There’s a change of pace this issue. We’ve put to one side the page architecture that usually shapes the issue and given the entire magazine over to The Monocle 100, a directory of people who we like, places with important stories to share and products that we covet. It’s a list that is hopefully useful but raises some smiles too.

We started working on this project some months ago, asking our team to nominate everything from the best military kit to running shoes, artworks to modernist apartment blocks (and even the ultimate roadside shrubbery). I think that they’ve done a fine job, even if there was some jostling for page acreage among editors keen to allow their selections to shine.

Beyond the competitive fun of pulling this together, there’s another reason why I hope that this issue hits the mark. It is a celebration of talent, shining a light on both established and aspiring names. It’s also a blast of positivity, global know-how and spotting opportunities at a time when such ambition can often be hard to locate in our media – or, indeed, anywhere.

So, you’ll meet a man taking a stance against graffiti vandals scarring his city, discover how Dr Stretch is manipulating a nation back to litheness, see how architecture is helping a city to rediscover its soul after a terror attack, slip into a cosy armchair in the perfect airport lounge and have a go on a vending machine that supports local businesses.

Also commanding some prime glossy-papered real estate in this issue is our annual Property Survey, which is timed to land ahead of Mipim in Cannes, the industry’s largest fair (we will be there again this year with a Monocle Radio studio at Le Palais des Festivals). Over our nicely appointed pages, we visit a new public housing project in Singapore that’s embracing nature, drop in on the agents charged with selling Dubai’s most valuable homes in the city’s highly competitive market and see why developers in Japan are wooing renters with pooches. Poodle power is on the rise. I’m all for it.

While I have you, if you are a subscriber, take a tour around our rapidly expanding collection of digital city guides – Palma and Dubai have just gone live. Written by our editors and correspondents, they are constantly being updated and will help you to unpack a city with ease. Come to think of it, they deserved an entry in The Monocle 100.

There’s another piece of travel news to share too. Always passionate about good hospitality, we have just launched the The Monocle Townhouse at the Widder Hotel in Zürich. This three-bedroom establishment, with an epic roof terrace, sits on the heart of the city and all of its furniture, art and fittings have been selected by us. There’s some rather fine reading material too for guests to peruse.

Finally, there are also upcoming events in the Gulf and Asia. You might have guessed that we like spending time with our readers. In the meantime, if you have thoughts or ideas to share, please always feel free to send me an email at at@monocle.com. Have a great month.

Illustrator Ana Strumpf moved to the Locarno building with her sons having lived in the US for four years. “I needed a neighbourhood that I could walk around,” she says gesturing to the vast window of her airy, art-filled apartment in the 1950s structure. Locarno is one of two identical buildings (the other named Lugano) in São Paulo’s Higienópolis and in is a portal to the past that offers some clues to what makes a meaningful community today.

From her studio in what would originally have been the maid’s bedroom, she says that the appeal of living here is the lively community. Strumpf is in a Whatsapp group with the parents who live in the buildings and organises parties for the children. One of her sons, she says, regularly goes down to the garden and plays with her neighbours’ dogs.

The architecture also provides entertainment of another kind for the boys. “Sometimes they like doing silly things that 12-year-olds tend to do, like pull moonies from the windows,” she says with only the slightest hint of disapproval. Once they’re safely at school, she throws open the shutters, partly to let in the breeze as she works but also because she knows that a well-known concert pianist, who lives above her, likes to practice every day at 11.00. “When he plays – oh my God,” she says. “This place is heaven.”

Lofty praise indeed for architecture’s capacity to make homes from houses and forge social connections, as well as for the vision of the building’s designer, Adolf Franz Heep. The émigré, known among contemporaries for gliding through the downtown in his distinctive slim bow ties, had arrived in Brazil in 1947 from Germany. He’d been helping with post-war reconstruction and separated from his Jewish wife by the Nazis. Following his escape across the Atlantic (at the age of 45 and using a fake passport) he joined the office of Frenchman Jacques Pilon and helped to complete the new HQ of newspaper O Estado de S Paulo, including subterranean printing presses. Heep’s solo designs for residential blocks soon followed. Relatively affordable and aimed at a burgeoning Brazilian middle class, Edifício Lausanne, with its red and turquoise aluminium blinds, is regularly name checked in today’s architectural guides; and at 47 storeys high, Edifício Italia still presides gracefully over Praça Republica.

Today, architect André Scarpa is convinced that the 1958 Locarno and Lugano buildings are Heep’s masterpiece. Scarpa knew of the buildings before he moved in and even once designed a shelving unit inspired by their H-shaped exterior window planters. He met his partner, Pedro Rossi, in 2023. After just two months they jumped at an available rental and moved in with their dogs Ipê and Gil. “I used to think that I loved Lausanne and lived in Lugano,” Scarpa says a little wistfully. “Now I think this design is better. Lausanne is very visual, with its coloured shutters, but Lugano and Locarno have light that flows through the apartments, the ceilings are high at 2.8 metres and every room connects perfectly.”

Higienópolis sill feels like a precious slice of old São Paulo in a city that likes to keep up with trends. On a Sunday, the queue for Mirian’s rotisserie chicken served from a hole-in-the-wall stretches round the block. Those waiting patiently are muttering that a much-loved bar has recently undergone a brutal refurbishment but another stalwart from the 1960s called Ugue’s still packs them in for feijoada (stew) and cold beers. Weekend runners in jogging kit are a common sight but you can spy uniformed maids walking packs of pedigree dogs, if you keep your eyes peeled.

Found beyond security gates (a 1980s addition), Lugano and Locarno lie perpendicular to the neighbourhood’s gently climbing main avenue. A mirror image of each another, they stand on either side of a narrow garden; their names spelled out in discreet sans serif ironmongery. A gardener sweeps the ochre paving stones with an old broom, clearing away branches and fruit from the guiambê shrubs, manacá-da-serra and palm trees. On the ground floor of each building are three apartments and two entrances with canopies held up by tapering white-tiled pillars. Inside, wide curving stairs – the steps and rails painted a soothing cream – take residents to other floors. While lower apartments have glass bricks that allow in plenty of light, the 12 floors above (with four apartments on each level) rely on windows that stretch their entire length.

The buildings are certainly attractive and welcoming places to live but they seem to be a particular draw to architecture obsessives. Agnaldo Farias, who teaches art and design at the nearby University of São Paulo, lives on the eighth floor of Lugano. “Heep was such a serious, meticulous architect with an eye for detail,” he says, citing the German’s education under Ernst May and Adolf Meyer at the Kunstschule in Frankfurt and years spent working with Le Corbusier in Paris. “Nothing escaped him. He brought ideas from Europe but adapted them to Brazil, understanding the climate, the problems,” he says with enthusiasm. “The ventilation windows above the main windows, for example. With their individual levers they’re so clever and they make for better living.”

With so much glass, however, each block offers views straight into the apartments of the opposite building. “Like Rear Window,” Farias says jokingly, in reference to the Alfred Hitchcock film. Scarpa admits that he had concerns when he first moved in. “I was worried about privacy but we respect each other, we all know each other,” he says. “I can look across and know [my neighbour] Claude is there today; that Juliana is back from holiday. Heep was interested in how the middle classes might live socially in a city as big and busy as São Paulo. If you have the privilege, this is a way to survive as a community without going crazy.”

Manoel Veiga, a painter who has lived on the second floor of Lugano for the past 18 years, says that there are more children here than when he first arrived. “I came at a moment of generational change,” he says. “My neighbours used to be much older and many had even lived here since the building was new but they were passing. I think my daughter, who is now 14, was one of the first children here.”

Veiga is proud that his apartment remains just as Heep designed it. Visitors step immediately into the living area, which stretches the entire depth of the floor plan, with a dining space to the rear. Here, Veiga and his wife, Nalu, have their morning coffee at an old bar table from Rio de Janeiro, watching the street behind the block come to life. On each shelf are what he calls his “nanocollections” – clusters of interesting objects that he’s picked up from antique markets and on his travels. There are vintage miniature spirits, little wooden boats and model airplanes, as well as magazines from 1966, the year that he was born. The kitchen runs into the old servants’ area and, like Strumpf, the artist has set up a workspace with a desk, chair and books in the former maid’s room. Across the adjoining corridor are the apartment’s three main bedrooms, though Veiga has turned one of these into a wet studio, a carpet of canvas protecting the floor from paint. Pinky-brown floorboards that run throughout are original, hence the care. “It is very hard to find peroba rosa wood anymore,” he says. “It’s very resistant, hard-wearing. Seven decades and I’ve never had any problems with termites.”

Veiga laments one detail, however. The previous owner changed the bathtub. To get a glimpse of the original, you need to visit art producer Thais Francoski’s nearby apartment, kept bright with its white walls and minimal decor. The 34-year-old has been in Locarno for three years, her first address in São Paulo after moving from Curitiba in the south of the country. She jokes that her neighbours know if she is having a party because her friends always end up dancing by the windows. Her bathroom, unchanged since Heep signed off on his project, is a vision of mid-century style: the walls are lined with aqua-blue tiles, matched by the chunky ceramic of the toilet, pear-shaped bidet and vast sunken tub.

Light flows in through the clouded glass bricks of the bathroom’s exterior wall. It also proves a party draw. “There are so many selfies by friends posted from this bathroom,” she says. The arrival of younger residents, as well as the pandemic, have loosened the community’s rules a little too. As well as sitting on benches outside to read or chat with neighbours, residents often take yoga mats or dumbbells down to the garden for exercise sessions, which was previously frowned upon. Children are not supposed to use skateboards but this has been allowed now too. Francoski bemoans that the communality only stretches so far, though. “The only complaint I have is that I can’t sunbathe in the garden in my bikini. It’s not allowed. We need sun though.” Heep, she tells Monocle, would have been on her side. After all, she opines, “this architecture is all about being healthy”.

When Farhani Hanafi-Shuy was hunting for a home with her partner in 2019, she knew that there was one public-housing development that she was willing to wait years for. Tengah in Singapore’s West Region was pitched by the city-state’s Housing & Development Board (HDB) as its first smart and sustainable town. On what was once a military training ground, 700 hectares of land would be turned into a walkable, eco-friendly neighbourhood with about 30,000 residential units. Unlike most of the older public-housing estates, Tengah would be enveloped in nature, flanked by a 5km forest corridor linking the Western Water Catchment area to the Central Catchment Nature Reserve.

The development’s proximity to lush, layered landscapes was a big draw for Hanafi-Shuy. “It’s rare to come across a neighbourhood with so much greenery these days ,” she says. “That’s why this project felt like a perfect find.” The prospect of living in the first HDB town to be developed entirely from scratch in about 20 years was also attractive to her.

The ambitious project draws from Singapore’s long history of creating public housing. In the 1960s the nation faced an acute overcrowding crisis; the state responded by selling heavily subsidised government-built homes – known as HDB flats – through a 99-year leasehold system. In 2001 it introduced the Build-to-Order (BTO) scheme, under which new high-rise estates are constructed in accordance to demand. Buyers typically wait three to four years for their flats to be ready but the units are priced below market rates. Today about 80 per cent of the population lives in HDB flats, attesting to the public-housing system’s success.

Ten years after Tengah’s announcement – and following delays related to the coronavirus pandemic – half of its homes have been completed, with a town centre, clinic and train stations still to come. Twelve months since she finally moved in, Hanafi-Shuy says that the long wait was worth it. “Unlike in my former estate, everything that I need is now only a short walk away and the paths aren’t disrupted by cars,” she says. “You’re guaranteed to see a garden along the way.”

Exploring Tengah on foot leaves a striking impression. Two “community farmways” – 40-metre-wide, 1.3km-long tapestries of pavilions, nature-themed playgrounds and fitness areas, all amid luxuriant flora – blur the line between a housing estate and a park. The playgrounds are positioned beside the fitness areas and outdoor seating to foster a sense of community and strengthen ties between different generations. These spaces show how HDB’s role has evolved: while building affordable homes remains a central goal, it now also focuses on placemaking grounded in compassionate design.

When Singapore-based multidisciplinary design firm DP Architects was tasked with shaping a 360-metre-long green spine within one farmway, it saw an opportunity to establish a focal point for the Plantation District (the first of Tengah’s five districts to be developed). “We drew inspiration from Singapore’s 1950s agricultural heritage by weaving pepper and nutmeg motifs into the estate,” says Guo Zi Ang, a senior associate director at DP Architects. At its heart is a diamond-shaped quadrangle featuring abstract pepper-leaf forms and an elevated platform that stretches outwards via sky bridges.

These walkways wind up towards pocket gardens dotted among the towers on the third storey. Though public spaces, commonly known as “void decks”, are usually found on the street level of HDB estates, DP Architects planted these leafy hideaways higher up to increase residents’ “sense of ownership” over them. “These raised ‘community living rooms’ offer more privacy, as non-residents are less likely to wander upstairs,” says Chai Yee Foo, the director of the practice.

Another unlikely social hub is a diamond-shaped courtyard on top of a multi-storey car park, nestled within four housing blocks. “We have adapted the traditional courtyard concept – commonly found in Chinese homes and prewar shophouses – for a larger urban scale, in the hope of encouraging neighbourly interaction,” says Foo. It is flanked by terraced gardens that turn rainwater run-off into cascading waterfalls after a downpour. Tengah’s green patches don’t just look pretty; they serve as natural sponges to filter storm water and reduce the risk of flooding. Given the rise of flash floods, such design decisions have become essential parts of Singapore’s urban infrastructure.

HDB has also carefully considered the home interiors. When architectural designer Linwang Zhang moved into Tengah, she immediately noticed the recessed, double-glazed windows in her residence. The development is near a military airbase so these help to dull the rumbling of overhead aircraft. “This might be the first time that I’ve seen a combination of casement and sliding windows in an HDB home,” says Zhang. “They reduce noise and keep out wind-driven rain without compromising on ventilation.”

Every home also comes with features such as a pneumatic waste-conveyance system that uses high-speed air suction to transport household waste and recyclables to a centralised facility, improving hygiene and reducing the manpower needed for rubbish collection. Meanwhile, a system of smart sockets gives residents a breakdown of their energy consumption through an app.

Tengah’s most ambitious new feature is the development’s centralised cooling system (CCS). Billed as an energy-efficient alternative to conventional air conditioning, it circulates cold water from shared rooftop chillers to individual flats.

Such cooling and heating systems have been in operation in several of Singapore’s public and commercial buildings (including at the Marina Bay Financial Centre) since 2006 but not in residences. There were initial teething issues – some of the first residents apparently experienced leaks and condensation – but the SP Group, the company overseeing the CCS, quickly made the necessary adjustments. “Everything has since stabilised,” says Yen Ching Tee, the managing director of SP Home Cooling.

Ultimately, the success of any new town is measured less by its systems than by its people. And for Hanafi-Shuy, her experience of Tengah’s community has been worlds apart from that of her previous neighbourhood. “I didn’t know my neighbours in my old area but the people here have been very welcoming,” says Hanafi-Shuy. “I started playing pickleball at an open-air court nearby and the retirees are always ready to help beginners pick up the sport.”

Zi Yang Wong, who moved into Tengah with his wife more than a year ago, feels the same way. He quickly found like-minded people through a badminton group. “If I had moved to an older estate, I don’t think that I would have found such a great community,” he says. The town’s groundbreaking design and infrastructure have fostered residents’ strong sense of place. At a time of property crises across much of the globe, Tengah is a testament to what great public housing can be.

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Dubai’s property market has never lacked ambition but it has rarely looked like this. According to the Dubai Land Department, more than 40,000 licensed brokers now operate here. However, only a small fraction of them get close to the apex of the market, where single homes sell for the price of small European hotels and commissions are earned (or lost) on instinct alone. It’s a pure commission economy. There are no salaries or safety nets. Agents arrive from everywhere: Britons fleeing tired markets; Russians following capital; Arabs returning with regional clout; Europeans armed with pitch decks. Most don’t last. Those who do learn quickly that in Dubai, property is part performance, part intelligence.

For some, success is visual. They arrive sharp, glossy and conspicuously wealthy, mirroring the aspirations of their clients. Fast cars, heavy watches and an Instagram-ready life are not indulgences here – they’re tools. As one agent puts it, “If you’re selling to billionaires, you can’t look like you don’t belong in their world.” Others operate quietly. They talk less about marble finishes and more about noise corridors, flight paths and resale risk. They build businesses around discretion and repeat buyers. In a market saturated with sellers, sound advice has become a rare commodity.

The agents who survive at the top do so because they understand something fundamental: Dubai rewards conviction but punishes bluff. What matters most here isn’t where you came from or how good you look. The market only asks whether you can close a deal.

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Ben Bandari

Company: Benco Real Estate
Years in business: 24
Biggest sale: AED500m (€115m)

Ben Bandari has seen Dubai at its most fragile and at its most inflated. He arrived in 2002, selling brochures and promises, long before the Palm Jumeirah had a shoreline worth photographing. Today he is widely considered to be the UAE’s most prolific broker, a status reinforced by his starring role in TV show Million Dollar Listing UAE and a contacts book that, he says, contains “at least 10 billionaires”.

Bandari understands visibility better than most. He is unapologetic about it. “If you’re not out there, you’re irrelevant,” he says. The cameras follow him, the Patek Philippe watch stays on his wrist and the deals often exceeding AED100m (€23m), continue to land. But longevity, he insists, matters more than glamour. “I stayed when others left,” he says of the 2008 crash. “That’s how reputations are built.”

The villa that he is selling on Billionaires’ Row on the Palm Jumeirah is valued at AED200m (€46m). It is a six-bedroom waterfront property with uninterrupted views, a rooftop area and a spacious basement; meanwhile, the artwork inside is worth the same as the house itself. Travertine marble, custom finishes and full water frontage make it one of the most expensive private homes currently on the market.

Bandari’s buyers are global and often already known to him. Sales are rarely public; they begin at private dinners or invitation-only events. “This isn’t about portals,” he says. “It’s about access.” In a market crowded with ambition, Bandari’s advantage is simple – he has been here longer than most and survived every cycle.

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Dounia Fadi

Company: EXP Realty Dubai
Years in business: 20
Biggest sale: AED38m (€8.8m)

Dounia Fadi doesn’t sell noise. In Volante Tower, one of Downtown Dubai’s most discreet addresses, she moves with the ease of someone who has watched the city build itself from the ground up. Cartier on her wrist, Van Cleef at her neck, she speaks calmly, deliberately – more adviser than agent. “Luxury is an overused word in Dubai,” she says. “What matters is quality, serenity and trust.”

Fadi is one of the few brokers who have operated across every phase of Dubai’s modern property history, from the introduction of freehold laws to today’s hyper-regulated, data-driven market. She is also the only female mentor appointed by the Dubai Land Department, a role that she describes as “necessary but difficult” in an industry still dominated by men. “You need patience and consistency,” she says. “And you must think like an investor, not a salesperson.”

The property that she is selling here reflects that philosophy. The full-floor apartment in Volante, priced at AED60m (€13.8m), offers private lift access, generous proportions and hotel-grade services. Another listing in the same building, a penthouse valued at AED190m (€44m), pushes discretion even further. Residents have chefs, spas and security. “This is for people who don’t want to be seen,” says Fadi.

Her clients are global, high-net-worth and exacting. And they are less interested in brochures than in track records. Before she recommends anything, she asks herself, “Would I buy this myself?” It is a question that has helped to keep her relevant for two decades in a market that rarely forgives complacency.

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Rami Wahood

Company: Fäm Properties
Years in business: 13
Biggest sale: AED61.5m (€14m)

Rami Wahood arrives in Al Wasl in a bright-blue Ferrari 812 Superfast, wearing loafers, a belt and a pocket square in matching shades. At 38, he looks every inch the modern Dubai broker: polished, relentless and hungry. “This is my life,” he says plainly. “I don’t have a balance.”

Born in Chicago to Syrian parents, Wahood started in Dubai at the bottom of the market, selling modest villas before climbing steadily into the eight-figure bracket. Today he is an executive partner at Fäm Properties. Exposure matters, he says, but consistency matters more. “You eat, sleep and breathe this,” he says. “That’s the job.”

The villa that he is selling in Al Wasl is priced at AED83m (€19m) and sits in one of the few freehold zones close to Downtown Dubai. With six bedrooms, Scandinavian-inspired architecture, Swedish wood cladding and views of the Burj Khalifa, it is deliberately restrained, a rarity in a city often accused of excess. “This is for people who understand taste,” says Wahood. “Minimalism is hard to do well.”

His buyers are often seasoned, internationally mobile and decisive. Wahood believes that presentation still matters. “You have to look the part,” he says. “Not for shallow reasons but because confidence is contagious.” In Dubai, ambition is not hidden. It arrives loudly and Wahood makes no apology for matching the tempo of the city.

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Matt Siddell

Company: Independent
Years in business: More than 15
Biggest sale: Transactions exceeding AED250m (€58m)

Matt Siddell doesn’t look like a Dubai broker. Shirt unbuttoned and relaxed, he greets his clients on the 41st floor of a Dubai Harbour penthouse with spreadsheets rather than spectacle. “I don’t sell real estate,” he says. “I advise.”

Formerly based in London, Siddell arrived in Dubai with a network, not a brand. He avoided large agencies and built a business around retainers and risk analysis. “If your incentive is to close before someone else does, that’s a different agenda,” he says. “My clients are long term.”

The penthouse that he is showing is priced at AED24m (€5.5m). West-facing, with expansive terraces, it is positioned for appreciation rather than drama. Siddell talks about road completions, sight-lines and noise maps before he mentions views. “You make your money when you buy,” he says. “Not when you post it on Instagram.”

His clients, often family offices and institutional investors, value restraint. Helicopters are tools, not toys. “It’s easy to get carried away in Dubai,” he says. “Staying grounded is the real skill.” In a city that celebrates performance, Siddell’s success lies in refusing to perform at all.

There was once a time when Masahiro Kurokawa had to explain to everyone what a stretching studio did. To many in Japan, it seemed rather odd that people would pay for something that was potentially painful and could be done for free at home while sitting in front of the television.

Kurokawa opened his first outpost of Dr Stretch in 2010 – a 40 sq m space with five beds in the Shinyurigaoka area of Kawasaki. Outside the world of professional sport, says Kurokawa, one-on-one stretching sessions with a trainer simply “didn’t exist in Japan”.

Today, Kurokawa’s Tokyo-based wellness company Nobitel runs a network of 240 Dr Stretch branches in Japan and 46 overseas – including in China, Singapore and the UAE. The company estimates that a million customers have had their limbs and joints tuned up by the brand’s trainers; there are currently about 70,000 active members. This spring, Dr Stretch will enter the European market with a space in Amsterdam. The brand then hopes to expand further west. “What I really want is to be in the US market,” he says.

The idea for Dr Stretch came to Kurokawa in the late 2000s when his 11 year old son, a talented footballer, was sidelined as a result of knee pain. The entrepreneur took his son to see several orthopaedic doctors and chiropractors; all simply prescribed prolonged rest. Then, by chance, Kurokawa met a professional sports trainer who told the boy to try a series of stretches. “My son’s pain went away and I immediately saw the potential for a broader audience,” says Kurokawa.

The experience became the basis for his business strategy: to demonstrate that Dr Stretch’s “core balance stretching” method could improve top athletes’ performance and offer a pared-down version to the general public. This approach allows the business to stand out in Japan’s ¥700bn (€3.8bn) fitness industry, while offering customers a new way to address physical ailments beyond popular options such as massage or acupuncture. It is the biggest name in a fast-growing sector of Japan’s fitness industry. The country has long had a wide array of treatment options for consumers’ everyday ailments: massage, osteopathic, acupuncture, chiropractic and orthopaedic rehab clinics. “Dr Stretch has increasingly established itself as an alternative to those types of services,” says Takenori Furuya, the editor in chief and publisher of Fitness Business, a Tokyo based bimonthly magazine.

Dr Stretch’s spaces are typically small and sparingly furnished, with between six to 15 beds. Trainers cater to clients from all walks of life, from J-pop musicians and primary school children to middle-aged office workers. “It can take three or four months before you see any noticeable improvements,” says Kurokawa. “With any health related business, it’s always the same: people have to feel the effect or they just won’t stick with it.”
doctorstretch.com

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We’ve all experienced the displeasure of navigating crowded aisles and wasting time trying to figure out the logic of ill-considered shop layouts – only to be forced to wait in long checkout lines. Good supermarkets can be hard to find. But they do exist: São Paulo’s Casa Santa Luzia, which celebrates its centenary this year, provides ample options and isn’t overlit. You’ll find it in the city’s chic Jardins district, where high-end shops and exclusive restaurants dot the elegant, treelined streets.

Locals pop in to buy a good bottle of wine, get their cold cuts sliced just right or pick up a rotisserie dinner. Stocked with more than 30,000 products including organic foods, Casa Santa Luzia is also beautifully designed. Colourful stained-glass windows add a playful touch of light above shoppers’ heads, while the modernist-style exterior offers an antidote to most supermarkets’ grey tones. Best of all, there’s a much-loved café on the second floor.

Over the years, Casa Santa Luzia’s family-led management team has repeatedly ruled out expansion, ensuring that its expertise isn’t stretched thin. Its third-generation director, Ana Maria Lopes, argues that this is the supermarket’s strength. “Our family is proud to manage what we now consider to be a true asset to São Paulo,” she says. “We’re committed to maintaining our position as a benchmark for the retail of food products.”

It’s no wonder that the shop has become indispensable to local residents. The menu, which features more than 1,000 homemade dishes, offers options for both lunch and dinner, such as beef stroganoff, Brazilian shrimp stew or a light selection of quiches. Doesn’t every city deserve to have its own Casa Santa Luzia?
santaluzia.com.br

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There was a time when Nokia was synonymous with mobile phones that could withstand just about anything. In its heyday, the company ranked above the likes of McDonald’s and Google as the world’s fifth-most valuable brand and it controlled more than 40 per cent of the global mobile-phone market. Then came smartphones. The qualities that had made Nokia so successful – sturdiness, dependability – were no longer seen as key selling points. In 2013 the company hung up its mobile-phone arm, selling it to Microsoft. Many assumed that the brand would simply disappear, swept aside by flashier, shinier alternatives.

But a look around the city of Oulu in northern Finland tells another story. The business is making a comeback. Last September, Nokia opened a 55,000 sq m campus in Oulu. The goal? To cement Nokia’s pivot to communication networks, researching, developing and manufacturing wireless 5G and 6G networks.

When Monocle visits, the factory floor hums with activity as autonomous robots shuttle components along the assembly line. Production specialists and engineers are working at full capacity, driven by demand from the artificial intelligence boom. “This is where we prepare for the next decade,” says Jarkko Pyykkönen, Nokia Oulu’s head. “The AI supercycle will be powered by 6G, connecting not just people but billions of intelligent machines.”

Most of Nokia’s main competitors are now Chinese. Its factory also c0-operates with the nearby Nato test centre on developing defence-grade 6G communications technology. The partnership underscores a strategic reality: the stability of Europe’s digital backbone increasingly depends on trusted network suppliers. Given Nokia’s expertise in secure radio technology – from tactical 5G “bubbles” for battlefield use to encrypted industrial networks – the company is at the heart of those conversations.

Results from 2025 were positive, with overall sales revenue at €19.9bn and year-on-year growth at 3 per cent. US chipmaker Nvidia, the world’s most valuable company, agreed a $1bn (€850m) equity investment in the Finnish firm late last year. Expectations for 2026 are high as Nokia holds thousands of 5G patents and is involved in shaping the protocols that will define future 6G networks.

Though Nokia’s days as a globally renowned phone brand are over, its next chapter could prove even more essential to the world by keeping connections secure and stable. It is, once again, a company to watch.

Groupe d’études géopolitiques (GEG) is one of those French phrases that don’t translate well into English. The Parisian think tank, founded in 2017 by three students from École normale supérieure (ENS), the grandest of France’s grand école universities, is much more than the “geopolitical studies group” of its name. In fact, it might just be the world’s coolest think tank – admittedly not the most crowded of fields.

To be fair, GEG’s name is an accurate description of the think tank’s birth. Its three founders – Manuel Gressani, Mathéo Malik and Pierre Ramond – who were at various stages of their degrees at ENS, began to organise debates devoted to geopolitics at the university. In 2019, Ramona Bloj joined the gang, who launched a complementary journal, Le Grand Continent, devoted to European politics. At a time when right-wing think tanks seem to be in the ascendant, what distinguishes GEG is its avowedly internationalist, pro-European and pro-EU outlook.

As French politics veers ever rightwards and the European project seems in decline, think tanks such as GEG could offer hope for intellectual renewal. It publishes three semi-annual journals, each in its own natty colourway: a red one devoted to law, green to the environment and blue to European elections. Contributors have included Emmanuel Macron, Kaja Kallas and Josep Borrell. This year, GEG launched a series of books, La Bibliothèque de géopolitique, with Gallimard, a publishing house almost synonymous with Gallic intellectual chic.
geopolitique.eu

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What are the chances of Montenegro becoming the first new EU member state since 2013? With an official population of about 630,000, it wouldn’t be Europe’s tiniest – though it would be smaller than every other nation except Malta. Nonetheless, senior EU figures are keen to complete accession talks by the end of this year. “If we finish in 2026 with the technical part of the negotiations, then in 2028 we could get the 28th member of the EU,” the European commissioner for enlargement, Marta Kos, told the Bled Strategic Forum last September.

This is in keeping with prime minister Milojko Spajic’s vision of his country as one “that makes the EU richer”. The usual concern of existing EU member states is that expansion to the less economically developed nations east of the continent might affect the fortunes of those already in the bloc. But in this analysis, Montenegro’s size works in its favour. What the EU would be gaining, after all, is a rare example of an ethnically diverse country that boasts harmonious internal relations. The largest part of the population identifies as Montenegrin – but they are collectively outnumbered by a combination of Serbs, Bosniaks and other ethnic groups. Before Spajic and his centrist Europe Now! party took power in 2023, the prime minister was Dritan Abazovic, an ethnic Albanian.

The economy, meanwhile, grew by more than 3 per cent over the past two years, while the country’s main port, Bar, is also vital for Montenegro’s landlocked neighbours, particularly Serbia – and the railway line to Belgrade is one of the world’s most spectacular. The vertiginous Mala Rijeka viaduct across the Moraca river canyon is Europe’s highest railway bridge, showcasing the austere charms of the mountainous landscape.

Natural beauty is the country’s greatest asset, with the peaks continuing all the way to the coast, where the Adriatic glitters and tourism is big business – accounting for more than a quarter of total GDP. Locals like to boast that they can ski in the morning and take a dip in the sea after lunch. Alternatively, you can enjoy the catch of the day at the Adriatic’s longest beach, the appropriately named Velika Plaza (“long beach”).

Financial opportunities abound – especially with the government set to introduce visa restrictions for Russians, who have previously been the country’s largest investors. As they sell up, buyers from Turkey, the US and the UAE are moving in.

Beyond property and tourism, low taxes, a well-educated workforce and potential for sustainable energy are considerable attractions. And after work, it’s time to tango. The mountain town of Kolasin switches from skiing to Latin dance in the summer, with its long-running tango camp. For those with two left feet, a thriving contemporary art scene – boosted considerably by Russian exiles – offers a different kind of culture. Or there’s viniculture: vranac is Montenegro’s indigenous grape and, when produced by Plantaze at Europe’s largest single vineyard, Cemovsko Polje, makes for a bold glass of red. When Montenegro’s EU membership is confirmed, expect it to flow freely.

If the defining contest of the 21st century is to be that between the US and China, then we would do well to learn the names of those who will be calling the shots. Since 2024, Admiral Samuel J Paparo has been the head of US Indo-Pacific Command – about 380,000 US personnel stationed in 38 countries. He is the most senior US officer charged with overseeing any future clash with China.

These are challenging times to be wearing four stars in the American military. Since Donald Trump returned to presidential office last January, the commander-in-chief has ordered US forces to take action in Nigeria, Venezuela, Iran, Yemen, Syria, Iraq and Somalia – and has been making vague threats towards Colombia, Cuba, Denmark, Mexico and Panama.

Given these whiplash-inducing scenarios, Paparo occupies one of the most important of all posts. As a shrewd officer, he understands that any US-China conflict won’t only be a physical war. At the Honolulu Defense Forum in January, Paparo noted that information and cyber operations have become “a salient form of warfare”. He believes that militaries have to accept the idea that information operations must be integral to everything they do, rather than a simple afterthought.

Paparo ascended through the army ranks, which helps in his efforts to convince the old guard about new methods. He was a naval aviator, graduating from the US Navy’s strike fighter tactics instructor programme. He has flown F-14s, F-15s and F/A-18s, and made 1,100 carrier landings. He has also undertaken less lofty missions, including leading a provincial reconstruction team in Afghanistan.

More recently, he has served as commander of the US Fifth Fleet, which generally conducts the US Navy’s operations in the Middle East, and of the US Pacific Fleet. Admiral Paparo wouldn’t be the one deciding whether the US rode to the defence of Taiwan or engaged in combat with China for any other reason. But he would get a big say in how any war that followed was fought.