(Carlos Barria/Reuters)

Francesco Duina is professor of sociology at Bates College and author of Broke and Patriotic: Why Poor Americans Love Their Country. Over in the Guardian, he grapples with what strikes him as a surprising and troubling phenomenon:

The World Values Survey indicate that 100% of Americans who belong to the lowest income group are either “very” or “quite” proud of their country. This isn’t the case for any other major advanced country in the world. These positive feelings are also resilient: they intensified, in fact, during the Great Recession of the late 2000s. As long as they remain deeply patriotic, America’s poor won’t rise up. Indeed, they’ll continue to fill the ranks of the military, strive and sacrifice to help America assert itself in the world, and even feed into and support the slogans and successes of the country’s political leaders.

I realize that these days, MSNBC’s Chris Matthews is now the subject of jokes about unregulated methane emissions, but way back in 2002 he wrote a book, Now Let Me Tell You What I Really Think that included a clarifying anecdote from Matthews’ days as an armed officer of the U.S. Capitol Police in the 1960s.

But the core of the force was made up of “lifers” from the military, enlisted guys who’d done long hitches with the Army, Navy, or Marines. I’d spend hours hanging out with these guys. My favorite was Sergeant Leroy Taylor. He was one of those citizen-philosophers who instinctively grasped this country’s real politics, the kind that people live and are ready to die for. He and the other country boys would talk about how they would do anything to defend the Capitol. More than some of the big-shot elected officials, my colleagues in blue revered the place and what it meant to the republic. It wasn’t about them, but about something much bigger. I will never forget what Leroy once told me and the wisdom it contained: “The little man loves his country, Chris, because it’s all he’s got.”

Being poor in America is terrible in a lot of ways. But even the poorest American is ensured a vote upon turning 18, their day in court if charged with a crime with a jury of their peers, a right to a public defender, their right to speak their mind and criticize anyone in government without the state prosecuting him, their right to assemble and protest, the right to own a firearm if they have no mental impairment or criminal record, no search or seizure of their property without a warrant, rights against self-incrimination, the right to believe whatever religion they want or none at all, and the right to be free from cruel and unusual punishment. There are wealthy moguls in China who don’t have half those rights.

I’d argue the more interesting question is not why do the poor assess living the United States so positively, but why the wealthy assess living the United States so negatively? (And why is there often an implicit assumption that the wealthy see their country clearly and accurately, while the poor do not?)

Perhaps the remarkable opportunities of the wealthy give them a skewed view of life at home and abroad.

Yes, a wealthy person is more likely to have traveled to more foreign countries, and have more firsthand experience with life in other countries. But what do they see in their encounters with other countries? The life of a wealthy person in New York is not all that different from the life of a wealthy person in London or Paris or Dubai or Tokyo or Shanghai. It’s not surprising that almost everyone at the Davos conference gets along well. They’ve all been to the best schools, they all enjoyed enormous opportunities in their careers, they all dress in similar tailored suits, live well, eat well, enjoy the finer things in life . . . It is unsurprising that a CEO from Silicon Valley meets a CEO from Switzerland and, after chatting over a tray of canapes, concludes they’re not so different after all.

If you have been lucky enough to stay or even just step inside more than one luxury hotel in more than one world capital, you’ll realize they all look more or less the same. The lobby of the Four Seasons doesn’t look all that different from one in the Mandarin Oriental, which doesn’t look all that different from the one in Ritz-Carlton, and most of us would be stumped if we had to pick out which one was which, and in which city. There’s a worldwide homogeny to the signifiers of the luxury lifestyle. While there’s a lot of overwrought denunciation of “globalists” out there these days, it’s safe to conclude that most of the wealthy elite in any given nation have more in common with other countries’ wealthy elites than with their own countrymen.

If you step into lower-class or middle-class person’s house in “flyover country” in the United States, or Morocco, or Israel, or France, or Brazil, you will much more likely to immediately spot distinctions and differences. Even something as simple as tea with grandma is going to be immediately distinctive from country to country — the Japanese tea set is going to look different from the English tea set, and different from the Turkish tea set, and if you see a samovar, there’s a good chance you’re in Russia. If there is Frida Kahlo or Diego Rivera art on the walls, there’s a really good chance the inhabitants are Mexican or have Mexican heritage. You’re more likely to spot symbols of religious faith, flags, sports team paraphernalia — all kinds of displays that declare, ‘this is where we come from, this is who we are, this is why we’re proud to be who we are.’ It is not surprising that poor and middle-class citizens would find “globalism” as an odd and not-that-appealing prospect, and express patriotism (and perhaps nationalism) in ways that wealthier, more cosmopolitan citizens find naive and parochial.


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Thanks to Aysem for this inspiring alumni interview; it's so intersting to see how our former pupils have progressed into different industries!

When did you attend Francis Holland School?

1991-1998

What is your fondest schoolday memory?

Gosh there are so many. The ‘review’ showpieces, ski trips, school plays, singing epic works with Harrow boys school, playing sports in Regent's Park...all shared with some very special people, many of whom are my closest friends today.

Which teacher did you find most influential?

Mlle Gustave who taught French was very encouraging of me wanting to pursue Languages at A Level and university.

What have you been up to since leaving FHS?

I studied French and Turkish at UCL and SOAS (some of the best years of my life) before falling into my first PR job by chance. I had always assumed I would become a translator/interpreter. Several years later whilst at my first company, I decided to pursue an MA in Translation and Linguistics at the University of Westminster which I thoroughly enjoyed but realised was not suited to me. Ironically I now work right across the road at The Langham! I got married in 2014 and gave birth to my daughter Ayla four months ago.

How did you come to be in your current career?

Totally by accident in fact - I was working in a high end boutique on the weekends right after uni and a girl there mentioned a travel PR agency she was based at during the week were looking to hire. I went in for an interview and ended up staying three years. It was my first foray into travel PR and the clients were very prestigious. I took some very memorable press trips whilst based there. I then studied my MA before venturing into a FMCG agency before heading to Mason Rose, sales and marketing agency for the travel industry. From there I moved to lifestyle agency, Purple, before getting my first in-house position at Preferred Hotel Group. After several years, an ex-client based at Langham Hospitality Group was looking for a Regjonal Director of PR EMEA and the rest is history. I was promoted to Director of Marketing Communications last year based at The Langham, London.

What are your role's most/least interesting parts?

The creative process is very rewarding. I love the interpersonal element too, the contacts you make within PR become very much your Black Book of need-to-know industry people, many of whom have become firm friends. The media has changed so much from when I first started; I distinctly remember faxing my first ever media request to a client whilst starting out, now we are living in the midst of social media and influencer marketing. There has been a huge shift to digital media. Hospitality is very much like a family and a hotel environment is uniquely rewarding, intense and buzzy, fast paced too. It was always my dream to work in house and I’m so pleased the hard work was worth it.

What advice would you give to FHS alumni/pupils?

Believe in yourself and follow your gut.

Are you still in touch with any other FHS alumni?

Yes, many of whom are my closest friends.

What will you be doing next?

I’m on maternity leave until the end of the year. I'm also planning to complete a few courses with the PRCA for additional training. No rest for the wicked.

If you would like to take part in our alumni interview series, please contact alumni@fhs-nw1.org.uk, we would be delighted to hear from you!


Bulgari Hotel and Residences

The Bulgari Hotel and Residences is a luxury hotel in Knightsbridge, London. When it opened in 2012, it was the most expensive hotel in London.

Location
The hotel is located in Knightsbridge, near The Knightsbridge Apartments, One Hyde Park and 10 Lancelot Place. It is close to Harrods and Hyde Park.

History
The hotel was built by Sir Robert McAlpine from 2010 to 2012, where once stood the Normandie Hotel. It was dedicated in May 2012. It was designed by Antonio Citterio, Patricia Viel & Partners. It was built with Portland stones. There are ten floors up and six underground floors.

There are 85 rooms and suites. All the rooms are designed in the same manner. The main thematic design is silver. The hotel is also home to a cigar shop, a cinema, a spa, an indoor swimming-pool, a ballroom, and the Rivea restaurant. The ballroom, which has a silver chandelier, can be rented for wedding receptions. It is "eco-friendly"; for example, the rainwater is recycled for the toilets. There is also a garden on the roof, or "green roof", with bat boxes.

In 2012, it was the most expensive hotel to stay in London, before The Ritz Hotel and the Savoy Hotel. In 2013, it signed a two-year contract with the Royal Albert Hall to be referred to visitors as its preferred luxury hotel.

In 2017, Bulgari London Hotel Private Screening Room was named as one of the top private screening rooms in London by Ikon London Magazine.

It is owned by LVMH.

References

Category:Hotels in London
Category:Hotel buildings completed in 2012
Category:Knightsbridge
Category:LVMH


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Hotels shown on Marriott.com may be operated under a license from Marriott International, Inc. or one of its affiliates.


Four Seasons Hotels and Resorts

Four Seasons Hotels Limited, trading as Four Seasons Hotels and Resorts, is a Canadian international luxury hospitality company headquartered in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. Four Seasons operates more than 100 hotels worldwide. Since 2006, Bill Gates (through Cascade Investment) and Prince Al-Waleed bin Talal have been majority owners of the company.

History

Canadian businessman Isadore Sharp founded Four Seasons in 1960.  While a young architect working for his father, Sharp designed a motel for a family friend; its success motivated him to try creating his own hotel.  He bought a large parcel of land in a run-down area of Toronto and planned a stopover for business travellers; the Four Seasons Motor Hotel opened in 1961.

Four Seasons built more hotels, including the 1963 Inn on the Park, a $4 million two-story resort hotel in suburban Toronto that housed Canada's first discothèque.

Upscale luxury became part of the brand when the company expanded to London.  When a developer approached Four Seasons about building a hotel in London, Sharp planned it to compete with the city's old-world, elite hotels, such as Claridge's and The Connaught.  The hotel opened in 1970.

The lead consultant was the architecture firm Aedas.]]

In 1974, cost overruns at the Four Seasons Hotel Vancouver nearly led the company into bankruptcy.  As a result, the company began shifting to its current, management-only business model, eliminating costs associated with buying land and buildings.  The company went public in 1986. In the 1990s, Four Seasons and Ritz-Carlton began direct competition, with Ritz-Carlton emphasizing a uniform look while Four Seasons emphasized local architecture and styles with uniform service; in the end Four Seasons gained market share.

Built in 1986, Four Seasons Hotel Austin is a nine-story hotel on 2.3 acres of land on the Lady Bird Lake's north shore. In 1997, Four Seasons Hotel Austin became the first hotel to have "a high-speed wireless Internet network" after Wayport, Inc. set it up there for testing wireless Internet networks. The hotel hosted Queen Elizabeth II in 1991 when she visited Texas. It was acquired by Anbang Insurance Group from the Blackstone Group for $359.7 million in 2016.

Economic downturns in the early and mid-2000s affected the company. When the September 11 attacks caused the collapse of the travel industry, Four Seasons refused to cut room prices in order to preserve the perceived value of the brand, which caused tension with property owners who were losing money.  The company recovered, and in 2007 it agreed to a buyout by Microsoft Chairman Bill Gates and Prince Al-Waleed bin Talal of Saudi Arabia for $3.8 billion. The pair own 95 percent of the company, in equal shares, and Sharp owns the rest.

Challenges returned again during the financial crisis of 2007–2010.  The company made the first corporate layoffs in its history, cutting 10% of its Toronto workforce. In April 2010, after a year-long dispute with Broadreach Capital Partners and Maritz, Wolff & Co., owners of the Aviara resort near San Diego, an arbitration panel ruled that, while both parties contributed to the demise of the business relationship, Four Seasons had not violated its management agreement.  The arbitrators ordered Broadreach to pay Four Seasons to terminate the contract." The resort is no longer a Four Seasons.

Four Seasons has continued to add more hotels and resorts to its portfolio, notably in China. It opened a new hotel in Hangzhou in 2010 and Guangzhou, Beijing, and a second property in Shanghai in 2012. In India, it has one hotel in Mumbai. In 2013, it opened its first hotel in Russia in the Lobanov-Rostovsky Palace in St. Petersburg, and later opened a second hotel in Moscow. In Indonesia, it has one hotel in Jakarta and another two in Bali.

In October 2012, Four Seasons opened a new 259 room Toronto hotel in Yorkville, designed by internationally known design firm Yabu Pushelberg. The hotel includes an upscale restaurant led by celebrity chef Daniel Boulud. It was hailed by The Globe and Mail as "the renewal of an iconic Canadian brand in its hometown". The penthouse was bought by entrepreneur Robert Österlund (founder of Xacti, LLC and Inbox.com) for a Canadian record price of over $28 million.

In 2009, founder Sharp wrote a memoir titled Four Seasons: The Story of  Business Philosophy. It contained a historical chronicle of the hotels since its inception.

Business model

Four Seasons does not own any of its properties; it operates them on behalf of real estate owners and developers.  For example, its New York Downtown hotel/residence is owned by Silverstein Properties, and its Las Vegas hotel is part of the Mandalay Bay complex.  The contracts between Four Seasons and property owners typically permit the company to participate in the design of the property and run it with nearly total control over every aspect of the operation.

Four Seasons generally earns three percent of the gross income and about five percent of profits from the properties it operates, and the property owners are required to additionally contribute money for chain-wide sales, marketing and reservations systems.  Four Seasons hotels have larger staffs than competing chains, and the company maintains separate reserve accounts for each hotel to cover upkeep costs. Profit margins are relatively low, but the brand attracts developers through the hotels' reputation as solid assets for loan collateral or resale. Four Seasons also produces a complimentary magazine for guests that is supported by advertising revenue. Four Seasons has a fractional ownership division, Four Seasons Residence Clubs.

Residential rentals

Four Seasons Hotels and Resorts began offering vacation rentals in June 2014. Titled Residential Rentals, the properties are available in: North America (Costa Rica, Houston, Jackson Hole, Nevis, Punta Mita, San Diego, Whistler, Vail). Africa (Marrakech, Mauritius, Seychelles, Sharm El Sheikh), Europe (Cap-Ferrat) and Asia (Jimbaran Bay, Chiang Mai, Koh Samui).

Residential Rentals provide the same services as Four Seasons Hotels and Resorts in a residential setting. Customers are mainly multi-generational vacationers and small group travellers.

The first stand alone Four Seasons Private Residences opened in London at 20 Grosvenor Square, Mayfair in July 2019. It will be the third Four Seasons venue in London.

European locations
Four Seasons has a total of 20 hotels in Europe.

Critical reception

Travel + Leisure magazine and Zagat Survey rank the hotel chain's properties among the top luxury hotels worldwide. Readers of Conde Nast Traveler magazine have voted Four Seasons Tented Camp Golden Triangle in Chiang Rai, Thailand as among the top ten hotels in the world for three consecutive years. The company has been named one of the "100 Best Companies to Work For" by Fortune every year since the survey's inception in 1998, ranking #47 in 2015, and is lauded for having one of the lowest employee turnover rates in the hospitality industry.

In recent years, restaurants at Four Seasons hotels and resorts have been recognized by Zagat and Michelin.  The latter has awarded at total of 29 stars to 20 of the company's restaurants, including Four Seasons Hotel Hong Kong (three restaurants), Paris (three restaurants), Beijing (two restaurants) and Florence.

The company has been recognized by Forbes Travel Guide with many of its properties earning a Forbes Fives Star rating. In 2017, 30 properties received the five-star rating, making it the most five-star ratings earned than any other hotel brand since its inception.

TripAdvisor named the Four Seasons Resort Bora Bora #1 Hotel for Romance in the World.

Philanthropy
The company and its hotels and resorts have been involved in a number of philanthropic programs, with a focus on supporting sustainability, building communities,  and advancing cancer research.  Four Seasons was one of the founders of the Terry Fox Run in 1981, which has since grown into the world's largest single day cancer fundraiser, with events around the world every September.  To date, the Terry Fox Run has raised more than CAD 750 million.

In 2001, Four Seasons Resort Maldives started collaborating with the local environmental organization Seamarc/Marine savers, which has set up a program of reimplantation of coral in damaged areas. Thousands of guest-sponsored "coral frames" have been transplanted in Kuda Hurra and Landaa Giraavaru resorts' reefs, and are under survey by marine scientists; they constitute a refuge for thousands of tropical species, and help to preserve and recover fragile ecosystems.

On June 19, 2002, the Canadian Opera Company announced Four Seasons Hotels as the naming donor for the COC's new Opera House, also home to the National Ballet of Canada, the Four Seasons Centre for the Performing Arts, located in Toronto, Ontario.

References

External links

Category:Hotel and leisure companies of Canada
Category:Multinational companies headquartered in Canada
Category:Companies based in Toronto
Category:Hotels established in 1960
Category:Canadian brands
Category:1960 establishments in Ontario
Category:Luxury brands
Category:Privately held companies of Canada


President Trump arrived here on Saturday for three days of meetings with world leaders at a Group of 7 economic summit that was already turning contentious even on a largely ceremonial first day.

Each of the leaders at the annual summit of the world’s seven largest industrialized economies is facing domestic turmoil and brings low expectations about collectively tackling major global challenges, from climate change to slowing economies.

The challenge other leaders seemed most focused on was the president of the United States.

Trump added fresh turmoil Friday when he demanded U.S. companies stop doing business in China, and said he would raise tariffs on Chinese imports as high as 30% in response to Beijing’s decision to place added tariffs on U.S. goods. It marked yet another incendiary escalation in a trade war that has rattled investors, worried central bankers and clouded the global economy.

Looking to present a united front and to set an agenda broader and more unifying than trade, the summit’s host, French President Emmanuel Macron, surprised Trump at the opulent Hotel du Palais with a private lunch on the patio.

Although some White House officials grumbled about Macron’s unexpected invite, both leaders spoke optimistically afterward about potential for progress at the three-day summit.

“This will be very important,” Macron said. “We will be allies, friends.”

Trump responded in kind: “So far, so good,” he said. “The weather is fantastic. Everybody’s getting along. I think we will accomplish a lot this weekend.”

The warm words didn’t fully defuse the tension.

Shortly before Air Force One touched down in France, European Council President Donald Tusk bluntly described the disagreements separating the European Union from the U.S. on several matters, including the escalating trade war with China.

“Trade wars will lead to recessions” and “trade wars among G-7 members will lead to an eroding of the already weakened trust among us,” Tusk said at a news conference.

He also criticized Trump for withdrawing the U.S. from the Iran nuclear deal, which he said “hasn’t brought about any positive results.”

And he responded to another provocation from Trump, who stopped to speak to reporters late Friday as he departed the White House, promising to impose taxes on French wine “like you’ve never seen before” in response to a possible French tax aimed at large U.S. technology companies.

Macron on Saturday called for an end to the trade wars that he said are “taking hold everywhere” and urged world leaders here to focus on helping Brazil and other South American countries fight the fires currently burning in the Amazon, whose vast, carbon-absorbing rainforests help counteract global warming.

Conservationists have blamed the fires on Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro, who has encouraged loggers and farmers to clear the land. Bolsonaro complained that calls from Macron and other G-7 leaders to address the fires in Brazil’s rainforests reflect “a misplaced colonialist mindset.”

Trump tweeted prior to leaving Washington that he’d just spoken to Bolsonaro. “Our future Trade prospects are very exciting and our relationship is strong, perhaps stronger than ever before,” Trump tweeted. “I told him if the United States can help with the Amazon Rainforest fires, we stand ready to assist!”

In Bayonne, a town outside Biarritz, police fired tear gas, water cannons and dispersion grenades on a crowd of about 400 anti-capitalist demonstrators. Authorities detained 68 of them for allegedly throwing projectiles, concealing their faces or possessing objects that could be used as weapons.

Macron has already said that the G-7 leaders probably won’t issue their traditional formal communique, usually a quickly forgotten record of shared values and joint promises, when the summit wraps up on Monday, given Trump’s startling behavior last year.

Hours after last year’s G-7 in Quebec, Canada, had adjourned in June, Trump demanded that his signature be removed from the perfunctory communique because he felt the host, Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, had disrespected him during a post-summit news conference.

This year, Trump picked a fight with Denmark, a longtime U.S. ally and member of NATO, before heading to the G-7. After the prime minister rejected his idea that the U.S. buy the Danish territory of Greenland as “absurd,” he abruptly canceled a planned state visit to Copenhagen and later called her remarks “nasty.”

He also rattled the nerves of G-7 counterparts by suggesting last week that Russia, which was expelled from the group in 2014 after it sent troops into Ukraine and seized Crimea, should be reinstated even though it continues the occupation.

“Under no condition can we agree on this logic,” Tusk said Saturday, adding that he’d prefer to see Ukraine invited to a G-7 summit rather than Russia.

Given Trump’s record as a global outlier on issues of trade, climate change and confronting Iran, and his propensity for derailing international confabs with threats and occasionally bellicose rhetoric, diplomats here hope to make any progress on the margins in sessions in the picturesque seaside town on France’s Basque coast.

Formal talks began Saturday evening with a welcome dinner at the Biarritz lighthouse overlooking the main beach. Trump, who prefers one-on-one interactions with leaders to large gatherings, is scheduled to hold private meetings with most of his counterparts on Sunday and early Monday.

In probably the most closely watched encounter, Trump will sit down for breakfast Sunday with new British Prime Minister Boris Johnson, who is committed to taking the United Kingdom out of the European Union by the end of October, a fraught process that already has brought down two British governments. Trump avidly supports Brexit, but Johnson may not welcome Trump’s embrace, given the president’s unpopularity in London and much of Europe, although the two leaders have been in frequent contact by phone in recent days.

Johnson met this week with Macron and German Chancellor Angela Merkel in a push to negotiate an exit deal from the 28-nation bloc before the deadline.

Trump is scheduled to hold a news conference on Monday before he returns to Washington.


From any device. A spectacular catalog with more than 800,000 ebooks

The Trouble with Women

Summary

Ever noticed that women don't feature much in history books, and wondered why? Then this is the book for you. In The Trouble with Women, feminist artist Jacky Fleming illustrates how the opinions of supposed male geniuses, such as Charles Darwin (who believed that women have smaller brains than men) and John Ruskin (who believed that women's main function was to praise men), have shaped the fate of women through history, confining them to a life of domesticity and very little else. Get ready to laugh, wince, and rescue forgotten women from the "dustbin of history," while keeping a close eye out for tell-tale "genius hair."

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10 Top London restaurants

With the Rugby World Cup done and dusted, you might need to find other reasons to visit London and try out some of their fantastic restaurants… Here’s our list of favourites:

Brasserie Zedel is housed in an astonishing Art Nouveau ballroom lovingly restored to a glittering pre-war glamour. The cuisine is classic French, of an excellent standard and very well priced, but for us, the thrill of finding such magnificence in the crowded streets of Piccadilly is a pleasure in itself.

Unquestionably the new foodie shrine of London, Story draws from the molecular gastronomy of Heston Blumenthal. Often containing more than 10 individual ingredients, the presentation and explanation of each course are forms of performance art. The menu changes seasonally and daily, according to availability and the caprice of Executive Chef Tom Sellers. Book well ahead.

Anyone who’s had the privilege of dining at Le Gavroche swears that it’s the finest restaurant in the world. This is for really special occasions. The cuisine is French in the grand style, but with occasional amusing contemporary twists as the chef sees fit.

Opened in the 1970s by the immortal Albert and Michel Roux, the legend continues under the rule of Albert’s son Michel Jr, who has 2 Michelin stars in his own right.

As your SAA flight banks left to commence its approach into Heathrow, gaze out at the huge splinter of glass jutting up from the city and you’ll almost be able to wave at the diners – you’re virtually at the same altitude. The Shard is the newest and tallest skyscraper in Europe. There are several restaurants to choose from – all on the mid-30’s floors. For true adrenaline junkies, the Gong bar on the 52nd floor is as high as you’ll ever get on a cocktail.

Rules has nestled in its Covent Garden location for 10 generations and has come to define that highly aristocratic club experience one imagines dining in a London restaurant to be. Rich sauces, carefully hung venison, plush velvet banquettes and and an unparalleled list of burgundies and clarets define this quintessentially English restaurant.

When you enter the restaurant founded by Fergus Henderson, St John’s, you’ll find yourself in a forgotten kingdom of cracklings, chitterlings, brawns and jellied eels. Henderson’s famous for his best-selling “nose to tail’ tome which documents how each and every part of the pig might be prepared and presented as a culinary delight. This is food unlike any you will find anywhere else.

The Clink Project (HM Prison Brixton) aims to lower the rate of recidivism among young convicts by giving them life skills training in the restaurant and hospitality industry, as well as helping them find jobs when they’re released. The restaurant’s actually inside the prison walls in the old governor’s office. The food is outstanding and very reasonably priced.

Interior of The Wolseley.

In the banking capital of the planet, what could be more fitting than dining in a building that was previously home to Barclays? Now restored to its 1920s magnificence and adjacent to the Ritz Hotel, The Wolseley is our favourite breakfast meeting place.

Bateaux London knows that the best way to see London is from the river Thames. Floating soundlessly past the city’s palaces, spires and skyscrapers, a small flotilla time their cruises perfectly to last the length of your meal. Boats depart from Embankment Pier.

Every Londoner has his or her own local “curry house” which they insist can’t be rivalled. Ask anyone where you can eat the best curry in London and you’ll immediately be directed to their local. You’re now a Londoner!


I'll Take Manhattan (miniseries)

I'll Take Manhattan is a 1987 American television miniseries,  adapted from Judith Krantz's novel of the same name. Screened by CBS, it tells the story of the wealthy Amberville family, who run their own publishing company in New York. After Zachary Amberville, the patriarch of the family, dies, the company is taken over by his unscrupulous brother Cutter. Zachary's children, especially his energetic and intelligent daughter Maxi, begin a battle to regain control of their father's company.

I'll Take Manhattan was the highest-rated miniseries of the 1986–87 US television season with a 22.9/35 rating/share.

Plot summary

Part 1
Zachary 'Zach' Amberville (Barry Bostwick), a former fighter pilot and now successful businessman, falls in love with his employee Nina Stern (Jane Kaczmarek). However Nina prefers her career over marriage. Broken hearted, Zach leaves Manhattan for London, where he falls in love with aristocratic ballerina Lily Davina Adamsfield (Francesca Annis). After a failed audition, she agrees to marry Zach, and follows him to New York City. When Nina learns about this, she gets upset. Lily, meanwhile, settles as a housewife and gives birth to Zachary's child. She is worried that her ballet career is now nothing more than a hobby, and acts out by behaving as a spoiled rich wife, even being nicknamed 'The Ice Queen'. Her lack of interest in raising her children comes to notice with Zach, who feels that discipline is not the key factor in parenting. When their eldest son Toby (Tim Daly) is eight years old, he is diagnosed with retinitis pigmentosa, meaning that he will be blind one day.

At a formal party, Zachary runs into his younger brother Cutter (Perry King), who is both charismatic and immature. In the past, he did not contact the family unless he needed money and so Zachary is immediately wary of Cutter's arrival in town. Cutter himself, meanwhile, falls for Lily and they engage in a sexual relationship. Months later, Lily gives birth to Cutter's baby.

Part 2
New York, 1960. Zachary and Lily have grown apart, encouraging Zachary to get back in touch with Nina. Nina is initially reluctant to reconcile with him, though soon falls for his charms and agrees to work for him, on condition that they have a baby. Elsewhere, Cutter has impregnated Lily again and is pushing her to have an abortion. Lily offers to divorce Zachary to be with him, but Cutter leaves her during a trip to San Francisco. In a letter to Lily, he claims to be scouting for a location for a better life, though he actually becomes intimate with a woman named Daphne. Lily feels betrayed and schemes her way back into Zachary's life by claiming to be pregnant with his child. Zachary, who believes her, abandons Nina to start another life with Lily.

In San Francisco, Cutter starts working as a broker and seduces the boss's daughter Candice Alexander (Lynne Griffin), a beautiful but shy woman. Her father Jonas (Walter Gotell) is opposed to the relationship, feeling that Cutter is only interested in Candice because she comes from money, and hires a private detective to gather evidence to prove this. Instead, Cutter assures a prominent part in her life by causing a horse accident that leaves Candice crippled: he marries her afterwards and manipulates Jonas into financially supporting them. Meanwhile, Lily gives birth to a son, whom she names Justin.

Ten years later, Zachary's magazine company grows into an empire, which saddens one of his loyal workers Pavka Meyer (Paul Hecht). His daughter Maxime 'Maxi' (Valerie Bertinelli) is now 17 years old and gets expelled from a strict all-girls school due to her rebellious behavior including skipping school to gamble with her friend India West (Julianne Moore). She starts working as a photographer at her father's company, in the department of Rocco Cipriani (Jack Scalia). She falls in love with him, and they soon have sex.

Cutter resumes his unfaithful behavior, and after an escapade with both Candice's sister Nanette (Kate Vernon) and Alice Chambers, he continues his affair with Lily, which Nanette and colleague Booker witness. Nanette informs her sister about Cutter's cheating behavior, causing Candice to get drunk and confront him. Cutter dismisses her claims, and states that Nanette has lied out of jealousy, before actually visiting Nanette to hit her. Nanette takes revenge by sending Candice pictures of Lily and Cutter having sex. Candice is heartbroken and commits suicide by jumping from her hotel room. The photos are then sent to Zachary, who is now aware of both his wife and brother's betrayal. Instead of leaving his wife, Zachary threatens to take the children and murder Cutter if she ever meets with his brother again.

In another sub-plot, Lily meets with Nina and claims that she did not trick Zachary into reconciling with her, leaving Nina to believe that Zachary did not want to be with her.

Cast
 Valerie Bertinelli as Maxime 'Maxi' Amberville-Cipriani
 Alisan Porter as Young Maxi
 Barry Bostwick as Zachary 'Zach' Amberville
 Francesca Annis as Lily Davina-Amberville
 Georgia Slowe as Young Lilly
 Jane Kaczmarek as Nina Stern
 Jack Scalia as Rocco Cipriani
 Paul Hecht as Pavka Meyer
 Timothy Daly as Toby Amberville
 Julianne Moore as India West
 Adam Storke as Justin Amberville
 Keram Malicki-Sánchez as Young Justin
 Perry King as Cutter Amberville
 Ken Olin as Nat Lammerman
 Kate Vernon as Nanette Alexander
 Brett Cullen as Dennis Brady
 Lynne Griffin as Candice Alexander
 Adam LeFevre as Jumbo Booker
 Staci Keanan as Angelica Cipriani
 Hillary Wolf as Young Angelica
 Barbara Barrie as Sarah Amberville
 Fritz Weaver as Mr. Amberville
 Katharine Houghton as Pepper Delafield
 Donald Trump as himself

References

External links

Category:1980s American television series
Category:1987 American television series debuts
Category:1987 American television series endings
Category:1980s American television miniseries
Category:CBS original programming
Category:Television programs based on American novels
Category:Television shows set in London
Category:Television shows set in New York City
Category:Television shows set in San Francisco
Category:Films scored by Lee Holdridge
Category:Adaptations of works by Judith Krantz


The Saudi crown prince is on course to be first Saudi monarch from new generation.

Saudi Arabia's King Salman has embarked on a domestic tour this week with his favourite son, demonstrating his support for his chosen heir despite the crisis spawned by the murder of journalist Jamal Khashoggi.

Roads were lined with Saudi flags and images of the king and his son Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, when they arrived in the central region of Qassim late on Tuesday. Distinguished figures greeted them and children offered flowers.

The tour is the latest public outreach by the 82-year-old monarch, apparently intended to shore up the power of Prince Mohammed, known as MbS, who has taken over day-to-day rule but whose international reputation was battered in the month since Khashoggi was killed in the Saudi consulate in Istanbul.

State media said the king laid the foundation for new or planned projects worth $1.12 billion and ordered the release of some people from debtors' prison in Qassim, a conservative province in the heart of the Arabian peninsula.

"There is a lot of tension, fear and apprehension among Saudis in the aftermath of the Khashoggi affair. So it's a trip that reassures the various regions that the king is still in his place and he's the highest authority," said Madawi al-Rasheed, a London-based Saudi author critical of the Al Saud.

Turkish officials have accused MbS of ordering Khashoggi's murder. U.S. President Donald Trump has suggested ultimate responsibility lies with the crown prince as de facto ruler.

Saudi Arabia, which offered numerous contradictory explanations for Khashoggi's disappearance, now says the U.S.-based Washington Post columnist was killed in a rogue operation. MbS broke weeks of silence on Oct. 25 to vow justice would prevail.

King Salman stepped in to defuse the situation. He sent a trusted aide to Turkey last month, then fired five senior officials, including his son's most trusted adviser.

After weeks of lying low, the prince has now returned to the public stage. He visited troops near the border with Yemen, where Riyadh is involved in a 3-1/2-year war, appearing in an online video on Monday with a soldier he called a hero. In a ceremony at a Riyadh university, he laid the foundation stone for a planned nuclear research reactor.

Greg Gause, a Gulf expert at Texas A&M University, said the domestic tour with his father did not indicate that the royal family is in the clear yet, only that "the king is confident that nothing is afoot right now."

CIRCLING THE WAGONS

The 33-year-old crown prince is on course to become the first Saudi monarch from a new generation in 65 years, following a succession of six brothers drawn from among at least 45 sons of state founder Abdulaziz ibn Saud, who died in 1953.

But MbS's rise has upended the system of rule in place for decades, in which successive kings sought family consensus and allocated powerful posts to their brothers and nephews.

MbS consolidated his rule by stripping some of his most powerful cousins from positions of authority and locking some under house arrest. Others were caught up in an anti-corruption crackdown and confined inside a luxury hotel for months.

There have been signs since last week that some princes are being rehabilitated to foster family unity in the wake of the Khashoggi killing. Last week, one of the king's surviving younger brothers, Prince Ahmed bin Abdulaziz, returned from 2-1/2 months abroad where he had appeared to criticise the leadership.

Two of the king's nephews, detained last year, appear to have been released recently, with pictures circulating of them reuniting with family.

Diplomats say the ruling family is "circling the wagons". But there is no indication King Salman is considering elevating another prince, either to replace his son or balance his authority by serving as his deputy.

"MbS is not going anywhere. The family is meeting and they will unite stronger behind him," said a senior Arab diplomat. "There is no way back" after the king cleared MbS's path to the throne by sidelining potential rivals last year.

The king's decision to put MbS in charge of restructuring the intelligence apparatus - a move aimed at addressing a purported cause of the Khashoggi crisis - indicates that the crown prince remains "untouchable", the diplomat added.

On Tuesday evening, as King Salman and MbS arrived in Qassim, north of Riyadh, to a stadium of cheering residents, online photos emerged showing Prince Abdulaziz bin Fahd with his brothers and daughters in a residential setting.

The images were the first of the prince, the son of a former king, since his detention, which the government never acknowledged. It was not made clear whether he had reached a settlement with the state like other detainees who were subsequently released, or if his freedom is still restricted.

Over the weekend, another of the king's nephews, a brother of billionaire investor Prince Alwaleed bin Talal, was photographed at his ailing father's bedside after being held for months over online criticism of the anti-corruption purge ordered late last year by MbS.

The next day Alwaleed, who was among scores of top royals, businessmen and government officials held at Riyadh's Ritz-Carlton Hotel as part of the sweep, went on Fox News to defend MbS in the Khashoggi crisis and the anti-corruption campaign.

"I believe the Saudi crown prince will be 100 percent vindicated and exonerated," Alwaleed said of his cousin. Alwaleed's own detention was "forgiven and forgotten," he said.


360 (film)

360 is a 2011 internationally produced drama thriller film  directed by Fernando Meirelles and written by Peter Morgan as a loose adaptation of  Arthur Schnitzler's La Ronde. The film stars an ensemble cast of Anthony Hopkins, Ben Foster, Rachel Weisz, Jude Law and other international actors. Following the stories of couples and their sexual encounters, 360 was selected to opened the 2011 London Film Festival. Magnolia Pictures released the film on video on demand on 29 June 2012 and was released in United States theaters on 3 August 2012. The film reunited Weisz and director Meirelles, who worked together on The Constant Gardener.

Plot

Vienna
Anna accompanies her sister Mirka to a nude photo-shoot for an escort agency, run by Rocco. Mirka chooses the professional name 'Blanca', and Rocco reveals he murdered a wealthy client, splitting his money with the escort who tipped him off. Anna waits downstairs while Mirka performs a “personal favor” for Rocco, and the sisters return to Bratislava by bus.

Rocco calls Mirka to meet a client named Michael Daly, and Anna accompanies her to Vienna. When one of Michael's associates loudly debates whether Mirka is a prostitute, Michael walks out, and leaves his wife multiple affectionate voicemails. Returning to his hotel, he receives a call from his associate, who talked to Blanca and blackmails Michael into a business deal.

Paris
An Algerian man spies on a woman wearing a red beret, on her way to the airport. It is clear he has feelings for her he cannot express. He talks to an imam, but continues to follow the married woman, and goes to his mosque and a therapist for advice.

London
Rose walks to a hotel, unaware a distraught woman is taking pictures of her. Rose meets Rui, and tells him they must end their affair, but they have sex. Returning home, Rui discovers his girlfriend Laura has left him, leaving him a video that reveals she was the woman photographing Rose. Michael Daly returns home, revealing he is married to Rose, and they attend their daughter's school play. In bed, Rose recalls Michael's voicemails, and when he mentions his next trip may be to Berlin, Rose exclaims that she would love to go.

Colorado
Sex offender Tyler, released after six years in prison, fears he is not ready to face the temptations outside. Boarding a flight home to Brazil, Laura chats with fellow passenger John, who is searching for his long-missing daughter, and they are stranded in Denver by bad weather. Tyler speaks on the phone with his social worker about his uncontrollable attractions, and encounters Laura in an airport restaurant. She invites him to her hotel room, but Tyler rebuffs her intoxicated advances and locks himself in the bathroom.

The next day, John finds Laura, and is moved when she hugs him before parting ways. John arrives in Phoenix to examine unidentified remains, which turn out not to be his daughter. At an Alcoholics Anonymous meeting, John declares that he can finally accept his daughter's unknown fate and move on.

At the meeting, Valentina (Dinara Drukarova) shares her own story, revealing she is the woman the Algerian man spied on in Paris. She plans to divorce her husband Sergei, who is consumed with working for a crooked Russian businessman, and she is secretly in love with her boss.

Back in Paris
Returning home, Valentina tells Sergei she wants a divorce and is interested in someone else, but Sergei ignores her and leaves. Valentina arrives for work at a dental office, where her boss is the Algerian man. They repress their mutual feelings for each other, and he tells her she should find another job; both are heartbroken as she leaves.

Back in Vienna
Sergei picks up his boss, who reprimands him for studying English. Mirka and Anna arrive in Vienna, and Sergei sends Mirka to his boss' hotel room. Anna and Sergei bond over their mutual love for books and learning English, and she persuades him to drive them around the city.

At the hotel, Sergei’s boss shows Mirka a briefcase of cash, and she texts Rocco. While Mirka performs fellatio, Sergei's boss reads her phone; realizing she plans to rob him, he knocks her unconscious and calls Sergei. Returning to the hotel, Sergei finds himself in the elevator with Rocco. Leaving as Rocco attacks the boss, Sergei drives away with Anna. Regaining consciousness, Mirka takes the money and leaves. In voiceover, Anna reads a farewell letter to her sister.

Berlin
Michael walks through Berlin with his business associate, professing his love for his wife. They meet Rose, and she and Michael head to the airport arm-in-arm. The associate notices a woman walk into a building; she meets Rocco for a photo shoot.

Cast

Lucia Siposová as Mirka
Gabriela Marcinkova as Anna
Johannes Krisch as Rocco
Jude Law as Michael Daly
Moritz Bleibtreu as Salesman #1
Jamel Debbouze as Algerian Man
Dinara Drukarova as Valentina
Vladimir Vdovichenkov as Sergei
Rachel Weisz as Rose Daly
Juliano Cazarre as Rui
Maria Flor as Laura
Ben Foster as Tyler McGregor
Marianne Jean-Baptiste as Fran
Anthony Hopkins as John
Mark Ivanir as Sania
Danica Jurcova as Alina
Peter Morgan as Salesman #2
Riann Steele as Waitress
François-Xavier Demaison as Taxi Driver
Patty Hannock as Psychiatrist
Djemel Barak as Imam
Chipo Chung as Editor
Sydney Wade as Ellie
Byrd Wilkins as Social Worker
Martin McDougall as Airport Policeman
Gerard Monaco as Airport Security Desk Official
Youssef Kerkour as Phoenix Policeman
Sean Power as AA Secretary
Christoph Zadra as Hotel Security Person
Tereza Srbova as European Girl
Giorgio Spiegelfeld as Photographer
Lisa Palfrey as Psychologist

Reception
360 has received generally negative reviews from critics, as it currently holds a 20% on Rotten Tomatoes based on 74 reviews. Philip French in The Observer (London) concluded "360 has a gleaming surface and a knowing air, but essentially it reflects the lives of people who spend too much time in planes". Manohla Dargis in The New York Times says "There are moments in "360" that show what the movie might have been ... But the overshooting and overediting here suggest Mr. Meirelles, or maybe the producers, were trying to work around this story, instead of with it."

References

External links

Category:French films
Category:French romantic drama films
Category:British films
Category:British romantic drama films
Category:Brazilian films
Category:Brazilian romantic drama films
Category:Austrian films
Category:Austrian drama films
Category:2011 films
Category:2010s romantic drama films
Category:Films directed by Fernando Meirelles
Category:Films shot in London
Category:Films shot in Paris
Category:Films shot in Vienna
Category:Films shot in Slovakia
Category:Films set in Colorado
Category:Films set in London
Category:Films set in Paris
Category:Films set in Vienna
Category:British films based on plays
Category:Films based on works by Arthur Schnitzler
Category:English-language French films
Category:Films set in Austria


Friday, July 8, 2011

David Gandy at Tatler's Pyjama Party at Claridges Hotel on July 07, 2011, London (England)

[...]Gandy was the best-dressed of the evening, adhering to the 'strictly bedroom' dress code in a silk polka dot robe by Dolce & Gabbana. A white shirt and black foulard ensured that the 31-year-old was ready for bed [...].


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Italian…beyond pizza and pasta!

Do Indians really love Italian food or are we just pizza-pasta junkies?

Until the Americans got involved, pizza was little known internationally(Istock)

The first time I ever had pizza, it was not in New York or Naples or anywhere quite so glamorous. I had my first pizza in Ahmedabad and it was home-made.

It happened like this: my aunt Sushila Subodh (Sushilamami to me) has been regarded as one of Ahmedabad’s best cooks for decades. In the 1960s, when most of us knew very little about Western food, one of her specialities was pizza. She made it, I think, to please her husband’s family. They had all gone to university in America, had developed a love for pizza and had been dismayed to find no sign of pizza anywhere in India.

The tomatoes that are an integral part of the Brits’ Spag Bol owe more to Naples than Bologna (Getty Images)

So Sushilamami took up the challenge and began turning out high-quality pizzas that became the stuff of legend.My family told me that Sushilamami loved making Italian dishes. (Which she did; they were outstanding.) This was hard to reconcile with another claim: that the family had discovered pizzas in America.

So what was this thing called pizza, exactly? Was it Italian or American?

You must remember that, in that era, our exposure to Italian food in India was severely limited. Outside of Sushilamami’s kitchen, it was hard to find pizza. And nobody ever used the term pasta. We called all pasta ‘macaroni’. A little later, in the ’70s, grocers started stocking spaghetti and, at least in North India, a few housewives began serving spaghetti in keema gravy, a variation on spaghetti bolognaise.

Nor were there many Italian restaurants. When Indian hotels wanted to serve ‘continental’ food, they went with classic French. At coffee shops, there were only a few attempts to put spaghetti on the menu. At the Mumbai Taj, the Sea Lounge served

Spaghetti Carbonara and Spaghetti Napolitana, made so inauthentically that the Taj managed to insult the populations of both Rome and Naples at a single stroke.

The Taj’s Trattoria alerted the restaurant trade to the potential for Italian cuisine in India

There was, apparently, an Italian nightclub at Mumbai’s Ritz Hotel called The Little Hut but I was too young to be allowed inside. And though other restaurants had such Italian names as Venice and Napoli, there was nothing particularly Italian about the food. At Bombelli’s(“Swiss Cafe”), the pastry shop made a ‘pizza’ that was no more than a patty. (Though Mario, their pianist was, if I remember correctly, an Italian; presumably he had the sense to steer clear of the ‘pizza’.) And try as I might, I can’t remember a single Italian restaurant at any Oberoi hotel in the 1960s and 1970s.

Why didn’t anyone want to serve Italian food?

Well, the restaurant trade was in its infancy and nobody had realised that Italian was the one European cuisine that Indians would love.

The original Diva in Delhi is one of the only pizza-free Italian restaurants I would go to

In 1977, when they were about to open the Taj Mahal Hotel in Delhi, Ajit Kerkar, Camellia Panjabi and the two top Taj chefs Satish Arora and Arvind Saraswat toured Italy, eating their way through the country. They shortlisted the best dishes they had eaten, came back to India and opened Casa Medici on the rooftop of the Delhi Taj.

As a restaurant, Casa Medici was about 20 years ahead of its time. The food was authentically Italian, which was hard to do in that era when ingredients could not easily be imported.Casa Medici worked as a nightclub (it had a band) for rich Indians and tourists but it had zero impact on the way that Indians ate.

A few years later, when it took over the President Hotel in Mumbai, the Taj had a brighter idea. It abandoned the fancy Italian food of Casa Medici and opened a casual trattoria called, with a staggering lack of imagination, Trattoria, which doubled as the hotel’s coffee shop.

It was Trattoria, more than any other Italian restaurant, that alerted the restaurant trade to the potential for Italian cuisine in India; but not the haute cuisine of Casa Medici. What Indians really wanted was pasta and pizza – lots of lots of pizza, actually. (So Sushilamami had the right idea!)

After grocers started stocking spaghetti in the ’70s, a few housewives began serving spaghetti in keema gravy (Shutterstock)

In that sense, we were only following a global trend. It has often been said that every country has its own version of Chinese food. What we don’t realise is that the same is true of Italian food.

In 1920, an Italian visitor to New York ate at an Italian restaurant and was introduced to Chicken Parmesan (or Parmigiana) and spaghetti with meat balls. Having never eaten them in his own country, he remarked that he found them quite tasty and hoped that someone in Italy would invent them for local diners.

In time, American-Italian became a cuisine in its own right. (Like our Sino-Ludhianvi Chinese food.) Dishes that had never been heard of in Italy like Veal Marsala and Clams Casino became fixtures on every menu. Fettuccine Alfredo was invented in Rome in 1914 but only became famous in the 1920s after American movie stars Douglas Fairbanks and Mary Pickford said they liked it. Even today, the dish is a staple of Italian restaurants in America, not of those in Italy.

Now, Americans make fun of ‘red sauce Italian’ and prefer the real thing (at least in the big cities) but there is no denying that Italians owe America big-time for popularising their cuisine.

Until the Americans got involved, pizza was little known internationally – often poor Italians would just smear sauce on bread, put it in the oven and call it pizza. But the Americans reinvented pizza, exported it and turned it into a global craze (which is why, as a small boy, I was confused about whether it was Italian or American).

So it is with British-Italian food. Spaghetti Bolognaise is an abomination to purists. Yes, there is a complicated meat sauce, called a ragu, made in Bologna but it bears no resemblance to what we call Bolognaise sauce in most of the world. And the tomatoes that are an integral part of what the Brits call Spag Bol owe more to Naples than Bologna. Nor do they eat their ragu with spaghetti in Bologna – they prefer fettuccine.

In the Swinging Sixties, when social barriers were breaking down in London, the new elite needed new restaurants. Two former waiters Mario Cassandro and Franco Lagattolla revolutionised the restaurant scene by opening trendy Italian restaurants that served dishes that they had invented in London including Pollo Sorpresa, a sort of Chicken Kiev with an Italian accent.

A few of those Italian restaurants survived on the basis of a devoted clientele – San Lorenzo, La Famiglia etc. – but ever since The River Café opened in London in the late 1980s, even the Brits have discovered real Italian food. Which is not to say that the era of Spag Bol is over but that people now recognise that there is British-Italian and there’s the real thing.

Why did it take so long for us to realise that Indians liked Italian food? Well, mainly because, when it comes to taste, nobody (not even a market research operation) knows anything. The Chinese food explosion happened by chance. The current sushi roll craze was unexpected. And so it was with the Italian boom.

But a few qualifications need to be made:

One: I am not sure there is really an Italian food boom. I think Indians love pasta and pizza but I don’t think we have much affection for the rest of Italian cuisine. The Taj’s Casa Medici did not work in the long run. Neither did the Hyatt Regency’s Valentino. And I can’t think of a single pizza-free Italian restaurant that I would really want to go to in most of India with the possible exception of the original Diva in Delhi and Vetro in Mumbai.

Two: Indians love carbohydrates. Anything with a high rice and wheat content stands a good chance of success. This is why Indians order both rice and noodles at Chinese restaurants, why we like rice-encased sushi rolls and why we love pasta and pizza. Take away the carbs and all restaurants struggle.

Three:Much of the restaurant-going market is vegetarian. So, any cuisine that has vegetarian options is more likely to succeed. With pizza and pasta, the vegetarian element is already there. With the others, you have to invent things like Gobhi Manchurian and Masala Paneer sushi roll.

Four: My pet theory is that the story of India’s love of foreign food is actually a discovery of umami, an element that we don’t necessarily have much of in our cuisine. (Think about: tomato, parmesan, soya sauce – what do all of them have in common?) But that’s another piece for another time.

So was my Sushilamami ahead of her time?

You bet!

Her pizzas would still beat the hell out of most of the stuff sold in the Indian market today. They were served hot, straight from the oven, were entirely vegetarian (it was a good Gujarati household) and made with fresh, natural ingredients.


Scents with a powerful sense of place

As both men and women seek ever-more personal and adventurous fragrances, perfumers are opening up a whole new world of niche “escapist” scents. Lucia van der Post reports on the new rules of attraction

The world of perfume is never a dull place. To some, who have never ventured beyond a quick spritz at fragrance counters, it might seem just a confusing melee of competing eaux, not all of which are pleasing. But to those who find scent infinitely intriguing, this winter is a rather thrilling time, with certain enterprising “noses” offering up a rich, stimulating, innovative – even radical – range of escapist scents to explore.

As this year’s standout exhibition Perfume: a Sensory Journey through Contemporary Scent at Somerset House described it, these contemporary “perfume provocateurs” are dispensing with traditional high-gloss concepts, gender boundaries and conventional notions of good taste to create “original and outrageous signatures which assault all of the senses”. For these maverick perfumers, it is not enough to develop a fragrance that merely smells delicious or makes the wearer feel attractive – they want to transport the wearer somewhere else entirely, to a place that’s rich, exciting and sometimes strange, and in doing so they are opening up a new and fascinating era for scent.

St Giles’ The Tycoon, £130 for 100ml EDP, has its roots in the boardroom
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Image: Getty Images

It could be a physical place, as in El Cosmico (by DS & Durga, £139 for 50ml EDP), David S Moltz’s stunning olfactory realisation of the nomadic hippie camp and hotel at Marfa, in the Texan desert, which offers guests “liberation from the built world”. Using indigenous plants such as creosote shrubs, sumac and Chihuahuan Mesa woods – mesquite, oak and pinyon pine – he has created an uplifting, nuanced fragrance that suggests the freedom and otherworldliness of the unique environment yet is very much connected to the earth.

Other perfume provocateurs play with time as well as place. La Maison Hédonique’s 5ème de Paris (£125 for 50ml EDP) – with its top notes of bergamot, Mentha citrata and mandarin, heart of warm cotton and soft woods, and base notes of coffee, hay and amber – cuts to memories of a romantic interlude in Paris, waking up on a Sunday morning between clean white sheets, with the smell of coffee and croissants wafting in the air. Lucy Akhurst, founder of the new perfume house, launching at the end of this month, seeks to “jog the memories of your soul”, capturing a sense of place, but also transience. 5ème de Paris one of four new scents, each “a riff on mystery and seduction” in an evocative place: a chance meeting with a stranger on the Côte d’Azur, a glowing fireside at a London gentlemen’s club when you should be in bed, or a midnight walk in the enchanted ruins of an Italian garden.

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This “movement” has come about partly because of the modern fashion for owning a wardrobe of perfumes: these singular scents don’t have to please all day, every day, so wearers can be pickier – choosing according to season, mood and the time of day they want to wear them. The sophisticated customer is looking for something highly specific, personal and experiential, which means the perfumers themselves can be much more experimental, offering niche scents for adventurous moods and fleeting moments.

“A great fragrance should always transport the wearer,” says Michael Donovan, owner of Roullier White, who has just launched his own collection called St Giles. “This can be through time and space, or simply into another emotional headspace, but a scent should always move you from the very first sniff: if it doesn’t, then it is best to move on.”

Many of these new olfactory offerings seek to take wearers to darker corners of their personalities. Donovan has spent three years working with perfumer Bertrand Duchaufour to develop his collection of five fragrances (£130 for 100ml EDP), which are designed to stimulate and amplify different aspects of our characters by setting a scene. This is not about appealing to potential partners; he is enabling wearers to immediately “place” themselves in a world and a state of mind. The Tycoon, a warm, luxurious chypre-infused power perfume, cuts straight to the boardroom or the bedroom, for those who want to feel self-assured and dynamic. But on the flip side is The Mechanic – an animalistic, hirsute, growling fragrance that places the wearer in the mechanic’s workspace, tapping into fuel, oil, rubber and hot skin to express the purity of doing something physical and how empowering it can be.

Even Clive Christian, normally associated with luscious, utterly seductive fragrances that appeal to more traditional buyers of the complex “great perfumes”, had a surprise for his fans when he launched his escapist Addictive Arts concept this autumn. The collection (£525 for 75ml EDP) captures the exotic and elusive scents of mood- and mind-enhancing narcotics – coca leaf, opium poppy and wormwood (used in absinthe) – to transport the wearer to far-off, forbidden lands. There are three pairs (Ecstatic and Hedonistic, Mesmeric and Psychedelic, and Euphoric and Hypnotic) inspired by moments of “dark, unspoken need”, to be worn only by the adventurous and the bold – those prepared to venture over to the wild side.

For a “dark” olfactory adventure (or perhaps misadventure), look to Bruno Fazzolari, a San Francisco-based rising star in the world of perfumery and a rare “nose” who – like Frédéric Malle – has synaesthesia, which comes to bear on his sense of smell and sight: he associates smells with colours. Fazzolari uses perfume to “connect” sensory experiences. His rather chilling Room 237 (£100 for 30ml EDP) transports the wearer to the spotless hotel room and source of all ills in Stanley Kubrick’s The Shining, with fleabane, angelica, oppoponax, costus, olibanum and even a note of vinyl shower curtain. It’s a strangely constructed, dangerous scent – a million miles away from those conventionally sweet florals that simply charm and seduce – but some may find that, like Room 237 in the film, it slowly draws them in until they succumb.

Less “out there”, but still with plenty of grit, British perfumer and linguist Nick Steward seeks to recreate emotional connections to his favourite locations around the world through smell. His Gallivant fragrances (all £65 for 30ml EDP), dedicated to those he calls “urban explorers”, are like insider guides to the cities they celebrate. With each bottle – London, Istanbul, Brooklyn, Tel Aviv – the wearer is spirited to another, utterly different, world. With Berlin, for example, he conjures modern-day bohemians living in brutalist apartment blocks with the help of a woody, citrus, spicy formula that reeks of leather, smoke, spices, cups of black tea, black pepper and undertones of Haitian vetiver, cedarwood and patchouli. “I wanted it to evoke the city’s concrete and steel, its decadence,” says Steward, “but also the forest and lakes on the edge of the city: carefree summers, the freshness of the water, swimming at the Strandbad Wannsee.” For Istanbul, Steward sought to capture the sense of the ancient city standing at the meeting point of two continents and cultures, but with a freshness and modernity about it. He dreamed of coffee, creaminess, leather, suede, spices and incense, waking up in Moda, crossing the Bosphorus and spending a balmy night in Karaköy. This is an ambery, spicy scent that incorporates notes of cardamom, red thyme, lavender absolute, Egyptian geranium essence, sweet myrrh, sandalwood, vanilla, tonka bean, amber and musks.

Other adventurous “noses” invite the wearer to experience less elevated locations and emotions, the kind with which many city dwellers are now so unfamiliar. Orto Parisi has created the fire-red Terroni (£138 for 50ml EDP), a wonderful earthy scent – its ingredients are a closely guarded secret – that curiously takes its name from the slang (and derogatory) term for those who work the land in the south of Italy. But Alessandro Gualtieri, the “nose”, comes from this world – where his own grandfather was one such labourer – and is proud of it. Gualtieri, who broke all the rules when he launched Black Afgano in 2009 (the first dark-coloured perfume, and the first to use a type of hashish, alluding to a state of temporary bliss), devised the fragrance – partly geographical, part emotional voyage – as a connection to the volcanic soil around Vesuvius and was inspired too by the “beautiful” natural smells of the toiling human body.

Meanwhile, multimedia artist Paul Schütze’s Tears of Eros (£135 for 50ml EDP) takes us with him on a moving, spiritual and inspiring journey into the heart of an artist’s studio, and his memory of one particular night. He paints the whole scene: it is Paris in winter, a breeze is blowing through the moonlit open window, and the scents in the room – discarded clementine peel, a potted hyacinth and the dying embers of a stick of Japanese incense – have combined to create a narcotic, heady beauty.

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All of these new, adventurous scents explore more interesting, often challenging, but infinitely arresting ways of creating fragrance, and encourage us to take different olfactory routes to discover what we really like, and why.


BRITISH RESTAURANTS TOP CLIMBERS IN LATEST WORLD RANKINGS

Tuesday 01 May 2012

It was a good night for the British restaurant and food industry, with three UK restaurants voted in the top 50. ‘Dinner’ by Heston Blumenthal restaurant, in London, shot straight into the Top 50 at No 9, and taken the Highest New Entry award, the organisers commenting on how his “historically influenced British cooking has proved hugely popular with both the local and international judging panels”. His world-famous Fat Duck came in at No 13.

Australian Brett Graham, whose London restaurant, The Ledbury, was last year’s Highest New Entry, rose an impressive 20 places to No 14, taking the Highest Climber award.

The No 1 place went for the third year running to Rene Redzepi’s Noma in Copenhagen, and visitors to London will have a chance to sample his cooking during London2012: Redzepi will be cooking at Claridges for 10 days, creating a five course menu which will reflect his signature flavours and dishes from Noma, and using local, seasonal British ingredients. www.claridges.co.uk/atasteofnoma. This follows in the footsteps of leading US chef, Thomas Keller, who brought his cooking to Harrods for 10 days in October 2011.

The transformation of British food was also celebrated earlier on Monday in the heart of London, as top chefs and producers from across Britain helped launch “Food is GREAT”. The event, hosted at 10 Downing St, was part of the campaign to promote Britain as a GREAT place to visit, invest in and do business with.

Food is one of the seven tourism pillars that VisitBritain, the national tourism agency, is promoting around the world, using inspirational chef Jamie Oliver to invite the world to come to Britain and experience the very best of what it has to offer. With some 30,000 restaurants, and a wonderful range of dining to be found in pubs and hotels across the UK, inbound visitor expenditure on food and beverages is worth over £4 billion to the British economy each year.

Raymond Blanc: “What is happening to British food is extraordinary, the French would call it la revolution…we are reinventing our food, our history, our culture.”

Gordon Ramsay: “There are so many young dynamic talented gifted chefs that are talking to the local purveyors more, using local produce. That’s the kind of impact these chefs are having on their restaurants. We can compete with the best now.”

Legendary chef Pierre Koffmann, who achieved three stars at La Tante Claire restaurant, and is now cooking at the Berkeley Hotel, praised the quality of the produce : “ Top shellfish from Scotland, lamb and beef as good as anywhere in the world.”

Patricia Yates, Director of Strategy and Communications at VisitBritain said: “Great to see such accolades for the very best of British cooking. Our food and produce and great regional specialities are an asset to be promoted around the world and add to the experience of international visitors.”


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Thursday, August 27, 2009

Goldsmith: his 1972 book Blueprint for Survival called for a world order based on small, self-sufficient communities Photograph: The Ecologist

Obituary

Edward Goldsmith

Environmental campaigner and writer who founded The Ecologist magazine

Walter SchwarzThursday 27 August 2009 20.20 BST

Edward Goldsmith, who has died aged 80, was an influential environmental scholar, polemicist and campaigner who founded and edited the Ecologist. A special issue in 1972, Blueprint for Survival, proposing the formation of a movement for sustainability, was published as a book, sold 750,000 copies in 17 languages and led to the foundation of the People party, later the Ecology party, which eventually became the Green party.

Blueprint for Survival was a call for a new world order founded not on economic growth but on stable populations of small, self-sufficient communities, similar to those that Goldsmith had seen in his early travels. "I began to see that the survival of primitive people and of the environment were inseparable," he wrote at the time. "Primitive people were disappearing. So was wildlife. I realised that the root problem was economic development. So I decided to start a paper to explore these issues."

However, Goldsmith's extremist, conservative philosophy, opposed to economic development and globalisation in favour of local self-sufficiency, later marginalised him in the green movement, whose politics were moving leftwards. While greens welcomed the Channel tunnel as investment in public transport, he damned it as "designed to further increase our economic activity, exacerbating our rapidly deteriorating environment".

Goldsmith was influenced by the sociological writings of Karl Polanyi, which emphasised the way economies are embedded in society and culture. His travels with his millionaire college friend John Aspinall introduced him to tribal communities on which his later thinking was based. The Ecologist, founded in 1969 and edited by Goldsmith from 1970 to 1989 and 1997-98, was partly financed by his younger brother, James, the billionaire financier.

For all his gloomy prognostication and his passionate commitment to protest, Goldsmith was a gregarious and exuberant bon vivant, a gifted raconteur who hosted parties in his homes in rural Cornwall, London, Paris and the south of France. His sociability, energy and charismatic charm won over even his most bitter critics. He liked to recall that, after attempting a business career in Paris, and failing, he gave his share of the family inheritance to his brother, an investment that laid the foundation for James's fortune and, indirectly, his own prosperity.

Edward Goldsmith

Goldsmith's passion for anti-science and his love of good company and good living combined in his foundation, with Denis de Rougement, Gerard Morgan-Grenville and others, of Ecoropa, a travelling debating society of scientists and writers which met convivially in pleasant parts of France, Italy and Spain and Germany.

His extreme social conservatism led Goldsmith at one stage to give support to an extreme rightwing, racist group in France. That, in part, led to Nicholas Hildyard's departure in 1997 from the Ecologist, which was then edited for 10 years by Goldsmith's nephew, James's son Zac.

Zac Goldsmith, environmental adviser to the Conservative party and prospective parliamentary candidate in Richmond Park, said his uncle "was responsible more than anyone else for waking us from our collective slumber. Radical ideas are no longer so radical – the credit crunch has made that obvious. If we pull through the environmental crisis, we all owe Teddy Goldsmith a debt of gratitude. He never regarded his work and status as ends in themselves, just a means to an end, an approach that today's politicians would do well to emulate."

The environmentalist Jonathon Porritt said: "Teddy was the first person who articulated the essence of sustainability in a complete and uncompromising way. He never worried about realistic possibilities. His mission was to have it all. Not always the most accommodating, but he was at his best applying scientific rigour to a problem."

Goldsmith was the son of Frank Goldsmith, Conservative MP for Stowmarket, Suffolk, from 1910 until 1918 who later ran luxury hotels in France. He was educated at Millfield school and Queen's College, Nassau. At Magdalen College, Oxford, he got a third-class degree in politics, philosophy and economics.

He began campaigning, in flamboyant style, in the February 1974 general election when he stood as the People party candidate at Eye, Suffolk. In protests against intensive farming which degraded the soil, he and his supporters paraded with a camel borrowed from Aspinall's private zoo, bearing the slogan "No Deserts in Suffolk. Vote Goldsmith." Few people did, he lost his deposit and retreated to a Cornish village from where he edited the Ecologist until 1989.

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Goldsmith soon returned to egregious protest when the Central Electricity Board tried to test-dig for a nuclear power station five miles from his home. As the diggers arrived, he blocked the entrance to the site by installing his desk and sat in his chair dictating letters to a secretary. The police declined to intervene and the project was eventually abandoned. In 1979 he contested Cornwall and Plymouth in the European parliamentary election for the Ecology party.

In the 1980s he directed some of his fiercest attacks towards the World Bank, which he saw as financing illusory progress by forcing developing countries to export food while destroying their natural ability to grow it. In an open letter to Tom Clausen, the bank's president, he told him to "stop financing the destruction of the tropical world, the devastation of its remaining forests, the extermination of its wildlife, and the impoverishment and starvation of its human inhabitants".

Another of Goldsmith's targets was big dams, which he saw as spreading poverty by flooding the lands of the poor for the benefit of wealthy industrialists and exporters. Goldsmith and Hildyard published a three-volume study: The Social and Environmental Effects of Large Dams (1984-92), which was later quoted in protests against dams in other countries.

Yet another consistent target was the UN's food and agricultural organisation, which Goldsmith claimed was controlled by multinational agro-industrial companies. He wrote: "Development may be designed to combat poverty, but it is in fact creating poverty. The main cause of poverty today is environmental degradation caused by economic development. Most people who live in the world's great slums are development refugees."

To combat what he saw as destructive economic development, Goldsmith elaborated his own spiritual philosophy. In his 1992 book The Way, he sought to expand Fritz Schumacher's notion of "Buddhist economics" based on "right livelihood" and "the middle way". Arguing that evolution was "purposeful, not for humans but for the planet", he set forth 66 precepts for "right living," warning against being "blinded by science which is itself a faith and has become an enemy. Ecology is also a faith – in the wisdom of those forces which created us with extraordinary benefits – and in our ability to develop cultural patterns that will enable us to maintain the integrity and wisdom of the natural world."

He saw scientists in their white coats as having "all the attributes of religion – faith, dogma and priesthood". Questioning the notion of objective knowledge, he pointed out that "man is a participant, not an objective observer". Few anthropologists would agree with Goldsmith that traditional societies do not change, but there is perhaps more sympathy for his central thesis that the natural world has wisdom greater than human.

Goldsmith, who was bilingual, launched a French edition of the Ecologist and co-edited a volume in French, La Médicine à la Question (1981). He also created versions of the Ecologist in Spain, Brazil, India and New Zealand. Other books included Can Britain Survive? (1971), The Earth Report (1988, co-edited with Hildyard), 5,000 Days to Save the Planet (1990, with Hildyard and others) and The Case Against the Global Economy (1996, edited with Jerry Mander). He received the Right Livelihood award and was made a Chevalier de la Légion d'Honneur for his services to France.

Goldsmith is survived by the son and two daughters from his first marriage, to Gillian Pretty, and by his second wife, Katherine James, and their two sons.

• Edward René David Goldsmith, environmentalist, writer and editor, born 8 November 1928; died 21 August 2009

Wednesday, August 12, 2009

Feeling the heat

Anushka Asthana on Field Notes from a Catastrophe

Field Notes from a Catastrophe

by Elizabeth Kolbert

Anushka AsthanaSunday 12 August 2007 23.55 BST

The Inuit people of Banks Island have no word to describe what we know as a robin. After all, the islanders, 500 miles inside the Arctic Circle, deep in Canada's Northwest Territories, had never seen the creatures until they suddenly turned up in numbers a few years ago. 'We just thought, "Oh gee, it's warming up a little bit,"' islander John Keogak tells Elizabeth Kolbert. 'It was good at the start - warmer winters, you know - but now everything is going so fast.'