“This is the place where makers have sought refuge and inspiration,” says Gus Casely-Hayford, director of the Victoria & Albert Museum, of the area in which London’s newest cultural destination has just opened its doors. V&A East Museum (V&A East), which opens to the public on 18 April, is the latest addition to what was once the site of the London 2012 Olympics and is now a buzzing cultural hotspot in the borough of Newham. “It feels both like we’ve come home and that we’ve been welcomed by east Londoners,” adds Casely-Hayford.

Visitors are greeted at the museum’s entrance by a striking, five-metre-tall statue by British sculptor Thomas J Price. An unlikely sentinel, the bronze figure of a young woman clad in trainers and clutching a smartphone feels right at home here. The borough has one of the youngest populations in the country and creating a museum that not only speaks to that demographic but was also made alongside them has been one of the defining novelties of this project. “Young people advised on everything from our uniforms to the food that will be served in our restaurant,” says Casely-Hayford. “It has been wonderful to reshape our operational and curatorial delivery to reflect their interests, needs and aspirations.”

The building itself was designed by architecture firm O’Donnell + Tuomey. It is angular and composed of sand-coloured triangles that tessellate to create a façade that seems to pleat. From the right angle, it has something of a spaceship look about it. 

Inside, V&A East comprises three galleries, the excellent Café Jikoni, an events space, shop and terraces. The permanent galleries – named Why We Make – celebrate the creative process by bringing together more than 500 objects from the V&A collection in an eclectic, unexpected way. Local heroes are, of course, paid their dues. On display is a wispy, ethereal dress covered with an angel motif by Alexander McQueen (who grew up in Stratford). It is from McQueen’s final collection before his death in 2010, poignant and hauntingly beautiful. Less ghostly and more garish are Leigh Bowery’s ballet costumes from 1987 – bright, sculptural outfits that include floral-patterned gimp masks and pink sequined cod pieces. 

Elsewhere, it is hard to miss a poofy hot-pink dress by contemporary east London designer Molly Goddard. Hanging within the same gallery is an Indian talismanic shirt inscribed with the entire text of the Qur’an from around the late 1400s and a Paimio armchair designed by Finnish modernist Alvar Aalto. This assortment, in the words of Zofia Trafas White, senior curator at V&A East, represents “a fresh and topical remix” of the museum’s collection. “Here, we’ve foregone typical displays based on chronology – displays sorted by materials or geography,” she says. “Instead, we’re looking at big ideas that we know are close to our audiences’ heart – identity, wellbeing, social justice, environmental action. It’s a thematic way to bring together objects that wouldn’t normally be displayed together and that mix of different cultures, countries and time periods is quite unique.”

The first temporary exhibition here catalogues the immense impact of Black British music on culture both in the UK and around the world. Objects tell the story – from Winifred Atwell’s piano to the Banksy-designed vest worn by Stormzy at Glastonbury – but so does the music, as motion-sensor headphones play an ever-evolving soundtrack to visitors while they move through the rooms. “This is one of the great stories of British creativity,” says Casely-Hayford. “It is uproariously inspiring and positive.” The very same could be said of this new museum itself.

Not too long ago I saw a young couple step into Shakespeare and Company, Paris’s storied English-language bookshop. After looking around, one of them turned to the other and said, “Oh. It’s just books.” Perhaps they were looking for a café. Despite their evident disappointment, I’m pretty sure that they left with one of the shop’s coveted tote bags. 

No one needs another tote: our cupboards runneth over with them. They accumulate in our closets but more of us seem to be seeking them as souvenirs than ever, to serve as canvas chronicles of our tastes and travels. The tote-bag market in 2025 was worth $2.75bn (€2.33bn). They have, in effect, become the concert T-shirts of our time. 

In the French capital, where I live, demand for these sacks is sky high. The trouble is that tote-seekers are warping the businesses that they claim to love. Some of my favourite shops are overrun with people who aren’t even there to buy what the establishment is known for. What they want is a branded bag that doesn’t scream “souvenir”. It simply whispers, “I shop in Paris and might even live there.” Sure, these visitors might walk out with a book, a bowl or a pair of jeans. But what they came for is visible proof of their connection to the City of Light.

At Merci, a chic shop in the Marais, you’ll find bed linens in saturated colours, fashionably lumpy pottery and luxe jumpers. It’s like the old Barneys New York if Barney had grown up in Brooklyn with French parents. But so many people now show up for its bags that the shop has now devoted a register to them and put up a blazing neon sign saying “Le Tote”. Merch seems to be eating up more and more of its space. You have to fight through an ocean of totes, banana bags and trinkets to get to the shoes and clothing. 

Local customers of any shop with a coveted tote brace themselves for the summer hordes. Queueing times in the line outside Shakespeare and Company can be 30 minutes or more. (Somehow, I can’t picture the world’s next James Baldwin waiting out there in the heat.) Maybe it should set up a dedicated tote stand, like Merci. Then again, perhaps the bags serve as bait, luring customers to the books. But there must be an existential tipping point at which a business starts selling more souvenirs than anything else. 

Some people go to even greater extremes to signal international-shopper status with totes. Fashionable folk in London, Tokyo and Paris are carrying bags from a US grocery chain called Trader Joe’s, a very unfancy place that many of them have never even set foot in. The bags sell in the US for less than $3 (€2.50) and the company doesn’t offer them online. Yet trend followers have paid hundreds for that elusive American cachet on Ebay and even more for rare versions. 

Significantly overpaying for a canvas bag from a grocery shop might be the souvenir-tote obsession in a nutshell. I admit that I probably won’t be able to resist buying a few more of them from places that I want to be associated with or support. But there’s something a bit weird about having a cabinet stuffed with empty bags. Sure, they’re souvenirs of places that we have visited, worked or shopped. But we’ll never use them all. We buy these things for what they signal to the world but the story that truly matters is what we carry inside them: the Lewis and Clark-level survival kit that we lug to work, the gifts for the friend in hospital and the lopsided apple cake that we’re bringing over for dinner tonight. 

To say that the DC media scene is saturated would be a gross understatement. Since US press secretary Karoline Leavitt announced last year that the White House was opening access to “new media” voices, hundreds of bloggers, content creators and “independent media outlets” have descended on the nation’s capital. So why are senators and congressmen quaking in their boots at the addition of three more reporters into this already eclectic mix?
 
Because tabloid gossip site and celebrity-baiter TMZ set up shop in Washington this week and marked its arrival with a video of a reporter chasing Republican senator Lindsey Graham down a corridor shouting questions about a bubble blower. It is hardly the stuff of Woodward and Bernstein, and yet there has been intense interest in DC media circles about the new arrivals – and whether this marks a new era of transparency or further spiralling toward the gutter for US politics. 

Much like Donald Trump’s White House, the TMZ model of newsgathering breaks all the rules. Owned by the Fox Corporation and operating more like a spy network than a media outlet, TMZ launched in Los Angeles in 2005 to cover the entertainment world and invested in developing a huge web of informants. At airports, newsstands, hotels and other locations where celebrities might lurk, staff were encouraged to snap photos and videos and gather other incriminating evidence to shame the great and the good. Crucially, TMZ paid for the tips and content, considered unethical by mainstream US media and earning it a reputation among loftier titles as the lowest dirt-diggers in the business. 
 
But for all the moral handwringing, the tactics worked, with TMZ getting scoop after scoop, from the audio of actor Mel Gibson’s drunken antisemitic rant in 2006 to the news this week that singer Britney Spears was back in rehab. So what does that mean for Washington? 
 
TMZ happened on this rich new seam of reporting partly by accident. During the recent partial government shutdown, when airport security staff went without pay, TMZ’s network started sending in photos of politicians enjoying themselves on holidays.
 
The snaps of politicians at leisure – including a group of congressmen and women at a Scottish castle and Graham clutching a Little Mermaid-themed bubble blower at Disney World – aimed to highlight inequality and hypocrisy. The photos were an immediate hit on social media, where TMZ boasts millions of followers.
 
So, TMZ founder Harvey Levin swiftly dispatched three brash young producers to DC and promised that they would “show how pop culture and politics converge”. One of those new arrivals, Charlie Cotton, announced, “We love DC, [and] DC is going to love us.”
 
That is optimistic: while there were some voices on social media welcoming any greater transparency in Congress, there was also nervousness among congressional staffers. Because there is no shortage of scandals to uncover on the Hill. Just this week, two members of Congress were forced to resign over accusations of sexual misconduct. Of course, politicians engaging in inappropriate dalliances is nothing new. But levels of trust among the public towards their representatives is pitifully low, with a recent Pew Research Centre survey showing just 17 per cent trust the government to act in the interests of its people – trust in the media is equally dismal according to Gallup, hovering at around 28 per cent. 
 
While there has been a flood of new outlets covering the White House, most of them are not the “independent journalists” that Leavitt promised but rather conservative outlets throwing softball questions at the president. Traditional networks and newspapers, meanwhile, cover the Trump White House with a po-faced sense of doom. 
 
For all its dubious ethics, TMZ will go after anyone of any political stripe with the same ferociousness and its crowd-sourced method of newsgathering creates the veneer of authenticity. Breaking past the perceived wall separating the people from their representatives is a tantalising prospect and, so far, traditional media have struggled to do this. 
 
Whether the TMZ approach will work remains to be seen. Covering Washington is about building trust with contacts and sources, and combative corridor encounters don’t tend to foster bonhomie. 
 
But with an anarchic president breaking all the rules to pursue his vision for the country, an anarchic media outlet operating with a similar disregard for convention seems to be the perfect fit for the moment. 

Charlotte McDonald-Gibson is Monocle’s Washington correspondent. 

Further reading? 
– How Karoline Leavitt became the world’s most famous White House press secretary

– ProPublica’s new pitch: Finding whistleblowers on the Washington Metro

– When it comes to Dulles airport, Trump might actually have a point

When asked a tricky question related to the US cost-of-living crisis by a reporter last year, Donald Trump knew exactly who to turn to: his press secretary, Karoline Leavitt, who happily obliged with a full-throttle defence of the president’s economic record. So devoted did she seem to her boss’s cause that Trump’s visiting dignitary that day – the now former Hungarian prime minister Viktor Orbán – quipped that he would like to hire her. In the intervening months, even as Trump’s rhetoric has tipped towards the genocidal and messianic, Leavitt’s dedication to her boss has not wavered, earning her both praise and scorn.

With Maga-blonde locks and an angelic face that can instantly transform into the glare of a loyal attack dog, Leavitt has become one of the most recognisable figures of Trump’s second administration. Utterly committed to the Make America Great Again cause, the 28-year-old is the youngest person in US history to step up to the White House press podium – and is arguably one of its best. She is quick-witted with a pitch-perfect grasp of her commander-in-chief’s messaging and appears to share his deep disdain for many of the reporters who she goes into daily battle with. 

White House press secretaries have always held a higher profile than their counterparts in other countries, which is unsurprising given the fact that their boss is often considered the most powerful person on the planet. But there is also something uniquely American about the performative nature of the job, with telegenic personalities relishing combative back-and-forths with an equally ego-heavy press corps. Try to name any other press secretary in the world and you might be able to conjure up Alastair Campbell – the spokesperson and communications chief of former British prime minister Tony Blair between 1997 and 2003 – who took a similarly combative approach. After which, you would likely be stumped. 

I was a member of the Brussels press corps for five years, and the EU had a host of spokespeople, all of whom were picked for their blandness and inability to create anything resembling news. In the many other countries where I have reported as a journalist, press secretaries exist as conduits for public statements, regurgitating sound bites while keeping the media at arm’s length from those in positions of power. Trump’s approach is different. He speaks to the press regularly, whether it be in the back of Air Force One for an informal chat with travelling media or fielding questions during Oval Office sit-downs. He even picks up the phone for chats with reporters, with the roster of journalists with his personal mobile number growing by the day. So, Leavitt’s job is not so much to act as a gatekeeper for the president but as an amplifier of his message. And for that, she is the perfect pick. 

A lifelong conservative, Leavitt began writing pro-Trump op-eds for a student newspaper in 2016 when she was 19, already laying into the “unjust” and “unfair” liberal media. As a university student pursuing a degree in communications and political science, she interned at Fox News and then at the White House, before joining Trump’s press team as a full-time staff member in 2019. After Trump lost the 2020 election, she unsuccessfully ran for US Congress – but her stardom in the Maga world continued to rise.

In January 2024, she was appointed as Trump’s campaign press secretary and landed the government’s top communications perch soon after his re-election. Now she has crafted an image as a highly effective operator – albeit a deeply divisive one. To conservatives, she is an icon: a whip-smart, beautiful Christian woman who is both a devoted wife and mother. (Leavitt gave birth to her first child in July 2024, three days after the assassination attempt on Trump in Butler, Pennsylvania. She often brings her child to work.) To liberals, she embodies the worst of the Trump regime, spouting propaganda and parroting the president’s many false claims while bad-mouthing journalists.

She has come in for particular criticism as she seeks to justify Trump’s incendiary rhetoric over the war with Iran. When he posted on Truth Social on 7 April that, a “whole civilisation will die tonight”, if Iran didn’t reach a deal, Leavitt insisted the president, “absolutely has the moral high ground”, despite claims he was threatening a genocide. Asked about other extreme rhetoric in the past, she has insisted that the public appreciates Trump’s “frankness” and that his approach gets results. Leavitt has not commented so far on Trump’s rage-baiting (and since deleted) social media post portraying himself as Jesus, but she clearly worships the man.

And Trump? He appears equally smitten. During his first term, the president went through five press secretaries: the most famous of whom, Anthony Scaramucci, lasted only 10 days. But Trump told reporters last year that, “I don’t think anybody has ever had a better press secretary that Karoline.” The big question now is what happens when Leavitt has her second child, a baby girl due in May. There has been no official announcement of a temporary replacement, leading to speculation that she has no intention of relinquishing her podium, and will be back on the job within days of giving birth. That would certainly suit her boss.

With a press secretary who seems to relish forging herself in his own image, it looks like he has found his perfect match. 

Six years after it was formed out of the ashes of a bankrupt Alitalia, ITA Airways (ITA) commemorated its official entry into the Star Alliance network at a recent gala in Rome. From the vaulted porticos of the Villa Miani, the Italian carrier marked the occasion with lighting coloured in the brand’s royal blue, live music and a team of 23 flight attendants in uniform representing some of the global network’s roster. Also on the itinerary were a number of speeches delivered by Germans – with a few attempts at Italian to varying degrees of success.

The presentation came on the heels of a challenging few years for the airline as it struggled to find its place in the market, culminating in Lufthansa Group’s purchase of a 41 per cent stake in the company last year. At the same time, former Air Dolomiti CEO (and Lufthansa pilot) Joerg Eberhart was appointed CEO of ITA. 

The German-Italian combination seems ripe for cultural clashes as far as branding goes but so far the effects have been positive. ITA’s fleet and network has been gradually growing and in 2025 the airline reported its first-ever full-year net profit of €209m. Days prior to the gala, ITA relaunched its Heathrow to Rome service, after having left the market two years ago partly due to the high price of slots at the UK airport. ITA says that with the Star Alliance link-up and Lufthansa Group membership, passengers stand to benefit.

“Our airline being now part of Star Alliance and Lufthansa Group opens so much more of the world to [our customers],” says Eberhart. Passengers will have access to more loyalty perks and 1,000-plus lounges worldwide. “And with us in the family, there’s more of Italy to be explored for the other airlines’ loyal customers,” he adds.

While recent success has been bolstered by some years of a healthy airline industry, the looming effects of the conflicts in the Middle East could dampen ITA’s momentum. This is the sort of moment where being part of a larger group, rather than an independent airline based out of a second-tier European market, can help weather any turbulence. The German carrier group can mitigate risks by shifting assets, co-ordinating schedules and streamlining the overall network according to where demand is rising or falling, or where fuel availability becomes problematic. ITA taking on two slots at Heathrow from Lufthansa is one good example. And the added Star Alliance integration will mean streamlined IT and processes, plus better chances to fill airplanes as partner airlines feed passengers to each other.

With regards to brand essence, ITA is keen to maintain its image as Italy’s carrier, even as it integrates into the middle-European Lufthansa Group. That means focusing on Italian cuisine and hospitality, and partnering exclusively with Italian labels for onboard items such as amenity kits by Italian wellness brand QC Terme and uniforms by Brunello Cucinelli. And if the gestures toward Italian food and culture come alongside increased reliability and a more streamlined passenger experience, that’s sure to be a win for both the company and its customers. 

As we enter a period where carrier networks have begun to shrink, with flights cancelled and capacity constrained, it’s no small thing for passengers to have access to wider groups and alliance networks to reach their desired destinations. At the end of the gala, guests were handed traditional colomba di pasqua Easter cakes in ITA-blue boxes – a move signalling that even while ITA aims to leverage its new global partnership, it intends to hold fast to its Italian identity.

Over the past two days, the watchmaking industry has come together at Geneva’s Palexpo exhibition centre for Watches and Wonders, its most important annual gathering. In between booth tours – each brand has a dedicated space and there’s stiff competition for the most creative set design – new collection presentations and plenty of champagne receptions, journalists and buyers discussed the year’s most impressive novelties, as well as the future of the industry at a time of geopolitical tension. While Cartier’s new iteration of the Baignoire was particularly popular, much of the conversation among C-suite visitors touched on how the war in Iran is impacting consumer consumption.

One CEO told me that any hopes of the industry recovering from last year’s sales slowdown were crushed when the Iran war started. Still, executives remain convinced of the industry’s resilience and ability to bounce back over time. For many watchmakers, this means investing in the future: opening new manufacturing facilities (ahead of the fair, Audemars Piguet announced a new site in Meyrin) or kickstarting training initiatives for young watchmakers, such as Cartier’s education programme, which launched earlier this month in partnership with the King’s Foundation and involves building a new workshop in the UK.

There was also renewed attention on innovation and on highlighting the high level of handwork that goes into creating a timepiece – making it a sensible investment, even in tougher economic times. Tag Heuer presented a new in-house movement, developed over several years, while Van Cleef & Arpels offered one-of-a-kind métiers d’art watches that showcase the house’s expertise in miniature painting and enamelling.

At Vacheron Constantin the focus was the new Overseas Self-Winding Ultra-Thin, with a movement just 2.4mm thick that still offers 80 hours of power reserve – an engineering feat. “Vacheron Constantin was founded 271 years ago – and during this long history we’ve had some good times and some difficult times,” says Christian Selmoni, the house’s style and heritage director. “Through it all, you have to stay creative, you have to stay innovative and consistent in your efforts. There’s no reason to change the way we work.”

Others made a similar point: creativity thrives in moments of challenge. Audemars Piguet’s artisans began experimenting with skeleton watches during the Great Depression, while the Royal Oak was born out of the quartz crisis of the 1970s.

Change is afoot today, too. Houses are not only renewing vintage designs and pushing the boundaries of the craft but also rethinking how they communicate – opening booths to wider audiences and hosting events across the city. Cultural relevance, increasingly, is proving to be the ultimate luxury.

Natalie Theodosi is Monocle’s fashion director. Monocle recently sat down with Piaget’s CEO, Benjamin Comar. Read the story here.

As Israel deepens its military campaign against Iran and its regional proxies, its ambassador to the UAE, Yossi Avraham Shelley, gives his first interview since the conflict began. Speaking on Monocle Radio’s The Briefing, he strikes an uncompromising tone: Tehran’s nuclear ambitions and ballistic-missile capabilities, he argues, remain an existential threat that Israel cannot afford to leave unresolved. 

Yet the theatre stretches beyond Iran. Despite the announcement of a ceasefire, Israeli strikes have continually hit Lebanon despite mediators, including Pakistan, suggesting the agreement extended to that front. Ambassador Shelley maintains that Lebanon constitutes a separate conflict and points to Israeli warnings issued ahead of the strikes – including text messages and leaflets – as an attempt towards mitigation. 

His remarks come on the same day that Israeli and Lebanese officials were set to meet in Washington for their first high-level talks in decades, a development that signals tentative diplomatic movement even as hostilities continue across the region. For ambassador Shelley, however, any progress with Lebanon hinges on confronting the role of Hezbollah, which he describes as both a dominant force within the country’s government and a proxy for Iran. In his view, meaningful diplomacy cannot advance while Hezbollah retains military and political influence – ultimately placing Lebanon within the broader confrontation with Tehran.

The conversation also turned to the resilience of the Abraham Accords, a set of agreements signed in 2020 between several Arab states and Israel. Despite the pressures of the war, Shelley insists that ties between Israel and the Emirates are not only holding but strengthening, framing the relationship as part of a broader alignment against what he describes as destabilising forces in the region. 

This conversation has been edited for clarity and length.

There are talks taking place in Washington between Israeli and Lebanese officials – the first such discussions in decades. Are you hopeful anything will come of them?
Someone has to take responsibility. We never had a real fight with Lebanon as a country. There are no territorial issues – in 2000 we left what we call the Litani region. So we can move forward. But Hezbollah is the problem. It is a terrorist organisation and that is what prevents progress.

So are you optimistic about these talks?
We have to be optimistic. But first, we have to finish the problem with Iran. If that is resolved – if Iran is defeated or agrees to new terms – then we can move towards a different Middle East.

Where do you think things stand now with Iran? Would Israel accept the situation as it is today?
No, of course not. We didn’t start this. Iran attacked us [with] more than 400 ballistic missiles. That’s a fact. There are two major problems: one is the nuclear facilities. You cannot allow a regime that supports terrorism to have nuclear weapons – they would have immunity and could threaten everyone. The second is ballistic missiles. People don’t understand what that means. A [one tonne] ballistic missile is like throwing a bus onto your house. People cannot survive that. This is about our future. We cannot let it continue.

But negotiations were ongoing before the conflict escalated. Why act during that period?
Iran is the only country that openly says it wants to destroy Israel. This is not a normal conflict – it is an existential threat. We have problems with neighbours, yes, but those can be resolved. We have peace with Egypt and Jordan. But if someone says they want to eliminate you, you cannot just wait. You have to act.

Has Israel underestimated the strength of the Iranian regime?
I don’t agree that they are strong. This is a regime that rules by force. The potential for change is with the Iranian people. What we want is to eliminate their capability to destroy us – that is the objective.

Have you achieved that?
We have reduced their capabilities by about 60 to 70 per cent. We destroyed key nuclear-enrichment facilities, the centrifuges. That is very important. But we cannot play a cat-and-mouse game where they rebuild deeper underground. They don’t want to stop.

If you’ve achieved that much, why does the war continue?
Because this is not an attack, it’s a defence. We want one thing: for them to stop. If they say, ‘Here is the nuclear programme, we [will] stop,’ then it’s over. But why continue building missiles with a range of thousands of kilometres? That means: if you don’t obey, we will attack you. That is the threat.

A ceasefire was announced but Israel continued strikes in Lebanon. Why?
The ceasefire did not include Lebanon. Lebanon is another conflict. Hezbollah is a proxy of Iran and we cannot allow it to establish itself like that.

But civilians were killed in those strikes, [including] women and children.
If terrorists are operating from within civilian areas, that is the reality we face. Before we attack, we warn people – we send messages, flyers, telling them to leave. But Hezbollah is embedded there. That is the situation.

The Abraham Accords have held through this conflict, despite tensions. Has that surprised you?
The Abraham Accords have faced challenges from the beginning. This is another test. And you can see [that] they are holding. The UAE was attacked as well. Why? Because it is a friend of Israel. We share goals: protecting our people, growing our economies. These are strong foundations.

Do you think ties with the UAE will be stronger after this conflict?
Yes, for sure. We have mutual goals – economic growth, security, stability. Not only with the UAE but with others as well. People want to work with those who build, not those who destroy.

Finland has long sold itself as Europe’s model of preparedness. This is the country of bomb shelters beneath apartment blocks, emergency grain stashes and a reserve army so large that officials from bigger European capitals mention it with a hint of envy. Since joining Nato, Finland’s reputation as the alliance’s northern sentinel has only grown. So, when Ukrainian drones recently flew into Finnish airspace undetected, before crashing on their way to strike Russia, there was cause for some alarm. 
 
The practical question is obvious enough. How does an aircraft linked to an active war pass through the skies of one of Europe’s most militarised border states without interception? But the resulting political query makes matters more uncomfortable still: why are the authorities so unsure of themselves?

Early official statements were muddled and public communication was patchy at best. The Helsingin Sanomat newspaper accidentally referred to the drones as being Russian (having mistakenly relied on AI tools in the newsgathering). Then came the prime minister’s remark that the failures were “alarming”, a striking admission in a country where governments usually prize calm competency above all else. Finns are accustomed to hearing that their institutions are prepared – learning that those bodies were caught by surprise does not sit well.

The temptation will be to treat this as a Finnish embarrassment. It is, however, more usefully read as a European one. For all the talk of rearmament since Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine, much of Europe’s defence thinking remains rooted in older assumptions about how war begins and what readiness looks like. Ministers still like to announce purchases of fighter jets, artillery systems and missile batteries. These are visible, expensive symbols of seriousness. But they are designed largely for conventional threats. The battlefield in Ukraine has made one point repeatedly. Expensive platforms do not automatically protect against cheap, improvised or technologically modest threats. Equipment built to track bombers and puncture armour-plated vehicles might still struggle with a low-flying drone assembled for a fraction of the price of the missile sent to destroy it.
 
Finland is not alone in this. It has simply become the first European state to confront the gap so publicly. The more interesting failing might lie not in radar coverage but in the state’s response. In Finland, national resilience is often discussed in physical terms: bunkers, stockpiles, conscripts, ammunition depots. Yet resilience also depends on something less tangible, namely, public and professional confidence – or, knowing what to do when the pressure is on. When official messaging turns hesitant or contradictory during a live security incident, that confidence weakens. In a crisis, competence must be visible.
 
None of this means that Finland’s preparedness has been exposed as a fiction. Far from it. Finland remains one of the few European countries to have taken territorial defence seriously throughout the post-Cold War decades, maintaining mandatory conscription for men, regularly mobilising reservists for refresher exercises and fortifying its long eastern frontier, even while much of Europe downsized. Its armed forces are credible, its strategic culture is mature and its political class generally grasps that geography still matters. Most of Europe would be wiser if it thought a little more like Finland. But even serious countries can prepare for the wrong version of the next war.
 
The real lesson here is not that Finland has failed. It is that preparedness cannot be treated as a finished project. The institutions that made Finland resilient in the 20th century will not, by themselves, guarantee security in the 21st. Europe now needs to think harder about drone defence, low-altitude surveillance, civil-military co-ordination and the bureaucratic agility required to respond to events faster than official processes.
 
Finland’s reputation as the prepper of Europe remains deserved. Yet reputations are useful only if they survive contact with reality. If even the Finns can be wrong-footed by a handful of drones, then the rest of Europe needs to ask itself what vulnerabilities of its own remain hidden. 

Warm spring light spills across a dark-wood counter, fresh terrazzo floor and rows of tables studded with comfy cow-horn dining chairs. Laughter ricochets off tall walls as glasses of pale rosé glint in the sun from the generous full-height window. We’re at the pre-opening of Café Jikoni, tucked under a concrete pleat of the skirt-like O’Donnell + Tuomey-designed V&A East Museum in Stratford. 

The restaurant is buzzing with press, friends, family and the plates of soon-to-be-sampled delights being whisked to waiting diners. There is the whiff of warming baharat from the lamb sausage roll, a toasted sandwich with Goan aubergine achaar (pickle) and gooey cheddar, and rigatoni with lentils and anchovies. It’s a new site and a fresh challenge for the team behind Marylebone’s beloved Jikoni restaurant on Blandford Street – but one that the team appears to be handling with relish.

“What has been interesting for us is how you bring true hospitality to a public institution and make it feel fresh,” says chef Ravinder Bhogal, sitting beside co-founder and partner Nadeem Nanjuwany. “That’s something I feel really proud of. Everything, from our bread and pickles to dessert, is made in house from scratch.” 

Bhogal’s South Asian, Kenyan, Persian and British influences combine at Café Jikoni, resisting swift classification in ever more cunning and comforting ways. The menu touts curries and baked potatoes, buddha bowls and iced buns. But all made better – flecked, freckled and fizzing with unexpected spices, unfamiliar additions or unlikely ingredients. It’s culinary alchemy of the highest order. The inventiveness of the original restaurant is here in abundance, albeit in a subtly more museum-manageable format with plenty of sandwiches (hot or cold), nibbles for kids and takeaway packaging (if you prefer).  

As we talk, museum director Gus Casely-Hayford arrives, beaming and congratulating Bhogal and Nanjuwany on a seamless first service. “I could write an essay in praise of Gus – he’s a rare breed,” says Bhogal with obvious affection. “His vision for this place is to make a public institution feel like it belongs to the public.” It wasn’t just Casely-Hayford who the pair needed buy-in from – part of the consultation involved the V&A Youth Collective, a group of local 18- to 24-year-olds. “That was the most terrifying pitch; they are the toughest critics,” says Bhogal. The upshot was everything from greater sensitivity around price points to conversations around representation. “Stratford has a very young population, so it was really wonderful to sit down with them and ask them about what matters.”

On a practical note, and for the brand, there were hurdles, from engineering space for the extractor fan to making a window to give the chefs some natural light. But what’s it like taking a West End favourite to the East Bank of Stratford? How do you scale a bijou and beautiful restaurant to the appetites and obligations of a public museum? And what if people don’t already know Jikoni? “We might not explain anything [about ourselves] if the person is coming in just to experience the museum,” says Nanjuwany. “They might just want a nice coffee.” 

Bhogal agrees. “Our coffee is so thought about,” she says. “It comes from Uganda and there’s complete traceability [in collaboration with Workshop Coffee]. Whether we’re explaining it or not, someone will feel that they’ll taste it in the quality. So, it’s all those little touches.” It’s a refreshing thought. Not all restaurants need concepts. It’s the food, not the philosophy, that most people end up chewing over anyway. 

Hospitality is more about intention than simple brand building, how things are done rather than needing to interrupt people mid sip to explain the concept. The ethos here is in everything – but blissfully, it’s not forced down your throat along with the miso-cream banana bread.

As the plates are cleared, talk turns to business. Both Nanjuwany and Bhogal are optimistic about keeping their company culture intact while hiring more staff and reacting to the subtle differences between a sit-down dinner service and a café set-up. The entrepreneurs seem to adore a new challenge. Nanjuwany has worked in design, agriculture and orchard-fresh apple juice, while Bhogal is, among other things, a writer, journalist and broadcaster. Both believe that their endeavour can do good as well as being good.

“When you have a business that’s growing, [it’s important] to be able to point or spend in a really positive way: from incredible farmers who are really looking after the land to women’s co-operatives who make our tablecloth or healthcare for our team,” says Bhogal. “Or the fact that we only use wind and solar energy,” says Nanjuwany. “We’re calling that restorative hospitality,” he adds. “This idea that you can use purchasing [to do good]. We feel that we’re just completing that model because now even our rent goes towards a public good.”

Replete, impressed and feeling inspired by the ambition of the project (and the yuzu kick of the strawberry iced bun), Monocle asks about the area. “Whether you’re in Stratford or Marylebone, the purpose of a restaurant is to restore,” says Bhogal. Coffee cups clink as the sun catches the London Stadium outside, visible like a halo beyond a landscaped garden amid the fast-changing former Olympic site from 2012. “[That means] restoring each other, our team, our guests, our neighbourhood, the wider community,” she says. “And hopefully the wider world around us.” It’s a big responsibility for a humble museum café. But you sense that Bhogal and Nanjuwany aren’t a pair to bite off more than they can chew. 
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Few maisons move as fluidly between watchmaking and jewellery as Piaget. Under CEO Benjamin Comar that duality is not a balancing act but a defining principle. “From the beginning, Piaget approached the watch as a piece of jewellery,” Comar tells Monocle. “It was always about design, about gold, about how the object sits on the body.” That philosophy crystallised in the late 1960s, when the house introduced bold cuffs and pendant watches – what Comar calls “a jewellery way of wearing time.” Today that spirit remains intact. “There has always been this culture of jewellery watches and watches within a jewellery expression.”

It’s a timely position. As the market rediscovers a taste for expressive, design-led pieces, Piaget’s archives feel less like history and more like a blueprint. But Comar is careful to stress that revival doesn’t mean nostalgia. “We don’t present things in a backward-looking way. We reinterpret them with modern people, modern styling,” he says. “The aim is not to look back but to make them relevant now.”

That relevance lies, in part, in Piaget’s particular brand of boldness – an interplay of elegance and eccentricity. Cocktail rings return alongside sculptural watches; hard-stone dials feel both retro and quietly radical. “There’s always a little extravagance,” says Comar. “But it must remain refined.”

Craftsmanship, however, is where Piaget continues to distinguish itself in an increasingly crowded field. The maison’s expertise in ultra-thin movements allows for unusually expressive dials, particularly in hard stone. “Our dials are about 0.4mm thick,” he says. “You have to find the right part of the stone, cut it, polish it, without breaking it. It’s extremely delicate work.”

The result is more poetry than technical showmanship. “When you look into these stones, there is depth,” he says. “You can look at them like a night sky. There is emotion in them.” In a market increasingly shaped by technology, this tactility matters. “We need one foot in the past and one in the future,” adds Comar. “Craft reassures us.”

That sense of permanence also underpins Piaget’s response to a more uncertain global climate. While some might frame fine watchmaking as a safe haven, Comar prefers a quieter formulation. “Our role is to create objects that last,” he says. “Pieces [that] you can wear for 20 or 30 years and then pass on.” He talks of the Polo 79, a watch that Piaget revived in 2024. “That is what we are proud of. Not something opportunistic but something enduring.”

It’s a philosophy that finds a natural stage at Watches and Wonders, where Piaget presents its latest collections each spring. For Comar, the fair remains as vital as ever. “It’s a moment of encounter,” he says. “People thought digital might replace it but it hasn’t. You need to see the pieces, to feel them on the skin.”

Beyond the spectacle it is also a space for exchange between collectors, partners and critics alike. “You have compliments but also criticism,” he says. “That’s important. It’s a real conversation.” As audiences broaden and more clients attend in person, that conversation is only deepening. But Comar resists over-segmentation in a market often driven by novelty, it’s not about chasing time but designing to outlast it. “We try to show as much as possible to everyone,” he says. “People are mature, they know what they like.”