AIR Magazine - Gama Aviation - February'24

FEBRUARY 2024

JAMIE DORNAN

TWEED DE CHANEL COLLECTION

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An Air Command is for eternity.

Marrying vintage style with watchmaking’s latest advances, the Air Command celebrates a fascinating era of our history. A legendary flyback chronograph, whose reputation has flourished over the decades.

Showrooms:

Contacts:

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+971 4 2262277

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Dubai Marina Mall

retail@mahallatijewellery.ae

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Mall of the Emirates

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Gold Souk

Contents

Credit: Helmut Newton, Self-Portrait, Monte Carlo, 1993 © Helmut Newton Foundation

FEBRUARY 2024: ISSUE 149

FEATURES Thirty Four

Forty

Forty Six

Jamie Dornan on fame, fandom and the downside of being blessed with good looks.

A TV drama about Cristóbal Balenciaga is a timely reminder of his masterful skills and enduring impact on fashion.

A new exhibition of Helmut Newton’s work highlights a photographer who dared to be different.

Everybody’s Talking About Jamie

Threaded Through

Shoot To Thrill

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Experience a delightful Asian fusion of flavors at Stella Sky Lounge, where tranquil surroundings and a serene outdoor oasis enhance your dining experience to new heights at The St. Regis Riyadh.

Contents

Credit: © Maureen M. Evans

FEBRUARY 2024: ISSUE 149

REGULARS Fourteen

Radar

Sixteen

Objects of Desire Eighteen

Art & Design Twenty Six

Jewellery Thirty Two

Timepieces Fifty Two

Property Fifty Four

Motoring Sixty Two

Travel

EDITORIAL

Sixty Four

Editor-in-Chief & Co-owner

What I Know Now

John Thatcher john@hotmedia.me

COMMERCIAL Managing Director & Co-owner

Victoria Thatcher

PRODUCTION Digital Media Manager

Muthu Kumar Fifty Eight

Gastronomy How teenage friends forged a unique path to open one of the world’s most innovative restaurants.

Dubai, UAE Reproduction in whole or in part without written permission from HOT Media is strictly prohibited.

HOT Media does not accept liability for any omissions or errors in AIR.

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Gama Aviation FEBRUARY 2024: ISSUE 149

Welcome Onboard FEBRUARY 2024 Janine Tombs Managing Director Gama Aviation

Welcome to the new issue of AIR, Gama Aviation’s in-flight magazine.

Gama Aviation’s started in 1983 as a bespoke aircraft manager and operator in the UK, and has since grown to be a leading, global, business aviation services organisation. With a fleet of over 230 aircraft, we have bases across Europe, the Americas, Asia and the Middle East. Our headquarters are located at Farnborough Airport, England, where we are listed on the London Stock Exchange (Gama Aviation PLC: GMAA).

In 2009, we opened an aircraft management office in Dubai, and applied for a UAE Air Operating Certificate (AOC). The GCAA awarded Gama Aviation’s UAE AOC in 2010, after which we grew our managed fleet of charter and private jets in the UAE. It quickly became apparent that Dubai International Airport was becoming increasingly restrictive in terms of slot and parking availability, in addition to airspace and taxiway congestion, which is not conducive to business aviation operations. Our industry is geared towards saving time for our clients. This led to our Group CEO identifying Sharjah International Airport as an intelligent gateway to Dubai and the Northern Emirates for private jet users.

In 2012, Gama Aviation was granted the concession at Sharjah International to provide VIP (‘FBO’) handling services, and in 2014 we opened the airport’s very first FBO facility. Sharjah International has since become a popular business jet hub — and fuel stop location — due to its ease of use and close proximity to the heart of Dubai and the Northern Emirates. We operate stunning passenger and crew lounges, with dedicated customs/immigration, along with providing line maintenance services and hangar/parking solutions. In a nutshell, we offer the highest levels of service delivery in our industry, for prices that are lower than the regional market rate. A very special service in Sharjah that also sets us apart is the fact we can arrange airside access for passenger vehicles to the aircraft steps on both arrivals and departures.

Sharjah offers true door-to-door time savings for visitors and residents of Dubai and the Northern Emirates.

An important component of Gama Aviation’s service offering in Sharjah is line maintenance and AOG (Aircraft On Ground) support in the surrounding region. In addition to our engineers holding US/FAA A&P licenses, our maintenance approvals include UAE/GCAA, UK/EASA, Isle of Man, Bermudan and Cayman registered aircraft. Our maintenance capabilities cover the Gulfstream G650, Bombardier Learjets, Challengers and Globals, Embraer Legacies, Hawker 800/900 and KingAir types.

Our group services include: • Aircraft management • Aircraft charter • FBO services: VIP aircraft and passenger handling • Line maintenance for business jets • Special missions support such as air ambulance operation and engineering modifications Thank you for choosing to fly with Gama, and for being part of our continuing success. We wish you an enjoyable journey.

Contact Details: info.mena@gamaaviation.com / charter.mena@gamaaviation.com

Cover: Jamie Dornan Williams+Hirakawa/AUGUST

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Gama Aviation FEBRUARY 2024: ISSUE 149

Business Aviation And Carbon Offsetting Why Gama Aviation is committed to carbon offsetting

We have been offsetting our own business aviation operations and the general operations of our entire organisation for over three years now.

We have chosen a carbon offset partner in Carbon Footprint Ltd and are delighted to have reduced our operational emissions over the past two years.

These emissions and our approach to improving our operational process are audited and ratified by Carbon Footprint Ltd and the projects we invest in are certified to ensure they have the very best and most positive impact.

What is carbon offsetting?

Carbon offsetting is about funding projects around the world that 10

help reduce carbon emissions by a measurable and verifiable amount.

Without the extra ‘carbon finance’ from people or organisations offsetting their emissions, these projects would not have happened.

How does carbon offsetting actually work?

Individual carbon offset projects around the world are being set up thanks to carbon finance provided by individuals and organisations offsetting their emissions. These projects include renewable energy generation, improving energy efficiency, reducing deforestation and planting more trees.

The projects our carbon offsetting

partner, Carbon Footprint Ltd, support all meet the leading international carbon offsetting standards and are rigorously inspected and regularly audited to assure that they are generating the carbon reductions. Carbon credits are only issued once these carbon savings have been made and verified. These carbon credits can then be purchased and used to offset the unavoidable emissions of organisations (‘carbon offsetting’).

And now to improve further, we believe this is important.

We want to make a difference. We believe in this, we are not doing this because we have to, we are doing this

With simple airside access and a quick 6 minute taxi time, the whole experience through our own dedicated, private and exclusive FBO is a decisive advantage to our clients and guests alike.

If you combine this with a 30 minute transfer time to Downtown Dubai then our access to the Northern Emirates via our Sharjah facility is a compelling reason to #switchtosharjah.

To discuss our services at Sharjah International Airport please call +971 65 734371 or email our FBO Services team on fbo.shj@gamaaviation.com

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Gama Aviation FEBRUARY 2024: ISSUE 149

believe that we have a responsibility to operate and perform ‘We in an environmentally responsible way, and offer our clients as much ratified and best practice information as possible so they can make their own, educated decisions ’

We believe business aviation can be responsible.

We believe that business aviation can operate in a much more ethical and environmentally friendly way. We are constantly monitoring available technologies and also trust our carbon partner to advise us on the best practices going forward.

As such, we are now giving all our managed aircraft clients the ability to offset their aircrafts’ operational footprint. This will be on a voluntary basis, but we will provide all the data required to highlight how their emissions can be offset. We even offer the same ratified project that we invest in to our clients, to ensure the best offsetting impact.

We also include and discuss the concept of carbon offsetting with all our new aircraft management clients and ensure they are fully aware of how best to operate their aircraft missions.

We hope our managed clients feel the same.

We believe that we have a responsibility to operate and perform in an environmentally responsible way. We offer our clients as much ratified and best practice information as possible so they can make their own, educated decisions.

What about our charter operations?

Our charter team is equally as committed to ensuring we operate in the best possible way. Once the new update to our myairops operating system is complete we will offer, as part of every charter quotation and subsequent booking, the ability to offset each flight.

The calculations and associated costs

because we believe we need to.

We started our monitoring and internal processes more than two years ago to ensure we knew the whole process properly.

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will automatically be sent to Carbon Footprint Ltd, so our clients can decide whether they wish to offset their specific charter mission.

Whilst we offer this service it is completely certified, ratified and operated by Carbon Footprint Ltd, and Gama Aviation makes no financial or benefit in kind from any of the processes.

So, by the close of this year all our existing business aviation managed clients will be notified on how best to offset their flights, all new managed clients will be offered, as part of contract discussions, the ability to offset their missions from contract outset, and all our business aviation charter operations will similarly be offered the opportunity to offset.

We will continue to engage with Carbon Footprint Ltd to monitor our own operational emissions to ensure we are hitting our own targets and to improve how we complete our business aviation services.

AIR X AMERICAN EXPRESS

A Glimpse of Centurion The invitation-only membership that unlocks unique service and extraordinary experiences

C

enturion is more than a card: it is a way of life. Since its launch in 1999, it has become a globally recognised icon that’s loved by discerning Members across the globe – as a prestigious membership unlike any other that extends itself by invitation-only. It opens doors not many have been behind to a world of carefully curated experiences, blending exclusivity with unmatched service.

You are one call away from amazing moments Centurion transcends the ordinary, offering a personalised service with a dedicated, around-the-clock concierge team poised to deliver flawless service.

Whether it’s reserving tables at the most sought-after restaurants, or access to the best entertainment across sports, music, theatre, art, and events, our servicing team can make it possible.

It’s your backstage pass to exclusive experiences beyond compare Centurion provides its Members with unparalleled access to some of the world’s leading artists, creators and performers of our time, with a focus on the “art of living”. From Tokyo to Dubai and Paris, Centurion Membership helps them enjoy the best of the best wherever they go.

“Centurion is a Membership that unlocks unique service and extraordinary experiences. Its unparalleled exclusivity invites our Members into a world where luxury knows no bounds. We invite you to explore the curated moments that redefine the essence of living life at its most exclusive.” Hamad Hassani, Vice President, Centurion Business – American Express Middle East We’re sure Centurion has piqued your interest. To know more about this one of a kind world, please visit www.americanexpress.ae/EOI

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Radar FEBRUARY 2024: ISSUE 149

AIR

The secret that Soneva was working on another Maldives resort may have been out for a long while, but in the coming weeks guests will get the first glimpse of Soneva Secret, the absolute gem they have crafted in the middle of the Indian Ocean, in an area where it stands alone. Or, in the case of the most exclusive of its 14 villas, ‘floats’ alone — the two-floor Castaway Villa, which boasts a retractable roof for stargazing, is only accessible by sea. And while the accommodation is low-lying, the service is elevated to a whole new level, with all villas granted a personal chef, each hailing from a different country — from Japan to South America — and experts in their native cuisine.

Soneva Secret, opens March, soneva.com

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OB JECTS OF DESIRE

OBJECTS OF DESIRE

Master craftsmanship, effortless style and timeless appeal; this month’s must-haves and collectibles

OB JECTS OF DESIRE

ZENITH & TIME + TIDE

DEF Y SK YLINE SKELE TON NIGHT SURFER EL PRIMERO The second collaboration between Zenith and watch content producer Time + Tide, the DEFY Skyline Skeleton is an evolution of the DEFY Classic Skeleton Night Surfer, featuring the latest generation of the high-frequency automatic El Primero calibre and, for the

first time with this model, an integrated bracelet and bezel fashioned from microblasted titanium. Additionally, a new screw-down crown ensures a water resistance of 100 metres, a sporty consideration given further weight with a new interchangeable strap system.

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OB JECTS OF DESIRE

CHANEL

COCO CRUSH 2024 Since its launch back in 2015, Chanel’s fine jewellery line, Coco Crush, has expanded periodically to include myriad variations of bracelets, necklaces, earrings and rings, each iteration continuing to draw design inspiration from the brand’s classic

quilted motif. New for 2024 is a beautiful new single earring in white gold and – perfect for stacking – a set of mini bracelets available in yellow, white, and beige gold, either with or without diamonds. We say with diamonds, please.

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OB JECTS OF DESIRE

JIMMY CHOO

Z E A 96

Though this square-toed Zea 96 drop heel shoe has been fashioned in Italy from sleek satin and is embellished with gold-tone metal flowers and pave crystals that draw the eye to the ankle line, you can’t help but gaze solely at the curved,

glossy heel. Standing just shy of four inches, it has been designed for the winter season to serve as a new statement silhouette for Jimmy Choo, sculpted into the shape of a drop of poured liquid that seems to have been frozen in time.

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OB JECTS OF DESIRE

BRIONI

F W 2024 Beautiful construction and expert tailoring are signature calling cards of Brioni and the brand’s latest collection charms with fine examples of both – particularly when it comes to trousers, which hold their shape despite their volume. Detailing further elevates

several pieces, not least the intricately embroidered glass beads that lend a couture feel to a silk dinner jacket. The designer Norbert Stumpfl wished to convey a sense of lightness, clothes that feel as one with the body, and it’s an idea that he extends through to accessories.

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OB JECTS OF DESIRE

VA C H E R O N C O N S TA N T I N

LES CABINOTIERS ARMILL ARY TO U RBILLON Vacheron was one of the first manufacturers to expand its operations into the US market, setting up a New York office in 1832. So by the time the art deco design movement took hold in the country, it was well set to embrace it. This single-piece 5

edition tourbillon pays homage to that influential style, with the motifs on it reminiscent of the embellishments seen on the city’s skyscrapers built at the dawn of the 20th century. A highly technical timepiece, it’s further defined by its many engravings.

OB JECTS OF DESIRE

BRU N EL LO CUCI N EL L I

F W24

The perfect antidote to fashion’s overreliance on imagination-light, logo-emblazoned garb comes in the always perfectly cut shape of Brunello Cucinelli. Its Fall/Winter 2014 collection takes us from ultra-soft knitwear and expertly tailored coats –

of which the trench is the standout – to elegant suits and velvet-adorned dinner jackets with more than a whiff of the Eighties about them, and a whole host of masculine accessories. If this is socalled quiet luxury, we’d much prefer the volume be muted permanently.

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OB JECTS OF DESIRE

HUBLOT

CL ASSIC FUSION TOURBILLON ORLINSKI Richard Orlinski has long found Hublot’s innovative timepieces a fitting canvas for his eye-grabbing expressions. In fact, since 2017 the world’s best-selling French artist has been given free rein to work his magic on the brand’s Classic Fusion series,

sculpting the bezel and redesigning the case, among other things. His latest masterpiece bears his signature style and comes in two distinct shades: sky blue and sunny yellow ceramic, both striking examples limited to just 30 pieces – on your marks…

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OB JECTS OF DESIRE

BERLUTI

SPRING 2024 Since waking from what can be best described as a vivid dream during the threeyear tenure of Kris Van Assche (the brand’s jump aboard the crowded bandwagon headed for a younger clientele steering it in a direction it never seemed that keen to head )

Berluti appears more assured than ever. Case in point, the Spring 2024 collection. While championing many of the house’s signatures and taking multiple design cues from its archives, this is very much a contemporary cut defined, as always, by fine materials.

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OBJECTS OF DESIRE

Art & Design

AIR

FEBRUARY 2024: ISSUE 149

See It Through

A new exhibition at the Musée Yves Saint Laurent Paris explores the couturier’s fascination with transparency, using it as a means to empower women WORDS: CHRIS ANDERSON

H

ow many historical figures, let alone fashion designers, have an entire museum dedicated to their memory? French couturier Yves Saint Laurent has three – the Musée Yves Saint Laurent Paris, opened in 2017, located at the historic headquarters of his luxury fashion house; the Musée Yves Saint Laurent Marrakech, opened the same year, in the Moroccan city he loved, where he once had a house, and where his ashes were scattered upon his death in 2008; and his childhood home in Oran, Algeria, which became a museum in July 2022.

Even with all of the sketches, photos, clothing and accessories amassed during his long career, and split between these locations, there is still enough left over for other museums to join in, hosting exhibitions based on different aspects of his life. In 2022, six Parisian museums, including the Centre Pompidou and the Louvre, held a simultaneous tribute 18

across each location to mark 60 years since the debut of Yves Saint Laurent’s fashion house.

Clearly, there are many sides to the man to be explored, and starting this month the Musée Yves Saint Laurent Paris is about to present another one. With Sheer: The Diaphanous Creations of Yves Saint Laurent, which begins on February 9, curator Anne Dressen is exploring the theme of transparency, which the designer began experimenting with in the 1960s, using such materials as chiffon, lace and tulle, and which remained evident throughout his career.

Dressen explains why transparency and the designer are so interlinked.

“Transparency is an ambivalent texture and material in itself, with a lot of variations,” she says. “It reaches an epitome when it comes to fashion creations, as it covers one’s body as much as it unveils it. Within their very nature,

Right page: Evening dress worn by Marina Schiano, autumn/winter haute couture collection, 1970.

Photograph by Jeanloup Sieff © Yves Saint Laurent © Estate Jeanloup Sieff

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AIR

Even very shy and reserved, Yves Saint Laurent had this amazing sense of provocation sheer fabrics convey a mysterious and intriguing aspect, and Yves Saint Laurent, more than any other couturier, was very conscious of these subtleties. He played with it for decades, and at a certain point it was obvious to us to rediscover this work through his lens.”

A recurring theme in his collections, Saint Laurent believed in allowing women to proudly and boldly assert their bodies, drawing on the power inherent in the fabric – this is the designer accredited with normalising women wearing trousers, after all. “If there is one couturier who has accompanied the social changes women went through in the second half of the 20th century, it is Yves Saint Laurent,” Dressen continues.

“He had a fine feeling and understanding of the changes in the culture of the time, and especially of a woman’s life and environment. As a couturier, he was surrounded by female friends, models and collaborators, and nurtured a love for these women. The clothes he designed were meant to highlight their feminine lines, attitude and character, as much as to give them power and confidence.”

For the purposes of the exhibition, the museum has brought together 40 iconic 20

’

garments, included rarely-seen pieces, to demonstrate Saint Laurent’s love of transparency. These are accompanied by sketches, photos, patterns on tracing paper, accessories, and drawings inspired by the paintings of Goya. Modern and contemporary artworks by various creatives, including drawings, paintings, photos, and even a film, themed around transparency, making a link with Saint Laurent’s work, are also displayed.

Dressen explains which of the garments best demonstrate the couturier’s ideas.

“The silhouettes from the 1960s embody the zeitgeist, with clear lines and delicate provocation,” she says. “Statement designs from this period include an evening dress from 1966, immortalised

by Avedon; a sheer shirt worn under a smoking tuxedo worn by Danielle Luquet de Saint Germain in 1968; and an iconic piece, the so-called ‘nude dress’, also from 1968. Transparency then continues up to the 1990s, sometimes in sophisticated ways with lace, and also in very structured and neat designs.

“In the exhibition, we’re really looking at two main points of view: firstly, how the body is unveiled, and secondly how Saint Laurent played with the light

Right: Smoking worn by Danielle Luquet de Saint Germain, spring/ summer haute couture collection, 1968.

Photograph by Peter Caine© Yves Saint Laurent © Peter Caine (Sydney)

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These pages, from left to right: Evening dress worn by Danielle Luquet de Saint Germain, autumn/ winter haute couture collection, 1968.

Photograph by Peter Caine © Yves Saint Laurent © Peter Caine (Sydney); wedding dress worn by Mounia Orosemane, autumn/ winter haute couture collection, 1983.

Photograph by Guy Marineau © Yves Saint Laurent © Guy Marineau

He had a fine feeling and understanding of the ‘changes in the culture of the time ’ fabrics to create movement around it.

On the one hand, a dress from 1970 with a cut-out in the back, covered with lace, illustrates how the woman’s body was highlighted: audacious yet discreet. Then other pieces show how the fabric moves with the body, playing with sheerness.”

Bridalwear, famous for its use of lace and veils, also makes an appearance, as does a portrait of Saint Laurent himself from 1971, posing as part of an advertisement for his first eau de toilette, Pour Homme. “Even very shy and reserved, Yves Saint Laurent had this amazing sense of provocation,” comments Dressen. “This shows a time where Saint Laurent embodied the brand bearing his name.”

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The exhibition itself is organised thematically. “It first gives an overview of the different fabrics and types of transparency used by Saint Laurent, and then casts light on how transparencies have been designed within the clothes to highlight the female form, through cut-outs or details, for example,” Dressen explains. “We’re very much focused on the style and artistic gesture of Saint Laurent, ending the exhibition with the figure of the bride, who embodies the paradox of transparency: wearing the required fabrics, but herself the centre of attention.”

Architect Pauline Marchetti has designed the exhibition setting, using dramatic lighting, and finding new ways

to display and hang such delicate clothing – she brings a special link, as her mother once worked for the Yves Saint Laurent brand. It should all help to leave a lasting impression on those who visit. “We want visitors to become immersed, and gain a new perspective when it comes to Yves Saint Laurent,” Dressen concludes. “They will discover a couturier who was an artist, learn about his designs, about the man and his brand, with his name recognised worldwide. We invite visitors to look at his clothing as artworks, meaning whole new levels of appreciation.”

Sheer: The Diaphanous Creations of Yves Saint Laurent is at the Musée Yves Saint Laurent Paris from February 9-August 25

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JOY RIDE Just as private jets provide the pinnacle of sky-high luxury, so do Bentley’s handbuilt models deliver an unrivalled on-road experience for passengers who demand to travel in style. Whether stretched out in the Flying Spur, at the wheel of the iconic Continental GT, or riding high in the Bentayga, every journey is a joy

CARS: BENTLEY, SAMACO MOTORS ART DIRECTOR: KERRI BENNETT PHOTOGRAPHER: AUSRA OSIPAVICIUTE

Credit: special thanks to Nasjet for the loan of the aircraft

Jewellery

AIR

FEBRUARY 2024 : ISSUE 149

Webb Wonder Why the daring designs of the quintessential American jeweller, David Webb, continue to inspire WORDS: JOHN THATCHER

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G

row familiar with the works of many jewellery houses and you’ll become aware that they typically draw design inspiration from a shared pool of familiar sources.

David Webb did things differently.

Self-taught, he schooled himself with books that told of Regency furniture, Chinese decorative arts, Greek gold from the age of Alexander and tomes written specifically for seafarers and botanists. And when not pounding the pavements of his New York City home, frequenting its myriad art galleries and museums, he’d venture further afield to foreign lands to soak in their culture and traditions, his inquisitiveness about the world and its ways insatiable.

It meant that Webb developed a design style that was distinctive, one that would cement his place among the list of history’s most influential jewellers. It was also a style that was distinctly American. “America itself is a nation characterised by cultural amalgamation and, similarly, David Webb himself sought inspiration from all around him, integrating these sources into his unique design voice to create something new and modern in the 20th century,” says Mariana Flores Sosa, Director of Marketing & Brand Strategy at David Webb.

“This unique design language covers a broad spectrum of materials, sizes, aesthetics, and techniques.

The house’s collections feature more than 45 techniques of textured gold,

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captivating carved animal motifs, intricate lustrous semi-precious stones, colourful enamel work, and gleaming rock crystal. David Webb himself was known for making pieces that no other jeweller would be confident enough to make, and for taking pride in the fact that someone could recognise a David Webb piece from across a crowded room. His signature creations continue to be highly sought after by leading tastemakers and celebrities, contributing to his legacy as an iconic American jeweller.”

Webb was destined to be a jeweller, serving as an apprentice aged 14 at his uncle’s jewellery store and opening his own store less than a decade later in 1948, having moved from North Carolina to New York. There, his design-led pieces swiftly won the affections of both an influential social set and Hollywood’s elite, from Jackie Kennedy to Elizabeth Taylor.

“We describe the David Webb DNA as ‘bold’, and the David Webb woman as ‘self-possessed,’” states Sosa.

Webb passed away in 1975 following a battle with cancer, but his name – and storied legacy – live on. Indeed, to mark the 75th year since the opening of that New York store, the brand has launched an extravagant 50-piece anniversary collection that draws upon the design elements Webb was famed for. “Enamelling is always at the core of David Webb’s practice,” says Sosa, labelling one such element.

This unique design ‘language covers a broad spectrum of materials, sizes, aesthetics, and techniques

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Our collection is an endless trove of ideas that fuels our innovation

’

“The Anniversary Collection playfully features zebra stripes, tiger stripes, and leopard spots on some of our classic forms and shapes to fully integrate two of David Webb’s most iconic design tropes: the animal kingdom, as well as the structures of the ancient world. Working from his extensive archives, the collection ranges in scale and aesthetic, aiming to cover a wide breadth of David’s remarkable design achievements.”

More treasure trove than traditional archive – comprising not just finished pieces but also ephemera and drawings – Webb bequeathed an enduring source of stimulus, ensuring that the brand can continue to push the boundaries of craftsmanship and design. “Delving into our archives, which serve as the epicentre of David Webb, we unearth the brand DNA, allowing for a continuous source of inspiration.

Here, we not only rediscover timeless drawings, sketches, and renderings, but also tap into a huge creative library of designs. With over 40,000 sketches in the archives – most of them yet to be realised – our collection is an endless trove of ideas that fuels our innovation.

These archival gems, combined with the vast creative library, serve as a constant wellspring of creativity, influencing the compelling narratives woven into our campaigns, events, and activations, ensuring its relevance in the contemporary landscape.”

Yet the archives are only one way in which the modern house

of David Webb maintains its connection to its founding genius.

The other is via the workshop.

“Over the past 75 years, the David Webb workshop has undergone significant changes while preserving its commitment to exceptional craftsmanship that defines our brand's legacy,” outlines Sosa.

“One notable change involves the modernisation of design processes through the expertise of our CAD team, facilitating early-stage support for artisans. This integration of 21st-century technology enhances efficiency and precision in creating our iconic jewellery.

“Despite these advancements, some fundamental aspects remain unchanged. The commitment to handcrafted excellence persists, with all our pieces meticulously handmade. Our workshop continues to be a repository of decades of experience, upheld by thirdgeneration artisans who still employ ancient artistic techniques. This dedication to craftsmanship ensures that the essence of David Webb's heritage is preserved even as we embrace cutting-edge innovation, creating a seamless blend of tradition and modernity in our jewellery.”

It's what makes the anniversary collection – which you’ll find in the brand’s Doha f lagship – distinctly David Webb. Easy to identity from across a crowded room, just as the man himself intended.

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A Deep Dive Into History Why Blancpain’s latest anniversary watch pays tribute to a true pioneer WORDS: JASON HEATON

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I

t’s no secret that watch companies love to celebrate anniversaries.

Commemorative editions seem to pop up annually, paying tribute to the introduction of a particular reference or historic event, whether it’s the first moon landing or a motor race. But some anniversaries are more special than others. Take, for example, Blancpain, which has just come off the back of a whole year celebrating seven decades since the introduction of not just a watch, but an entire category — the dive watch.

The year 1953 proved momentous for various reasons, including the end of the Korean War and the first ascent of Mount Everest. It was also the year when the Swiss watch company Blancpain introduced the Fifty Fathoms, the world’s first watch expressly built for scuba divers. Given the groundbreaking importance of that watch, it’s small wonder that Blancpain celebrated in style with limited-edition releases, most notably the Fifty Fathoms 70th Anniversary Act 3.

When Jacques-Yves Cousteau and Emile Gagnan invented the aqua-lung in the 1940s, it effectively freed deepsea divers from the constraints of heavy bronze helmets and umbilical air lines.

A diver could now nimbly swim around with a simple mask and fins, plus a ‘self-contained underwater breathing apparatus’ (scuba) on their back.

Although sub-aquatic exploration would never be the same again, new concerns arose — chiefly regarding a limited air supply and a need to keep 32

track of time. While wristwatches had been worn underwater before, they had not been deployed with the specific aim to monitor elapsed time.

In the early 1950s, Jean-Jacques Fiechter, Blancpain’s then co-CEO, was an early adopter of scuba diving.

Reportedly, he nearly ran out of air during a decompression dive in the Mediterranean, which inspired him to develop a watch that could meet the needs of this new adventure sport.

Working alongside the elite French Commandos Marine unit, the result was the evocatively named Fifty Fathoms, with its hyper-legible dial, locking timing ring, and innovative sealing system that ensured it could withstand the pressures of the deep.

These days, it’s difficult to imagine the breakthrough that a dive watch signified back in the 1950s. Despite its rather simple brief and ‘blunt instrument’ appeal, those earliest Fifty Fathoms watches featured some impressive technology that changed watchmaking forever. To help ensure that the Fifty Fathoms remained watertight, and to prevent distorting the rubber caseback gasket, the watch made use of a centre disc and a screw-on flange that compressed the seal evenly as it tightened.

The timing bezel had to be pressed down to turn and then locked in place in order to prevent accidental rotation. And to alert its owner to the intrusion of water, a moisture-sensitive disc was painted onto the dial that would change colour when

Timepieces

Credit: © Jason Heaton / Telegraph Media Group Limited 2024

FEBRUARY 2024: ISSUE 149

it became wet. To combat the effects of magnetism on the movement, meanwhile, a soft-iron shield was added, and some versions were made from less magnetic German silver to prevent the watch from triggering sensitive sea mines.

All of these features might be perceived as mere marketing talking points now, but at the time they were direct responses to the practical needs of divers, both recreational and military. The Fifty Fathoms became the watch of choice for various naval diving forces around the world, including the French Nageurs de Combat and the German and Polish navies, as well as the US’s elite SEAL special forces.

The United States Navy put the Fifty Fathoms through a series of punishing tests before giving it the seal of approval, having found almost no faults in its design or functioning. In its final test report, it concluded: “Experience with 12 Blancpain underwater watches… yielded virtually complete satisfaction. No worthwhile suggestions for improvement of this watch can be offered.” High praise indeed.

But a lot has changed during seven decades in regards to diving and watches.

Divers now rely on digital diving computers to track every element of their time underwater, and Blancpain has become a powerhouse maker of haute horlogerie.

Following up two earlier Fifty Fathoms commemorative watches (the Act 1 and Act 2), as well as a playful collaboration with Swatch (the Blancpain x Swatch Bioceramic Scuba Fifty Fathoms collection), the Act 3 edition reflects the history of the original Fifty Fathoms, as well as Blancpain’s prowess in fine watchmaking. Cues linking the watch to its historical forebear include the Blancpain logo on the dial, which uses the same sans-serif typeface as the 1953 watch, as well as the same style hands and hour markers, tinted to mimic aged radium paint. Also on the dial is the

Fifty Fathoms watches ‘featured some impressive technology that changed watchmaking forever ’ trademark moisture indicator disc that changes colour if water enters the watch.

The rotating timing bezel, the most known element of any diving watch, bears the same giant numerals as it did 70 years ago.

Inside, meanwhile, ticks the self-winding in-house Calibre 1154.P2 movement, with 100 hours of power reserve, while a silicon balance-spring ensures the movement’s resistance to magnetism. Visible through a sapphire caseback, the movement has the same understated finishing, plus a slotted winding rotor that echoes the one in the 1953 archetype. It is housed in a case of the exact dimensions as the original watch — 41.3mm — and machined from a 9ct alloy of bronze and gold.

While the original Fifty Fathoms was made from stainless steel, some military versions were machined from German silver, an alloy with a low magnetic signature, vital for divers defusing mines. This material over time would age to a pleasing golden hue, of which the Bronze-Gold casing of the new watch is reminiscent. And while the high domed crystal may look altogether mid-century, it is bang up to date and made from scratch-proof sapphire instead of the acrylic of yesteryear.

Of course, the latest iteration is a far cry from the 1953 original - it’s more refined, more luxurious and considerably more expensive. But what about its functionality?

Over the course of my years of diving, I’ve been underwater with no fewer than seven releases of Fifty Fathoms, including

last year’s earlier and limited-edition anniversary Act 2, the wholly modern Tech Gombessa, designed for ClosedCircuit Rebreather (CCR) divers, where the exhaled gas is recycled, extending the time you can spend underwater.

In essence, dive watches are tasked with tracking elapsed time, being legible, and not leaking. Perhaps it’s the intangible element of diving with the weight of history strapped to my wrist, but I’ve always found Blancpain not only good at everything a dive watch is supposed to do, but doing it with a certain je ne sais quoi that reconnects me to the long legacy of diving as an adventure. This was especially evident in Cannes recently, where I had the chance to explore the same waters as Cousteau and Fiechter, while wearing a restored 1950s Blancpain.

The man now at the helm of Blancpain is, like his 1950s predecessor Fiechter, an avid diver. Marc A. Hayek has been CEO of the brand since 2003, when it celebrated the 50th anniversary of the Fifty Fathoms with a limited-edition piece.

“Some of my earliest memories are of the sea,” he says. “I grew up near it and for as long as I can remember, I wanted to be underwater.” This passion for the sea has been evident in not only the watches that Blancpain produces, but also in the extensive conservation efforts he oversees.

When he launched the 70th anniversary model in Cannes, his personal pride and commitment were on show for all to see.

“It’s rare to witness the creation of an entirely new category,” he commented, aware of the responsibility of Blancpain to get this watch just right. And it was surely no coincidence that Cannes was chosen for the occasion — it wasn’t far from this spot that Jacques-Yves Cousteau first tested his aqua-lung, and where Fiechter was inspired to create the original Fifty Fathoms.

Call it a true French Connection.

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Jamie Dornan on fame, fandom and the downside of being blessed with good looks WORDS: ADAM WHITE

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amie Dornan, Kenneth Branagh once said, is far too interesting a person for someone so pretty. That was the gist, anyway. “He surprises you as being something more intriguing than his exceptional good looks,” were his exact words, right around the time he directed him in Belfast, the 2021 Oscar winner that helped transition Dornan out of his vaguely unhelpful status as ‘the guy from Fifty Shades of Grey’. When I repeat Branagh’s words back to Dornan over Diet Cokes at a publicity office in central London, I’m taken aback by the sincerity of his response. Dornan doesn’t blush or cringe. He doesn’t scold me for embarrassing him. He just sits there, touched, as if it’s the nicest sentiment he’s heard in years.

“Oh man, I need to hear s*** like that,” he tells me, rubbing gently at his salt-and-pepper beard. “Sometimes I’m just riddled with self-hatred and doubt. It’s very, very nice to hear that.” Branagh, he says, has always treated him like an equal. “The first time I met him, to discuss Belfast, I

don’t think there was a job I’d done that he hadn’t seen. He’d seen stuff that I didn’t think anyone had ever heard of, let alone been released. He’d really done his research on me.”

Dornan is 41, Irish and sweary, that mellifluous brogue of his at odds with the sheer volume of f-bombs.

He has been famous for more than a decade – but it’s a fame that has unique peculiarities, ones that help explain why he’s surprised when people take him seriously. He was once, as if his face wasn’t a big enough clue, a highly successful model. Underpants, Calvin Klein, the lot. There’s strike one. Then, in 2013, he starred opposite Gillian Anderson in BBC’s The Fall, lending menace and subtlety to the role of a father-of-two who moonlights as a serial killer. Everyone, though, still really fancied him. It was weird. And then a couple of years later he was Christian Grey, the freak-in-the-sheets, unrelenting-bore-in-the-streets hero of a franchise of maligned bonkbusters adapted from a series of terrible books. It was a poisoned chalice of

sorts, so no wonder he has a bit of a complex. Then again, it started early.

“All I’d ever get to audition for was, you know, ‘the count who comes in on a f***ing horse and ravages the woman’,” he remembers of his days trying to make it as an actor. “I’d come from modelling, so I thought those were the only types of roles I was going to do.”

But then he tried out for The Fall, and got the part, and people liked him a lot in it. The show was one of those big, culture-rattling hits – a twisty catand-mouse game between a ludicrously attractive twosome on opposite sides of the law. Dornan found the whole thing personally gratifying. “I’d never had an opportunity to show that darker side of myself – and when you’re told that you do it well, it really makes an impact.” He fiddles with the ring on his cola can, seeming quite touched again.

In The Tourist, his BBC thriller now in its second series, Dornan is back in scary mode. He plays an amnesiac on the run in the Australian Outback, who slowly learns that he was formerly a very crooked man 35

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working for an international crime syndicate. Part of the fun of the series is watching Dornan’s Elliot wrestle with the horrifying deeds he is told he’s committed but has no memory of – it’s a bit like Christopher Nolan’s Memento, if more knowingly zany.

“The way those guys write,” Dornan says, “I’m always asking, ‘What the f*** is happening now? Who’s this lunatic you’ve just brought in?’” The Tourist stems from screenwriting brothers Harry and Jack Williams, who most recently scripted the Coen Brothersesque dark comedy Boat Story. They’ve been accused of sometimes veering too heavily into the absurd, and while Dornan says he understands those complaints, he also loves it whenever a script takes a sharp left turn. “I know some people didn’t like Boat Story, but I loved that it was just so mad! I’d far rather watch that than some formulaic mystery drama with... ” He seems to spot my Dictaphone and clams up. “I was about to start naming actors, but I can’t do that with that thing there. But anything weird as f*** and non-linear – is that not just really interesting?”

The Tourist’s location moved to Ireland for season two, meaning less yellow-filtered exoticism this time round, which Dornan admits was his idea. More a demand, really. “I couldn’t have done Australia again, if I’m being really truthful – just logistically for my family,” he says. Dornan has been married to the musician and composer Amelia Warner (who has performed under the name Slow Moving Millie) since 2013, and they have three children; they all moved down under for six months while Dornan filmed series one. “We had a great time,” he says, “but I can’t be doing that to my family every other year. It’s not how I want to live my life.”

He also knows the risk of bringing back a hit TV show for more episodes.

A case of diminishing returns did, after all, affect The Fall. The first two series were blockbusters, but series three was a creative black hole – something even Dornan noticed at the time. “I remember getting a sense that people could have done without the third,” he laughs. “The first series was vital and impactful, quite seismic... and it certainly changed my life overnight.

Then the second series was inevitable and needed. But the third might 36

have been over-egging it a bit.”

Dornan has always found it hard to avoid hearing what the public think about him or his work. He knows people turned against The Fall. He knows people have thoughts about him (maybe, probably not) playing James Bond. He read all those bad reviews of Fifty Shades. I tell him – though I’m not sure he believes me – that I actually quite liked the first Fifty Shades of Grey. It was glamorous, sexy, and seemed to have its tongue firmly in its cheek – no doubt in large part thanks to screenwriter Kelly Marcel and director Sam Taylor-Johnson. They both seemed to treat the premise with respect when it was required, yet poke fun at it when it was too silly not to.

Taylor-Johnson, Dornan and his co-star Dakota Johnson were close allies, but their shared vision for the trilogy clashed with that of the woman behind the novels, the enigmatic quasi-wordsmith EL James. TaylorJohnson once said that “every scene was fought over”, comparing her

dynamic with James to “wading uphill through sticky tar”. James got her way in the end, with Taylor-Johnson banished from the franchise and her husband recruited to write the scripts for the subsequent two films (Fifty Shades Darker and Fifty Shades Freed). Dornan and Johnson were contractually obligated to make the sequels, so had to grin and, well, bare it.

“It was very different without Sam there,” Dornan says today. “You go into these things where you build all that faith and trust with a person and then that person is taken away.

There’s a breakage, and it’s mended in a way that doesn’t fit the same way as it did before.” He cracks a wry smile.

“That’s the way I’m gonna say that. It was difficult for lots of reasons. But the sensitivity and understanding that Sam had around it all was, I thought, pretty vital.” The subsequent two films were shot back-to-back, under the direction of James Foley. “The first one made a ton of money, but critics didn’t like it – so that in itself moved

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I’m an ambitious person and I have a fire under me, but I’ve realised I don’t want big peaks all the time

the goalposts. It was a uniquely odd experience, and I would have really liked to have seen it be what it was originally set out to be under Sam.” I begin to ask about the frenzy that surrounded those movies, specifically the contingent of conspiratorially minded fans who insist Dornan and Johnson have been a real-life item for years and are parents to a litter of secret children – but Dornan interrupts.

Then the conversation gets quite dark.

“I tried to put walls up around [the fans], to really try and not let that in,” he says. “I’m pretty good at just blocking any of the noise associated with whatever fandom is – not letting it affect me, or more importantly my family.” He sighs. “I’ve been involved in situations where it’s impacted my family. I had a situation... a stalkertype situation before Covid. That was f***ing scary. Someone turned up at my house when my kids were there.

It was not something...” He trails off.

“The more I can block that out, the better it is for me and the family.”

When things like that happen, I

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ask, does that change how he picks work? Would he ever do something so big again? “I don’t know, because obviously that was a whole fallout from Fifty Shades and the hysteria around that franchise,” he says. “There’s never going to be anything like Fifty Shades again. It felt very much like its own thing. But there are obviously other jobs that bring insane scrutiny, like superhero stuff, or James Bond – any of that stuff. I’ve done pretty well to avoid that sort of s*** so far.”

But he has expressed interest in it.

He told The New York Times in 2021 that he’d had meetings with Marvel and would love a career like Robert Pattinson’s – who can move seamlessly between expensive studio films and wilder indies. And we’re meeting a few weeks after a report claimed that Dornan recently screen-tested for Marvel’s Fantastic Four reboot, only to be pipped to the role of Mr Fantastic by Pedro Pascal. He’s quick to pour cold water on that story.

“I think if you’re an actor of a certain standing, who has a certain sort of

These pages, clockwise from left: still from Belfast (2021); still from Wild Mountain Thyme (2020); still from Once Upon a Time (2012)

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Left: still from season one of The Tourist (2021)

Credit: The Interview People

I’m pretty good at just blocking any of the ‘noise associated with whatever fandom ’

recognition, you’re going to be in those conversations,” he says. “I’m not saying I’d never do anything super high-profile again, or a big [intellectual property] with all eyes on it... I probably will.

But I’m also really happy with where I’m at right now. I can live a pretty normal life for the most part. I can sit on the Tube and I’m fine. I’m an ambitious person, and I have a fire under me, but in the last 10 years or so, I’ve realised I don’t want big peaks all the time. That doesn’t interest me.

I’m happy to keep ticking over as I am, then one day just disappear and play golf for the rest of my life.”

If Dornan seems ambivalent, it’s only because he’s gone a lot further than most. He was born to parents who were prevented from pursuing their creative dreams – his father was forced by his parents to turn down a spot at Rada, while his mother wasn’t allowed by her parents to study art.

Instead they were pushed into more practical endeavours, namely medicine.

“I would have been obsolete if they hadn’t done that, because they only met because my dad went to medical school and my mum went to nursing school,” he laughs. “But there has been something lovely about sort of living

vicariously through their dreams.”

Dornan’s mother died from pancreatic cancer when he was just 16, but his father – who died in 2021 – was able to witness his acting career flourish.

“Some people, and particularly boys, go their whole life without their dad ever telling them that they love them or that they’re proud of them,” he says, “but I got that literally every day from my dad. I was able to bring him to premieres and have him experience a lot of the good stuff that’s happened in my life, and he really got off on that.”

Every time Dornan booked an acting job, his father would ring up and ask him who he’d be working with. “Really cool people, like Sebastian Stan or Anthony Mackie or Kristen Wiig, but obviously Dad would never know any of them.” Belfast, though, was different.

“It was so cool to be able to say, ahh, I’m working with Judi Dench and Ciaran Hinds, and Kenneth Branagh is directing – he’s like ‘Wow!’” Dornan’s father died before he could see Belfast, but he did manage to see Barb and Star Go to Vista Del Mar – another of the actor’s personal favourites, primarily because it was such a massive departure for him. The 2021 comedy served as

Wiig’s follow-up to Bridesmaids, and revolved around an eccentric pair of friends who must stop a supervillain from unleashing a hoard of killer mosquitos upon an unsuspecting public. Dornan plays the villain’s incredibly vapid henchman, who at one point stages an elaborate musical number in which he pirouettes across sand dunes and serenades a seagull. It is, in all seriousness, Dornan’s finest work to date.

“That film got nailed by Covid, but it’s got such a cult following now,” he says. “I’m probably closer to that character than any other character I’ve played – if a bit smarter. I think at my core I’m just really silly, you know?”

He remembers his family flying out to see him during filming – and their visit happened to fall on the day when he was shooting his musical number. “I’m on this beached jetski, the wind machine is in my hair, and I’m lip-syncing and doing all this stupid s***,” he says. “They call ‘cut’ and Millie walks over to me and says, ‘Do they know you’re just playing yourself?’ And I’m like, ‘Shuddup, they’re not supposed to know that.’”

I’m beginning to get what Kenneth Branagh was on about.

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The new six-part TV drama that tells the life story of Cristóbal Balenciaga is a timely reminder of his masterful skills and enduring impact on fashion

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WORDS: LISA ARMSTRONG

These pages, from left to right: a design from the Cristóbal Balenciaga Museum; Cristóbal Balenciaga

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These pages, from left to right: Prêt à Porter Spring Summer 1991 collection (“Superstar Diana Ross”) Metal bra, shorts, articulated armpieces and helmet, made in collaboration with Jean Pierre Delcros © Emil Larsson; Thierry Mugler, Montreal 2018. Courtesy and © Max Abadian

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here’s a scene in Cristóbal Balenciaga, a new Disney+ drama about one of the 20th century’s most important and mysterious designers, in which Balenciaga, partway through an interview with the fashion journalist Prudence Glynn, can no longer bear it.

The sleeves on Glynn’s mustard patterned dress (it’s 1971) are a travesty.

He rips one off and begins to rework it.

Most fashion screenplays – a small but growing genre – steer clear of the actual grunt work of making a garment, mining instead their subjects’ lives for scandal and roller-coaster emotion.

Kudos, then, to the makers of this series, who turn the technicalities of creation into gripping drama.

“To be honest, I didn’t know much about him,” says Lourdes Iglesias, the writer who came up with the idea for the big-budget six-parter.

“That’s despite us both being Basque. It’s only when I was living in Korea and met a designer there who worshipped Cristóbal and told me how iconic he is for so many of today’s designers, that I got really interested.”

Surely some mistake, you might suppose, to place a writer with little background knowledge in charge of a major TV retelling of the life of the great Cristóbal Balenciaga, who was revered by his rivals Coco Chanel and Christian Dior.

But what Iglesias instinctively understood is that his story is as much about the often painful act of creativity, “and how you maintain authorship and integrity of what you create”, as it is about a man who lived through extraordinarily turbulent times while making a living from clothes.

If Iglesias knew little at the start, she’s not alone. Even in Spain, where Balenciaga spent the first 42 years of his life, the fashion house that bears his name is probably best known now for its cartoonish trainers (worn by Hailey Bieber, Pharrell Williams et al) and a cumulus of scandals – from claims of ill-treated models in 2017 to 2022’s ad controversies – rather than its founder’s groundbreaking designs.

Cristóbal Balenciaga was born in Getaria, northern Spain, in 1895, a decade after Chanel and another decade before Dior. His father, a fisherman, became mayor. His mother was a

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I think Balenciaga’s creativity brought him happiness, even though it was also a kind of torture dressmaker. They were poor but not destitute and Cristóbal’s prodigious talent declared itself early on.

At 12 he was apprenticed to a tailor, and the Marchioness of Casa Torres began patronising him when he was still a teenager. He opened a boutique in San Sebastián, a chic resort favoured by the Spanish royals, and then in Madrid.

Spain’s aristocrats flocked to be dressed by this master sculptor, whose creative genius Cecil Beaton would later compare with that of Picasso.

Then came civil war. Balenciaga realised he needed to be in Paris, the birthplace of haute couture, to reach his full potential – and to feel safer. In 1937 he packed his bags.

Paris welcomed him. In his 30 years there he dressed the world’s most elegant women – Mona von Bismarck, Gloria Guinness, Ava Gardner, the Duchess of Windsor, Grace Kelly…

Audrey Hepburn wanted him to make her costumes for Sabrina in 1954, but he palmed her off on his protégé, Hubert de Givenchy.

It’s hard to imagine Balenciaga himself wouldn’t be aghast at the way his label has recently been besmirched.

This is a man who navigated the fallout

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of the Spanish Civil War and later, after he settled in Paris, the catastrophe of the Second World War, by saying almost nothing about himself in public and staying assiduously neutral in the face of political oppression.

Not easy when even your hats are called into question: Balenciaga adored hats. They were integral to his silhouettes, which often required exaggeratedly large millinery. This, the Nazis didn’t like. At one point he had to close his Paris workrooms for several months. No wonder he became so resolutely reticent, in public at least.

In recent times, however, his house has been dragged through the mud via a series of own goals.

In 2017 there were allegations, from US casting director James Scully, that casting agents used by the house treated models sadistically.

“I was very disturbed to hear from a number of girls this morning that yesterday at the Balenciaga casting… they made over 150 girls wait in a stairwell, told them they would have to stay over three hours to be seen and not to leave. In their usual fashion they shut the door, went to lunch and turned off the lights to the stairs, leaving every

girl with only the lights of their phones to see,” Scully wrote on Instagram.

Balenciaga put out a statement condemning the incident and saying it had stopped working with the agency.

Then in 2022 the house – and its profits – were rocked by two of its own advertisements. The first featured children holding teddy bear handbags embellished with what looked like bondage gear.

The second somehow managed to include documents pertaining to child pornography laws – the decision in the Supreme Court case United States v Williams – among its props.

To run one tasteless ad is unfortunate. Two concurrently appeared careless. Even Kim Kardashian, who (in)famously wore a black Balenciaga look that concealed everything, including her face (but not her distinctive shape) to the 2021 Met Gala, put temporary distance between herself and the house she had previously championed.

Mind you, recent controversial baggage may have helped convince Disney+ there’s sufficient name recognition to make a glossy retelling of Balenciaga’s story worthwhile.

Cristóbal may be a shadowy figure, but the brand is not just part of the popular consciousness, it’s notorious.

The series is of course fabulously costumed, by Bina Daigeler, an Academy Award-nominated German costume designer. But Daigeler didn’t merely have to outfit scores of characters in period clothes, she had to recreate 70 of Cristóbal’s most memorable designs, in various stages of their completion.

There are three versions of the famous ermine-trimmed wedding dress he designed for the 1960 marriage of the future Queen Fabiola of Belgium – a toile (the term for a practice version) in a relatively affordable silk that could be used for rehearsals; a semi-complete one that showed the gown mid-process; and the finished

masterpiece with its 22ft-long train.

“That dress was maybe the biggest summit,” Daigeler tells me from Berlin. “I had a studio with 10 people working on it for two months. We were constantly cleaning all the sewing machines and space around it to avoid getting a single mark on it. Balenciaga famously used masses of fabric for all his clothes, so for a royal wedding gown we needed a huge amount of room.”

Another challenge was the singleseam coat, a garment as audacious as it sounds. “Balenciaga wasn’t a sketcher.

He preferred to cut fabric straight on to the mannequin’s body, so there aren’t many clues to how he achieved some of his feats. Luckily I had help from someone who knew how he constructed that coat. I tried not to change anything.

“But just finding fabrics with the same weights that he used was difficult. Fabrics are lighter now and softer, but they have less structure…

It was all nerve-racking to be honest…

I thought everyone would kill me.”

These pages, from left to right: a design from the Cristóbal Balenciaga Museum; Balenciaga spring/ summer 2022 43

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It was worth it, though. “For me he’s the iconic 20th-century designer… plus I got to be an extra in a black Balenciaga evening dress, which I now own.” As well as masterminding reproductions that would convince the beadiest-eyed fashion purist, Daigeler had to come up with deliberately bad copies.

Before couturiers began to produce off-the-rack clothes in the 1960s, women who didn’t have the budget to fly to Paris for multiple fittings for original couture could buy licensed copies made in the countries in which they lived. It provided designers including Chanel and Dior with a valuable income stream.

But Balenciaga wasn’t interested in money. He detested the way some department stores would breach their licensing agreements, cutting corners and using cheaper fabrics in the belief that Paris was a long way away and no one would notice. He did – and these inferior reproductions caused him visceral distress. If he saw a woman in something he felt traduced the Balenciaga name, he had no qualms about approaching her to remonstrate.

“I don’t think it was ego that made him a perfectionist,” says Iglesias. “I think it physically pained him to see things he thought were ugly or wrong.”

The scene where he wrests Prudence Glynn’s sleeve may not have happened in real life. Yet though he almost never gave interviews (‘The one thing Christian Dior does better than you,’ his long-suffering business partner reasons at one point, ‘is communication’), towards the end of his life he did grant Glynn an audience.

“That interview wasn’t nearly as long or as intimate as we’ve portrayed it,” says Alberto San Juan, who, via some subtle prosthetics and a sublimely tailored wardrobe, plays Cristóbal from age 42 to 77. “But it’s a pivotal dramatic device to move backwards and forwards in time. In reality, Cristóbal was so private and discreet we don’t even know for sure which side of the civil war he was on.”

When the Nazis cooked up a hare-brained scheme to transport Paris’s cherished couture industry to Berlin, he held his counsel, doubling down on dressing their wives and mistresses in Paris.

Balenciaga avoided attention, 44

although perfectionist that he was, he risked severe punishment by smuggling in fabrics from Spain, where they were not rationed.

It was only when the Nazis declared his oversized hats depraved that he broke, almost refusing to comply with a demand for less extravagant brims. This is captured in the new drama: “I am apolitical,” he insists.

“Don’t you see, everyone is political,” his backer ripostes. “Even hats.”

“He dressed Spain’s fascist wives and Nazi wives and yet we couldn’t find a single opinion he expressed about any of them,” says San Juan. “I think he was probably conservative. But I also think dictatorships create a horrible reality that makes some become activists and others, like Cristóbal, who just want to get through it.

“I think we address that in the series.

When a reporter later questions him about that period, Cristóbal responds by asking the journalist whether they’ve

been through a war. His basic argument is, if you haven’t you can’t judge.”

His business partner, Władzio Jaworowski d’Attainville, the love of his life, died prematurely in 1948 and Balenciaga never found the same romantic fulfilment. After inhabiting this apparently austere figure at length, does San Juan feel Balenciaga was ever happy?

“A question I’ve asked myself a lot.

I don’t think he was a joyful person.

He was never fully satisfied and he was very hard on himself, despite his huge success. But he had some joys in life – and I can tell you, although I was a bit of a fashion philistine before, it was absolutely wonderful to dress like Cristóbal did. I think his creativity brought him happiness even though it was also a kind of torture.”

To an extent, Balenciaga’s distaste for publicity worked in his favour, adding to the aura of mystery. But it also hollowed out his reputation after

These pages, from left to right: Balenciaga spring/ summer 2022; a design from the Cristóbal Balenciaga Museum

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Hats were integral to Balenciaga’s silhouettes, which often required exaggeratedly large millinery

he died in 1972. He had shuttered his house in 1968, declaring, with characteristic doominess, “there is no one left to dress.”

With no business to carry on his name he receded into the mists of fashion history. The name languished until Nicolas Ghesquière, an experimentalist after Cristóbal’s own heart, was appointed creative director of Balenciaga – which had been relaunched in 1986 – in 1997.

Even then, it remained a relatively small player. After Kering, the French luxury conglomerate that owns Alexander McQueen, Gucci and Saint Laurent, acquired it in 2001, there was more money around to turbocharge its recovery.

Today, it’s under the creative leadership of the brilliant, mercurial designer Demna Gvasalia, who deepdives into Cristóbal’s archives when

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he needs to assert his creative and technical chops, sometimes reproducing the great man’s work almost stitch for stitch, as he did last summer when he showed a black velvet simulacrum of a dress Princess Grace wore to her 40th-birthday ball in 1969.

After a turbulent period, celebrities are showing support – Isabelle Huppert, Eva Longoria, Kim Kardashian – but hostilities have not entirely ceased.

“I thought Balenciaga was supposed to be cancelled,’ one social-media user posted, after Cardi B walked in the Fall 2024 show in Los Angeles.

That collection, it’s fair to say, divided critics with its embrace of low-culture LA style (think bum-baring pink tracksuits and Ugg-influenced stilettos) as much as it won praise for the “spirit of the great master” shawl-collared coat dress worn by

Nicole Kidman on the front row.

Would Cristóbal embrace what his house has become? “He was modern,” muses Iglesias, “but he wouldn’t enjoy being exposed to so much controversy.”

At least his brand is alive, having been put into cold storage in 1968.

In 2022, it generated about €1.5 billion – a minnow perhaps compared with Chanel, with revenues of €17.2 billion that year, and Dior, at around €6.6 billion in 2021, but very much part of the cultural conversation.

Whereas Chanel and Dior both had a constellation of beloved products for subsequent designers to play with, Balenciaga’s distaste for logos and obvious codes means there is no Balenciaga equivalent of a Chanel tweed jacket or quilted shoulder bag – nor a Balenciaga perfume as enduringly successful as Miss Dior.

Yet his impact on the way the world dresses is as powerful today as ever. It’s just that the world doesn’t necessarily know it. Those cape dresses, loved by everyone from the Princess of Wales to Lady Gaga? Pure Cristóbal.

The slashed neckline of the Duchess of Sussex’s Givenchy wedding dress?

Another Cristóbal-ism (which Hubert de Givenchy made globally famous on Hepburn in Sabrina).

Funnel necks, so current today, are also a debt we owe to Cristóbal, who created them for women who wanted to conceal their necks (he was as skilled as any plastic surgeon at perfecting the human silhouette). Baby doll dresses, a perennial favourite of JLo and Alexa Chung? Cristóbal.

“He created some of the most lasting and impactful silhouettes, such as the sack dress and the envelope dress, but he also produced practical, flattering cuts for multiple body shapes. Christian Dior said Balenciaga was the master of all his peers,” says Oriole Cullen, the V&A’s curator of textiles and fashion. “It’s hard not to agree.

He produced new concepts throughout his career and arguably became more experimental, reaching a peak of creativity towards the end of his career.”

Perhaps Coco Chanel, an on-off friend, put it best: “Balenciaga alone is a couturier in the truest sense of the word. Only he is capable of cutting material, assembling a creation and sewing it by hand. The others are simply fashion designers.”

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A new exhibition of Helmut Newton’s work highlights a photographer who dared to be different WORDS: JOHN THATCHER

Left: Helmut Newton, Daryl Hannah, Los Angeles, 1984 © Helmut Newton Foundation 47

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hen asked to define his photographic style during a magazine interview at the turn of the century, the late Helmut Newton succinctly summed up the polarising nature of his work. “They are photographs. Each one speaks for itself.

Some people hate them and hate what I do. Others think they are beautiful.”

Those in the former camp branded his images misogynistic, a view Newton’s own words did little to dispel: “The women you see in my photographs,” he explained, “are my ideal women. The less I know of them, the better. The more I know, the more disillusioned I become. I lose the glamour, the aura, the illusion of beauty.” Others viewed his images as championing feminine strength and power, including many of the famous faces who posed for him, while Newton called himself a feminist. “Many people think that the women he photographed were just objects. Of course, everything in front of a lens becomes an object, but Helmut wanted to show women’s dimensions and to tell their stories,” argues journalist and filmmaker Gero von Boehm, who directed the 2020 documentary Helmut Newton: The Bad and the Beautiful. “His photos were either the beginning or the end of a story and the rest is simply our fantasies around it. He played with that idea a great deal in his work. I can see that some people say his images have a male gaze or a male fantasy, but life itself is filled with our fantasies. The freedom of art and expression is so precious — you can choose whether or not to look at his photographs, but art and ideas need to be visible. Helmut wanted to incite fantasies but his were not dangerous ones; they were just stories. We must look to see the images themselves, not only the man or the artist, or to speculate about his intentions, but to see in our own right.”

Yet one thing both his detractors and enthusiasts agree on is that Newton was a visionary, whose often provocative images injected the pages of Vogue, Harper’s Bazaar and the other leading publications he shot for with a vibrancy no one knew they were previously lacking.

Those magazine pages were Newton’s primary portal for connecting with his audience, and the always striking images he shot have been the subject

These pages, from left to right: Helmut Newton, Self-Portrait, Monte Carlo, 1993 © Helmut Newton Foundation; Helmut Newton, Italian Vogue, Monte Carlo, 2003, Polaroid © Helmut Newton Foundation

of short films, documentaries and countless exhibitions since his passing in 2004. The latest celebration of his work is staged in A Coruña, Spain, where The Marta Ortega Pérez (MOP) Foundation hosts Helmut Newton – Fact & Fiction until May. “Helmut Newton’s remarkable life story and photographic legacy continue to fascinate an international audience today, two decades after his death,” says the exhibition’s curator. “Newton enjoyed toying with contradictions.

His pictorial world was one of meticulously constructed artifices, yet with the insistent immediacy and the compelling persuasiveness that he so cleverly coaxed from the neutral, forensic medium of photography.

This question of contradictions and of the dynamic that they generate is central to the man and to his work.”

Helmut Newton was born Helmut Neustaedter in Berlin on October 31, 1920, the son of a rich button

He was the ‘photographer to

whom we all looked for inspiration but whom we could never be quite as good as

’

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These pages, from left to right: Helmut Newton, Monica Bellucci, Monte Carlo, 2001© Helmut Newton Foundation; Helmut Newton, Shoe, Walter Steiger, Monte Carlo, 1983 © Helmut Newton Foundation

‘ Newton enjoyed toying with contradictions ’

manufacturer. Drawn to photography at an early age, he purchased his first camera aged 12 and offered himself as an apprentice to the theatrical photographer, Yva. But his fledging career was cut short by the growing unease in Berlin as the Nazis swept to power, and his family fled, first to Singapore, then Australia, where he changed his surname to Newton and from 1940-45 served in the Australian Army, later meeting and marrying the photographer and actress, June Brunell, who would become a huge influence on his work.

Though his life was no longer obstructed by war, it wasn’t until Newton moved to Paris in 1961 that his career took off, regularly contributing to the pages of French Vogue and

Harper’s Bazaar and going on to shoot with the foremost names in not only film (Elizabeth Taylor), fashion (Yves Saint Laurent) and music (David Bowie) but politics, too, most notably Margaret Thatcher, widely considered the world’s most powerful woman at the time of her sitting. “I’m always looking for a woman who’s superior, not an object I can push around. To tell you the truth, I like photographing people I love, that I admire, and even people that I hate.”

Newton preferred to use natural light and worked primarily in black and white, conjuring an ability to take shots that looked like snaps but which were, according to another legendary photographer, Lord Lichfield, “crafted with incredible stylishness. He was

the photographer to whom we all looked for inspiration but whom we could never be quite as good as. He was as good as they get.”

Newton died in 2024 at the age of 83 when the car he was driving struck a wall. “His death was tragic but also fitted into his whole story,” says von Boehm. “He was at the Chateau Marmont in Hollywood and he was on his way to shoot some beautiful girls on the beach at Santa Monica when he had a heart attack at the wheel,” he says. “But I do think if he hadn’t died, he could have gone on working for many more years to come. Helmut definitely wasn’t finished yet.”

Helmut Newton – Fact & Fiction is showing at The MOP Foundation, A Coruña, Spain, until May 51

Property

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FEBRUARY 2024 : ISSUE 149

California Love

A huge slice of California’s history hits the market for the first time

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Travel JANUARY 2023: ISSUE 136

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ne of California’s most historic (and largest) estates has been put up for sale with a price tag of $110 million – exactly 110 years after it was built. Green Gables served as the summer residence of the entrepreneurial Fleishhacker family of San Francisco at the turn of the last century, when it was designed by the period’s leading architectural firm, Greene and Greene, and through the intervening decades has swelled in size across its 74-acre plot. It now comprises seven homes, extensive gardens, vast woodlands, and a Roman-style pool the size of a football field – in addition to soul-stirring views over California’s hills and surrounding mountains. But what adds to Green Gables’ appeal is that it was a property of firsts for California: the first to have a free-form swimming pool and the first to have a roof that replicated the thatched roofs of England, a quirk born of the Fleishhackers’ fondness for the homes they saw while on vacation there. Such is its global allure that it was once selected by the United Nations to host its 20th-anniversary commemoration gala. toptenrealestatedeals.com 53

Motoring FEBRUARY 2024 : ISSUE 149

Brother Nature

Nothing comes more naturally to the Ringbrothers than reimagining and enhancing classic cars, with looks, handling and performance like never before

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WORDS: CHRIS ANDERSON

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heck out our YouTube channel, where we race it against a modern Rolls,” says Mike Ring, co-founder of Ringbrothers, the custom car company he established with his sibling, Jim, in a small Wisconsin town in the US. “Our 1961 Rolls-Royce Silver Cloud II versus a present-day Phantom on the drag strip. The newer car has a twin-turbo V12 engine, but we fitted our classic with a supercharged 6.2-litre LT4 V8, capable of 640hp!”

In the video, Mike can be seen behind the wheel of one car, and Jim the other, both wearing chauffeur hats. Originally, the older car was equipped with just 185hp, but times and technology have changed. “It’s got a lot of torque as well,” Mike continues. “And we added 10-speed automatic transmission and had to improve the suspension, just so the car could handle the uprated performance.”

The Silver Cloud II, which the Ringbrothers have named ‘Paramount’, was one of three classics sourced, rebuilt and reimagined for last year’s SEMA

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‘

We always try to do something that nobody has seen before

’

modified car show in Las Vegas. A 1965 Ford Mustang Convertible, ‘Uncaged’, and a 1969 Dodge Charger, ‘Tusk’, were the other two on display. The SEMA show has become something of a Ringbrothers tradition, where Mike, Jim, and their team work on several cars in the months and even years before, unveiling them at the event, usually to a stunned public.

As Mike explains, this is how it has been for years. “Ever since we took our first car to SEMA, a 1967 Mustang called ‘Reactor’, in 2006,” recalls Mike. “That was when the restoration and modification side of our business came together. But my brother and I have been tinkering with cars since we were 10 or 12 years old in our mom’s basement. We lived in a small town of about 600 people, and we’d work on their cars, fixing them up or painting them.

It didn’t become an official business until 1989, when my brother set up on his own, offering restoration and collision work.

Then in 1994, he bought a new workshop, and that’s when I came in, so we’ve been Ringbrothers now for 30 years.”

Today, the premises in Spring Green, Wisconsin covers all things automotive, with space to build the iconic road machines for SEMA, 3D printers and CNC mills for making bespoke parts, and a garage handling everyday repairs. “To restore the Rolls, we remade everything, from the body panels to the nameplates, reimagining every line and proportion while maintaining the classic feel, finishing off with custom 18in wheels,” says Mike. “The only thing we didn’t do in-house was the interior, where we added a starlight headliner with over 1,000 LEDs, similar to what Rolls-Royce has in its current line. Like the engine, that wouldn’t have been around in 1961.”

Mike remembers the other cars built for shows in previous years, with various Mustang, Camaro, and Charger models,

each given their own catchy nicknames.

“We always try to do something that nobody has seen before, and not repeat ourselves,” he explains. “That’s why it was fun to work on the Rolls. You don’t see a lot of them out here, especially the classics, and this one belonged to a local potato farmer. He was looking at retirement, sold his farm and had some money, and originally just wanted to restore it. But when he saw what we could do, basically rebuild and enhance it, he wanted it to become a show car.

And in Las Vegas, people were blown away. We’ve even done a segment on it with Jay Leno for his Jay Leno’s Garage series, which will be out soon.”

But the other cars that the Rolls was

unveiled with are just as special. “The 1965 Mustang Convertible, ‘Uncaged’, is the follow-up to a 1964.5 model we built, ‘Caged’, for the previous year’s SEMA show,” Mike explains. “The wheel centre caps are the only thing left that’s still stock, as the body is an inch wider either side, and we’ve redesigned the taillight bezels, side scoops, running horse emblems, fenders, and rocker panels. Then it has burgundy paint, with a 5-litre Coyote V8 and 10-speed automatic transmission.

“And ‘Tusk’, the 1969 Charger, got its name thanks to the supercharged 1,000hp Hellephant 7-litre V8 we added, which sits 2.5in further back than the original against a bespoke firewall to improve the weight distribution. We also gave the

classic looks a radical rethink, adding a two-piece carbon-fibre bonnet with rear-facing scoops, plus a new front fascia and chin spoiler, and extended the quarter panel end caps at the rear.

The body colour is called Black to the Future, and we added the gold accents.”

These are some impressive cars, and Mike concludes by revealing the one Ringbrothers is working on next – a classic Aston Martin with a seriously powerful engine. Further details are under wraps, but it seems that building the Rolls has given them a taste for non-American muscle cars.

If you want to see what they come up with, a trip to SEMA in Las Vegas next autumn might be in order.

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Gastronomy

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FEBRUARY 2024: ISSUE 149

The Spice Route Jeremy Chan’s pathway to the kitchen may have been unconventional, but it’s made for Michelin-starred cuisine that defies definition

J

eremey Chan maintains an insatiable appetite for learning. While a teenager, he taught himself to speak six languages fluently, simply because he found them interesting. He added a seventh, Farsi, when a student of philosophy and the theory of languages at Princeton University. And when he later developed an interest in food, he simply devoured cookbooks. Hundreds of them. “When I’m interested in something, I want to know everything about it.”

No surprise, then, to learn that once Chan decided to embark on a career in the kitchen – eschewing the world of finance, in which he was briefly engaged – he was eager to jump in at the deep end. Not for Chan the paddling pool of culinary school. “I thought I could just walk into a threestarred restaurant and start working, but I realised that no restaurant was just going to take this random person who had no experience.” Instead, he wrote to chefs he was keen to 58

shadow, seeking on-the-job experience to acquire knowledge as swiftly as possible. And not just any chef in any old kitchen. Only the best would do. Claude Bosi, who now heads London’s two Michelin-starred Bibendum but at the time was running the two-star Hibiscus, took him on. “Entering a professional kitchen for the first time, I realised there was a lot to learn, and physically I couldn’t move my hands as fast as everyone else,” Chan concedes. It did not deter him.

Further experience was gleaned from the groundbreaking Noma and much-lauded Dinner by Heston. “Cooking felt like the only thing I wanted to do in my life. I fell in love with ingredients, understanding their properties and how to harness flavour while enacting my own sense of creativity and flavour. I began cooking at 26 and I haven’t looked back since. I spent a few years doing stages and working for short periods in other kitchens, but it never really stuck. I studied, learned, and applied myself until opening Ikoyi.”

Credit: © Maureen M. Evans

WORDS: JOHN THATCHER

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Below: Iré HassanOdukale and Jeremy Chan © Cristiana Ferrauti.

All other images © Irina Boersma

Ikoyi is the London restaurant Chan opened in partnership with his childhood friend, Iré HassanOdukale. Like Chan, Odukale took an unconvential pathway, working for six years as an underwriter for his family’s insurance business before, with no formal training in the industry, opening a restaurant with friends.

“I guess having a different background means we don’t think like restaurateurs or chefs,” suggests Chan, when I ask whether their unorthodox experience has actually proved more beneficial. “I don’t know. We believe in rounded individuals with a varied set of experiences. I don’t think it makes us any better; it just makes us think differently, I think, from a much more objective standpoint. And perhaps to the degree that it gives us some advantage, because we are not stuck in any traditional mould; we don’t do things in the ways others do them, we do things our way. And to a degree, that’s been a success for us. But we had to learn and become restaurateurs, to acquire skills, because we never had them before we entered this field.”

Reflecting the global nature of their early years (Odukale was born in Nigeria and moved to London as a teenager. Chan was born in England to a Chinese father and Canadian mother, 60

who now heads London’s two Michelinstarred Bibendum but at the time was running the two-star Hibiscus, took him on. “Entering a professional kitchen for the first time, I realised there was a lot to learn, and physically I couldn’t move my hands as fast as everyone else,” Chan concedes. It did not deter him. Further experience was gleaned from the groundbreaking Noma and much-lauded Dinner by Heston. “Cooking felt like the only thing I wanted to do in my life. I fell in love with ingredients, understanding their properties and how to harness flavour while enacting my own sense of creativity and flavour. I began cooking at 26 and I haven’t looked back since.

I spent a few years doing stages and working for short periods in other kitchens, but it never really stuck. I studied, learned, and applied myself until opening Ikoyi.”

‘

I’ve accepted that I will never be able to define my food

and has lived in the United States and Hong Kong), Ikoyi’s influences are nuanced and myriad.

While West Africa was the initial driver for the type of food the duo wished to present, Chan also garnered ideas from conversations with Professor James McCann of Boston University, a specialist in the history of grains. He worked with the Umami Information Centre, a global online platform founded in Japan; studied the medical journal, African Ethnobotany in the Americas, and a wide collection of books and manuscripts from the British Library.

Little wonder that Ikoyi’s culinary style now defies categorisation. “Ikoyi’s

’

cuisine is undefinable. That is why that’s interesting,” states Chan. “And that is why it is constantly changing.

I have never defined it. I don’t define it. I don’t wish to define it because I wish to evolve it and make it change constantly. If I were to define it and limit it to that definition, I’ve accepted that I will never be able to define it. I just want to do what I want to do, go with my feelings and intuition, and cook things that inspire me. If you had to define it to some degree, I would say it’s seasonality. It is food based on seasonality, heat and spices. It is food that is based on technique with the aim of making people feel good.

It is not a cuisine that is supposed to be challenging to understand on the palate. It is food that is designed to please people.”

It’s certainy done that, scooping two Michelin stars in the process. But Chan can pinpoint what it is that makes Ikoyi unique. “Our use of spice characterises Ikoyi. The intention behind every dish

is deliciousness, but I want guests to feel the intensity that can push people in different directions. Spice is part of our weaponry. It’s not just a quick hit of chilli; it has a rounded depth to it. It is that that gives you that warm, comforting feeling. That’s what is unique about Ikoyi.”

Just over a year ago, Ikoyi moved locations within London to the more prominent The Strand, while April will see Chan launch a cookbook, Ikoyi: A Journey through Bold Heat with Recipes. “We’ve gone from a casual, à la carte restaurant to an extremely sophisticated, refined gastronomic experience, which is cool.”

Cool, yes, but with a hit of spice.

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ULTIMATE STAYS

St. Regis Riyadh

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Saudi Arabia

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J

ohn Jacob Astor IV was a visionary, a man who changed the landscape for luxury hotels when he opened the St. Regis New York more than a century ago. It was hailed as not only the most luxurious hotel of its time but also the most advanced – Astor insisted that each room have its own phone, a first for a hotel in 1904.

Were he alive today to witness the opening of the St. Regis Riyadh, Astor IV would be pleased to note that his appetite for innovation is deeply rooted in the now storied St. Regis brand – this is a game-changing hotel for high-level hospitality in Saudi Arabia.

Set in Via Riyadh, also home to designer boutiques and a clutch of celebrated restaurants, the St. Regis Riyadh houses 83 guestrooms, including 21 impeccably designed suites and an expansive two-bedroom Royal Suite. It is the city’s first boutique-style hotel, where modernity melds with tradition in alluring architecture, not least the St. Regis signature staircase and dramatic crystal chandelier which greet guests on arrival.

But perhaps Astor IV would be most proud of The St. Regis Spa, created to transform the spa experience in Riyadh. “Its attention to detail, exquisite facilities, and diverse range of wellness offerings set it apart as a premier destination for those seeking an unparalleled spa escape in Riyadh,” says Director of Spa, Aida Jamanbekova. “But it also stands out from other hotel spas with its unwavering commitment to luxury and personalised experiences.”

The city’s largest hotel spa, it features eight treatment rooms, a Spa Suite for couples, and two thermal experience areas. These areas include a traditional sauna, herbal steam room, snow shower, ice fountain, and heated lounges. “Our experience showers provide a unique touch,” outlines Jamanbekova. “Guests can choose from soothing tropical rain to an invigorating Caribbean storm.”

This is a spa that features the best of the best, its materials selected from across the globe. “The sauna and steam facilities came from the Netherlands; walnut tree veneer was sourced from the USA, treated in Italy, and assembled in Bahrain; while natural parquet flooring was sourced from Italy, along with green marble,

Spa Relaxation Lounge

each slab engraved with patterns printed by the latest technology.” You’ll also find the likes of leather wallpapers and ‘puzzle’ flooring, comprising five different types of marble, each with a different texture, while the relaxation lounge features a striking chandelier and cozy fireplace.

“This attention to detail ensures a truly extraordinary experience for our guests,” enthuses Jamanbekova.

AMRA products were chosen for their innovative, results-driven properties. “AMRA goes above and beyond by incorporating opulent elements like 24k gold and platinum into their products,” says Jamanbekova.

“AMRA also stands out for its commitment to scientific research. The brand leverages cutting-edge research to formulate products that are not only effective but also at the forefront of skincare advancements.

This fusion of nature and science reflects AMRA’s dedication to pushing the boundaries of traditional skincare approaches. Moreover, AMRA places a strong emphasis on ethical values, ensuring that their products align with principles that prioritise crueltyfree practices and environmental sustainability.”

When pushed to recommend a treatment from the spa’s expansive offering, Jamanbekova highlights the 400 Journey from Caroline’s Collection. “It begins with a personal consultation, ensuring that each element of the treatment is meticulously crafted to cater to a guest’s unique needs.” There then follows a fusion massage of deep-tissue and aromatherapy techniques, before an exclusive infusion of the AMRA Elixir, a blend of semi-precise minerals and bioactive ingredients, which Jamanbekova ensures will “elevate this massage to unparalleled heights, offering both relaxation and results-driven benefits.” Next up is the application of hot stones infused with 24k gold or platinum to, “promote circulation, soothe muscles, and impart a radiant, revitalised aura.” Lastly, is a facial using an AMRA product infused with platinum, designed to “leave your skin radiant, revitalised, and indulgently pampered.”

“It’s this type of tailored service that makes the St. Regis Spa the ultimate destination for an extraordinary and holistic spa journey.”

John Jacob Astor IV would be proud.

Spa Couple Suite 63

What I Know Now

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Illustration: Leona Beth

FEBRUARY 2024 : ISSUE 149

Izu Ani CHEF One of the greatest lessons my mother ever taught me was to show up every day, to keep going and to keep striving towards my dreams. My idol in so many ways, she leads by example and showed me how to make things happen, instead of waiting for things to change. There is so much beauty and power in putting in the work and taking daily action. It’s a concept that I live my life by and hope to pass on to my boys one day. We can’t keep putting things off until tomorrow; we have to make the most of each day.

One thing I do every day is commit to my morning routine. It is so important to make time for yourself, to hit the reset button and clear your mind. I make sure I cycle every morning. My time on the bike is my meditation, and it sets me up for the day. Knowing how to take care of ourselves allows us to be there for others.

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If we look at our circumstances as opportunities instead of obstacles, we can positively impact our mindsets.

Experience cannot just be about ‘what went right’ — success is what we celebrate, mistakes are what we learn from.

There is a lesson in every situation, and challenges give us valuable knowledge that we may not have gleaned otherwise.

The trick is to pay attention. It’s all information and information is everything.

The more we know, the greater our spectrum of understanding, which leads us to better opportunities and experiences.

Success is a road that is always under construction, every single day, so make sure that you bring your hard hat and keep building. Everything we associate ourselves with in life is an extension and reflection of our ambitions. When we work with passion,

we can see how much there is to achieve, and our success will be our evidence.

If I could advise my younger self I’d say to do something that you haven’t done before and make something that people really appreciate — you have to shake things up.

Do something that puts you in a different realm and breathe in the craziness of life. Ask questions, investigate, learn, take everything in and experience it all.

Looking with the eye of discovery leads us to the knowledge that helps us evolve.

I believe that milestones are often found in the small moments. I find the most pride and pleasure when I am consistent and striving towards my goals every day. By focusing on improving every single day of your life, and really embracing this process, we can see how much there is to achieve.

RM 65-01 Skeletonised automatic winding calibre 60-hour power reserve (±10%) Baseplate and bridges in grade 5 titanium Split-seconds chronograph Function selector and rapid winding mechanism Variable-geometry rotor Case in grey Quartz TPT®

A Racing Machine On The Wrist