The Monocle Minute

Travelling the Balkans by road can be terrifying. The highways through the mountains of southern Bosnia and Herzegovina, Montenegro and Albania are full of sheer drops, sharp bends and motorists driving at hair-raising speed. After all that, you might find yourself in need of a stiff drink. Thankfully, the mountainous area has a long winemaking heritage and is emerging as a modern viticulture hub.

Balkan wine has come a long way since the dissolution of Yugoslavia in 1990, with producers now focusing on quality over quantity. On a recent 10-day roadtrip from Sarajevo to Tirana, I tasted many well-priced and well-made wines. In the Bosnian capital I drank a Serbian sauvignon blanc produced at Belo Brdo, a winery set up in 2007 by Aleksandar Zeremski, which is now producing prize-winning vintages.

In Mostar, the heart of Bosnia and Herzegovina’s southern wine-growing region, I sampled a bottle of zilavka from Vinogradi Nuic. It was soft and buttery, and paired perfectly with fresh trout from the Neretva river. At Stari Mlini, a famed restaurant housed in a historic Kotor flour mill, I drank a Montenegrin krstac with our dinner of grilled red snapper. I chased it all down with fiery shots of homemade cherry liqueur and slivovitz, a plum brandy.

Despite its fine viticultural scene, the area accounts for about two per cent of global wine production. But with more than 1,000 indigenous grape varieties on the Balkan peninsula, the winemaking region could hold its own in Europe. Combine that with inspiring landscapes and reliably excellent cuisine, and the potential is considerable.

Yet roadblocks remain. There are few high-quality hotels outside Balkan cities, while even fewer vineyards have a place to spend the night. Though some wineries are open to the public in Bosnia and Herzegovina, most are industrial operations rather than luxurious pit stops. The sector is most developed in Montenegro and North Macedonia but visitors still mainly need to seek out vineyards for themselves. Where are the organised tours and the thorough, well-designed guidebooks? With growing numbers of tourists discovering Balkan wine, gregarious and generous residents need to lean in to the opportunity – just as they do on hairpin bends.

Lucinda Smith is Monocle’s Istanbul correspondent. For more opinion, analysis and insight, subscribe to Monocle today.

Calculating the value of an event to the economy is a popular focus of research in Japan (writes Fiona Wilson). And that’s especially the case now as the threat of the US’s “Liberation Day tariffs” looms over the country’s auto industry. More positively, however, a professor at Kansai University has been examining whether there will be an economic boost to the country as a result this year’s hanami – or cherry-blossom viewing – season.

The ritual peaks in Tokyo this week and is expected to contribute ¥1.39trn (€8.6bn) to the Japanese economy. That would be a 22.2 per cent increase on last year’s figure. More tourists are visiting Japan than in previous years and more than a quarter of those enjoying the delicate pink flowers this year will be overseas visitors.

But a boom for hanami also spells trouble: kafunsho (pollen allergy) season, which this year is set to be worse than ever. With nearly half the population struggling with itchy eyes and streaming noses, the cost of lost productivity is estimated to be about ¥232bn (€1.4bn) a day. On the flipside, however, sufferers spend more than ¥40bn (€247m) on over-the-counter medications – and that’s before you even start to think about the goggles and masks that proliferate at this time of year. Those who find it uncouth to measure the economic value of something as ephemeral as cherry blossom should spare a thought for any allergy-ridden mathematicians who are trying to work it all out.

While dashing between booths and meetings at Watches and Wonders, Monocle’s contributing fashion editor Marcela Palek selected a number of elegant timepieces that caught her eye. Here is her timely round-up of both the bold and understated releases for the new season.

J12 Bleu by Chanel
Frédéric Grangié, president of Chanel watches and fine jewellery, compares the 25th anniversary model of the iconic J12 watch model to a Porsche 911. It took five years to develop the exclusive deep-blue matte colourway used on the ceramic, which is stronger than steel but also lighter.

Royal Oak in Bleu Nuit, Nuage 50 by Audemars Piguet
The night sky over the Vallée de Joux inspired Audemars Piguet’s first Royal Oak model in 1972. That same intense, celestial blue colourway has been deployed again in three new versions. The ceramic Royal Oak Double Balance Wheel Openworked attracts the eye with its visible movement. While its siblings, the two Royal Oak Offshore Selfwinding Chronographs, come with ceramic elements and a sportier finish.

LUC Quattro by Chopard
Chopard’s new LUC edition has a remarkable power reserve of nine days. “It’s a technical masterpiece,” says the company’s co-president, Karl-Friedrich Scheufele. The watch also has an elegant, slimmer casing in rose gold, a sleek dial and a diameter of 39mm – making this a versatile fit.

Constant Force Tourbillon 11 by Arnold & Son
This extraordinary tourbillon watch with a 100-hour power reserve is inspired by the collaboration between watchmakers John Arnold and Abraham-Louis Breguet. While their original tourbillon still ticks in the British Museum, this new yellow-gold model, with a constant force mechanism and enamel dial, is available in a limited edition of 11.

Arceau Rocabar de Rire by Hermès
In a nod to Hermès’s origins in saddlery, this watch’s face revives the horse that Dimitri Rybaltchenko designed for the brand’s iconic Rocabar de Rire silk scarf. The timepiece is crafted with horsehair inlays and engravings, and is set in a 41mm white-gold case.

Technology-based sniffer systems are no match for hounds on high alert (writes Tom Vanderbilt). That’s why the US spends about €30,000 per pooch to teach dogs new tricks. Deep inside the sprawling Lackland Air Force base in San Antonio, Texas, is the headquarters of the Transportation Security Agency’s Canine Training Centre (CTC), where Monocle rolls up on a foggy day to see a man about a dog.

CTC mutts are looking for just one thing: explosives. “We are the world’s largest canine explosive-detection programme,” says Zebulon Polasek, director of the CTC, while standing in the facility’s lobby on a rug emblazoned with the US flag and a pack of dogs. According to him, the animals that eventually make it into an airport are akin to professional athletes: they are scouted and groomed to perform at a high level for a relatively short career. But there’s a key difference. “There’s no off-season,” he says. “And they’re constantly in the play-offs.”

To read the full feature on the CTC, pick up a copy of Monocle’s April issue today. Or better yet, subscribe so that you never miss out.

Online news outlet The Kyiv Independent launched three months before Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine. Now it is publishing its first print magazine, The Power Within, offering a snapshot of the country three years into the war. Business editor Liliane Bivings tells us more.

Was having a print title always the plan?
It felt like a pipe dream until we brought our photo editor, Irynka Hromotska, on board. Her creative eye really brought the idea to life. The team wanted to create something tangible for our audience to have on their coffee table or bookshelf.

How will it differ from your online coverage?
It features articles that were commissioned specifically for the magazine. We can’t avoid the war but we wanted to show the resilience of the Ukrainian people. Flower producers, for example, are still farming roses and getting them to florists in Kyiv. The magazine is full of long-form content and is led by visuals.

Tell us about the design of the magazine. The debut cover is beautiful.
We knew that it needed to be aesthetically pleasing and attractive to those outside Kyiv. If someone comes across the magazine in a western European city or in the US or Canada, they will see a top-quality product from Ukraine. That might change stereotypes. People have deep-seated opinions about this part of the world. Hopefully, the first issue will help to dispel some of those preconceptions.

You can listen to the full interview with Liliane Bivings on ‘The Stack’ and you can pre-order ‘The Power Within’ here.

We explore experimental ways of living, thanks to a new exhibition in Tokyo and we imagine sunnier futures at the Solar Biennale in Switzerland. Finally, a cooling dip in the pool as we visit Splash! A Century of Swimming and Style at London’s Design Museum.