresques only the one star following its most recent visit.
In 2010, the French Minister of Tourism decided that five stars simply didn’t do justice to his country’s top guesthouses and dreamt up a new classification of hotel. ‘Palace’ status was awarded to hotels that ‘embodied French standards of excellence and contributed to enhancing the image of France throughout the world.’
Even the most sanctified of the 25 hotels currently on the list – Paris’ the Crillon, the George V and Le Bristol, Le Byblos in Saint-Tropez, and the neighbouring Saint-JeanCap-Ferrat and Le Cap-Eden-Rock, among them – require an element of compromise. A city centre location comes at the cost of a pokey room; a subterranean spa negates a decentsized swimming pool; a reputation as a party palace attracts a certain type of pleasuremonger. It’s difficult to pinpoint the opportunity cost of staying at the Evian Resort.
‘Grand’, ‘opulent’ and ‘classy’ are lazy, stock images of words, but they’ll do just fine in précising this fanciest of French resorts.
Rooms at Hôtel Royal from approx. £255 per night, rooms at Hôtel Ermitage from approx. £148 per night, evianresort.com
THE PHOTOGRAPHY 04 They say a picture is worth a thousand words, but for a picture taken with a camera phone, it’s probably a little less. Or at least that used to be the case. Nowadays, photos taken on smart phones are breathtaking – so much so that an award has been set up exclusively for iPhone photography. The iPhone Photography Awards insist that you don’t need fancy equipment to create powerful images – just a good eye – and a glance at the winning shot proves this to be true. Top prize-winner Istvan Kerekes, a Hungarian
photojournalist, snapped a haunting image of two Transylvanian shepherds against an industrial landscape on his iPhone 7. The iPhone Photography The Photographer of the Year Award, meanwhile, went to Sharan Shetty of India for his moving picture of an Azerbaijani man and
Awards his horse, while Dan Liu took second for his shot of the Martian-esque landscape of Qinghai province in China (pictured). WHY FORK OUT SEVERAL THOUSAND In a year where digital
POUNDS FOR A FUJIFILM X-T4 OR sharing became the ultimate A CANON EOS R6 WHEN YOU COULD (and at some points, sole) JUST USE YOUR IPHONE 7? tool of communication, this year’s competition takes on a Words: Anna Solomon particular poignancy.
TOP IMAGE LIZHI WANG BOTTOM LEFT DAN LIU BOTTOM RIGHT EINAT SHTECKLER IPPAWARDS.COM
05
THE PROPERTY Park Modern, Hyde Park
LONDON’S NEWEST COLLECTION OF SUPER-PRIME RESIDENCES COMPRISES 57 APARTMENTS OVERLOOKING HYDE PARK AND KENSINGTON GARDENS
Words: Ellen Millard
So spectacular is the view at Park Modern that, when Fenton Whelan’s sales director Lars Christiaanse pitches the development, he simply sticks a photo of the vista in front of potential buyers. It’s a sales tactic that worked – £100m worth of apartments were sold off-plan before the property had been officially unveiled in June.
Located on Bayswater Road, towards the entrance of Queensway, the property faces the park from the south, allowing residents to enjoy both the sunrise and the sunset from their apartments, which range from £2m for a one-bed and go up to £60m for the striking nine-bed penthouse.
The building, designed by architecture practice PLP, was informed by the surrounding parkland, with its curves representing “a continuous line that moves from one end of the site to the other, evocative of the organic shapes found in nature,” says PLP-founder Lee Polisano.
Every property will have access to outdoor space in some capacity, whether that be a balcony or a wider terrace. Inside, the developers spent time designing the joinery, doors and ironmongery to ensure that “everything you touch feels special”, says James Van den Heule, co-founder of Fenton Whelan.
The building expected to complete in 2022. “We set out to create the best residential development in London,” continues Van den Heule. “We wanted to create a legacy for what truly is a spectacular location.”
OCCUPANTS OF PARK MODERN WILL BE PROVIDED ACCESS TO A RESIDENTS-ONLY SPA, WITH TREATMENT ROOMS AND A 25M SWIMMING POOL, A GYM AND A 16-SEAT CINEMA
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THE VILLA
Villa Belich
PARED-BACK INTERIORS PUT THE EMPHASIS ON CONTEMPORARY ARTWORK AT THIS SECLUDED BOLTHOLE BY THE SEA
Words: Richard Brown
Standing sentinel, shoulders back, head up, in the corner of one of the two living rooms of Villa Belich, a pink-hued one-bedroom bungalow roughly 90 kilometres from Palermo Airport, is a three-foot-tall superhero wearing red-andyellow budgie-smugglers.
It takes about one-and-a-half hours to get to Belich from the Sicilian capital, the last 15 minutes of which become a tangle of pot-holed B-roads and beaten-up dirt tracks. Fortunately, The Thinking Traveller, the only villa rental company through which you are able to hire the property, sends you a handy information pack before you’ve even left the UK.
‘Turn left at the green gate, bear right at the cream
house, look out for the old farm with the cylindrical red water tower’; don’t try this in the dark folks, otherwise you’ll end up lost, just like us.
The scaled-down superhero, based on the Fantastic Four character The Thing, is the work of the Sicilian-born, Palermo-based sculptor Domenico Pellegrino. Of the belief that post-war America plundered the history of Greek gods for its comic book protagonists, Pellegrino re-appropriates Marvel characters as Sicilian heroes. Hence the reason why Belich’s resident superhero has swapped his customary blue shorts for a pair of underpants painted in the highlydecorative style of a Sicilian horse-drawn cart.
“I’m totally in love with art,” explains Belich’s proprietor Adriana di Mariano, an interior designer by trade and a contemporary art collector by passion. “I am convinced that pieces of art decide the houses they live in. When I was working on Belich I brought some of my favourite pieces to the house to decide which of them would stay.” Some of the villa’s other artworks include a huge drawing in the dining room by the abstract Palermitan painter Ignazio Schifano – you can see some of his other pieces in the Museum of Contemporary Art in Catania, on the other side of the island – and an even bigger canvas, ostensibly left blank, unless we missed something, by the conceptualist Vincenzo Schillaci. Something about the seen and the unseen, or something, we guessed.
Villa Belich is burrowed several hundred metres from the beach on Sicily’s south-east corner, where the island flattens into fields of wheat and vine, and the horizon dips into the sea. As well as directions of how to get to the property, the booklet provided by The Thinking Traveller offers advice on everything from local restaurants to the treasures of the surrounding area (the company publishes a guidebook for each of its 220 properties).
Fifteen minutes away, for example, is the archaeological park of Selinunte, one of the most progressive cities in
Magna Graecia, until the Carthaginians sacked it in 409BC. The ruins that remain today are as impressive as anything found in the Valley of Temples, the more famous archaeological site one-hour to the east in Agrigento.
Also within the book are the details of how to get to the hilltop estate of Planeta, one of Sicily’s largest fine-wine producers. Between mid-August and the end of September you can help them harvest grapes. Alternatively, you can skip the manual labour and arrange a wine tasting within the estate’s chic La Foresteria restaurant.
Menfi, the closest town, is a fifteen-minute drive away. Much of the city was razed to the ground by an earthquake in 1968, meaning that the town isn’t so much to look at nowadays. Restaurant Liccumarie near its centre, however, does serve slabs of meat and glasses of red wine worthy of an evening out. Nearby ristro-pub Befolk is mostly homemade beef-burgers and locally-brewed beer. It’s shut during lunchtimes but hosts local bands at the weekends.
Alternatively, you can opt to hideaway in Belich and have The Thinking Traveller arrange a chef to cook for you. Gabriella Becchina swapped life as an art historian in New York to set up a food-themed experience company in Sicily. The daughter of an upmarket olive oil producer – her father founded Olio Verde in 1989 – Becchina was born and raised in neighbouring Castelvetrano. Today, she works with The Thinking Traveller on in-villa menus that highlight the strength and breadth of local ingredients. Becchina’s sea bass was one of the highlights of our entire time in Sicily.
Belich is a design lesson in chicness and light; whitebeamed ceilings and grey, micro-cement floors. It’s ludicrously spacious for just two people. There’s a doubleaspect kitchen, a separate dining area and two living rooms; so that one of you can be playing vinyls on a record player in one, while the other flicks through coffee-table tomes in the other. The furniture is as eclectic as the artwork.
“Most of the furniture in the property is from an old uncle’s house,” explains di Mariano. “I love mixing memories, traditions, roots and family stories with contemporary furniture to create a sort of timeless, free spirit atmosphere.”
The Belice Nature Reserve is only 300 metres away. Chances are you’ll have the beach all to yourself, such is the off-the-beaten-track nature of this south-facing stretch of Sicily’s coastline. An infinity pool, surrounded by palm trees, looks out to the ocean.
Belich has its own vineyard and citrus orchard. They run in furrowed rows in front and behind the house, their sun-scorched branches creating a natural sound barrier to the cacophony of the outside world. Not that there’s much noise to keep out down this way, except for the gentle chime of clanging sheep bells and the continual brushstroke of smooth ocean waves.
Villa Belich sleeps two guests. It is available to rent exclusively through The Thinking Traveller. Prices per week start from £3,207, thethinkingtraveller.com
