Issues

Culture

Q&A

Jannis Stürtz
Co-founder, Habibi Funk

Jannis Stürtz is a co-founder of Habibi Funk, a Berlin-based label specialising in reissues of music from the Middle East and North Africa, from Libyan reggae to Sudanese jazz. Stürtz tells Monocle more.

How did Habibi Funk start as a record label?
I was visiting Casablanca and bought an album by a singer called Fadoul that piqued my interest. We tried to find and sign him but learned that he had died in the 1990s. We found his family and reissued his work, splitting the profits with the artist’s estate. We’ve since built our catalogue. There’s a trove of work from overlooked artists from North Africa, West Asia and elsewhere.

Tell us about the genres that Habibi Funk covers.
What we focus on is not a representation of popular music in, say, Libya. We’re interested in these who took influences from outside their countries and mixed them with something that already existed. Ibrahim Hesnawi, the father of Libyan reggae, is a good example: he was the first to popularise the genre in the country.

How do people listen?
I love physical records but if you release non-mainstream music, you don’t have the luxury to oppose streaming platforms. Our main playlist on Spotify has 100,000 followers – and it is vital. We invest our time into streaming, direct sales via Bandcamp and advertising. If you wish to pay your team and artists fairly, you need all these revenues.

To hear the full interview with Jannis Stürtz, listen back to The Monocle Weekly from 27 October 2023, on Monocle Radio.

Making magic

Hole & Corner magazine is marking 10 years of covering the world of craft with a handsome book called simply Make Well! The British publication was founded by creative director Sam Walton after he moved from London to Dorset and began to shrug off his fashion-focused career in favour of putting a spotlight on the producers and makers that populated his new life. “The worlds of fashion and art had their platforms and were good at promoting themselves but not artisans,” he says of his inspiration to start Hole & Corner (a now-faded phrase that implies a spot away from the public gaze).

The magazine, and now the book, bring together a diverse set of makers, rural and urban, young and old, all given a unity by Walton’s art direction and the photography that never over-romanticises – hands are calloused, beards bushy, studios cluttered. “We have been documenting makers and want to bring the texture and reality out with a beautiful level of photography. But we also said to people, ‘Please don’t tidy up before we come.’”

Walton has made it through the decade – he makes clear that this has not always been easy – with a close group of collaborators, who like the folk that they feature, believe in craft, creativity and dedication to the cause. But what has changed over that period? “Ten years ago it was hard to even use the word ‘craft’ because people associated with crafting, hobbyists,” says Walton. “But now it has much greater respect.” Here’s to all the makers.
holeandcorner.com

Notable endeavours

Roland Allen has always scribbled in notebooks but his interest in paper was really piqued after finding his grandfather’s diaries. “He had died many years earlier and I didn’t know him really,” says Allen, author of The Notebook: A History of Thinking on Paper. “Learning about his life before the war made me curious about what it would be like to keep my own diary.” What started at the age of 28 has since become an obsession that has led Allen to research the ways in which human thought, education and ideas have been bound up with our use of notebooks.

The story that Allen tells dances from the pages of the earliest Arabic texts and the oldest surviving European scribbles from the 13th century, to friendship albums in the Netherlands in the 16th century and onto recipes, cures and bookkeeping. Technology might have changed things but there’s research to back up the idea that making notes on paper is sometimes more effective than doing so on a laptop or phone. “It’s clear that you remember things more if you write them down on paper,” says Allen. “You process them better if you’re analysing them in some way.” Allen thinks that more sophisticated information that might need mulling over could benefit from being committed to paper. “If you’re doing anything creative with ideas, numbers or words, it’s really important.” 

The Notebook: A History of Thinking on Paper is published by Profile Books and is out now. To hear the full interview listen to ‘The Stack’ on Monocle Radio.

Out and about

Jump on a train. Take the plane. Get in the car and just drive. Journalism requires lots of skills and sensitivities but one of the most basic requirements is a powerful desire to know what’s happening around the corner, in the next town, just over the horizon. Yet, too often, modern journalism is seen as little more than the creation of “content”, the generation of bland gunk that can be used to fill up websites and social-media feeds – and all generated while sitting at a desk, just rewriting and paraphrasing what is already known and out there. But this isn’t a new problem.

When monocle started out, we knew that a key tenet would be that we would never become a place where agency copy was presented as original reporting and that we would hesitate before running a story that had appeared in any other publication. Surely it was our job to go out, witness, interview and interpret what we saw? And we also knew that we would always welcome the tangents, those moments of serendipity that can see a report head off on an unexpected path, deliver surprises and intrigue, when you hit the road.

So it’s reassuring to see two stories that top and tail this issue taking this spirit to heart. For our Affairs pages, Mary Fitzgerald headed to Senegal to unpack a story that is reshaping diplomacy, defence ties and trade in Francophone Africa. Following a series of coups, France is finding that it is no longer welcome in several nations across the Sahel whose leaders would rather be cosy with China and Russia. Senegal, for now, remains a friend of France but not an uncritical one. And it’s in the conversations that Fitzgerald has with critical politicians, artists and business leaders that you understand some of the frustrations with Emmanuel Macron’s Africa strategy. Yet the human ties, the cultural exchanges, are strong (and it’s hard to imagine Moscow or Beijing replacing Paris as the place where young Senegalese want to study, perform or start businesses).

The “tail” comes in our Expo, where our design editor, Nic Monisse, and photographer Conny Mirbach got in a car and weaved their way across Czechia. They visited the finest outposts of the nation’s rich and varied craft and architectural heritage, from bicycle factories to communist housing blocks, glass factories to bag makers. While the duo had researched the route carefully in advance, the wonders that they discovered and sheer number of creative people they met left me feeling that they could have brought back an inspiring story if they had just hit the road and allowed luck to guide them. Monisse had his work cut out this month – he might even have sailed past a few supposedly final deadlines – as this issue is home to our autumn design special. So one day he was in the studio as we shot our “furniture top 20”; the next heading to Genoa to meet one of architecture’s greats, Renzo Piano (this issue also contains interviews with Shigeru Ban and Jeanne Gang). We’ll forgive him the occasional tardiness.

We are sending this issue to the printers as London slowly nudges into autumn. From here until Christmas, it feels like something of an editorial toboggan run. Perhaps we should put on our Moncler jackets – you can discover the secrets of that brand’s success in our fashion editor Natalie Theodosi’s interview with owner Remo Ruffini.

Over the coming weeks we’ll be also dispatching three specials: The Entrepreneurs, The Forecast and The Escapist. Yes, our travel magazine is finally making its much-requested return. And, of course, the simplest way to ensure that none of these, or anything else, sneaks past you is to subscribe – all you need to do is head over to monocle.com/subscribe and we will have you aboard in no time.

And meanwhile, if you decide that you want to drop me a note or forward a suggestion (hopefully a pleasant one), you can find me, as always, at at@monocle.com. Have a great month.

Back to nature

Camptown, nestled in the Catskill Mountains north of New York, marks a striking departure from the creepy Deliverance days of the region. This new 50-room hotel flips the narrative of the cabins in the woods and injects a design-forward, service-centric, 1970s pool-party feel – complete with waterbed cabanas (even if the weather won’t always oblige).

The Catskill Mountains’ brand story revolves around Washington Irving’s tale of Rip van Winkle, an idle farmer who wanders into the woods to escape his wife’s nagging. He meets some dwarfs, drinks a magic potion and falls asleep for 20 years. When he wakes up, he has missed a war and his sleepy village is transformed into a vibrant town.

Arriving at Camptown is similarly transportive. The hotel, formerly the Rip Van Winkle Motor Lodge, was owned and run by the Carl family since the 1930s. New owners Ray Pirkle and Kim Bucci of Ramshackle Studio have reimagined the existing historical structures. A hillside gazebo with a beautiful cedar roof is now Bar Piscina. The dark dive bar has evolved into an intimate gathering spot. The lobby retains dark wood ceiling beams and a massive stone fireplace but is contrasted with white walls, Scandinavian furniture, custom mirrors and chairs with weaving by Catskill fibre artist Becca Van K. What’s particularly lovely is that this iteration of Camptown – a 24-room lodge with a further 26 authentic log cabins spread out across nine hilly hectares – preserves its original charm.

Pirkle and Bucci approached Camptown thoughtfully, opening it in stages to ensure top-notch service. The rooms in the main lodge, updated with Shaker-style built-in bunks and furniture, opened in early 2023. Casa Susanna, Camptown’s modern Mexican (Jaliscan) restaurant also debuted then, causing a stir with its inventive menu and exceptional margaritas.

The log cabins presented unique design challenges. “We knew going into the Camptown renovation that we would have to winter-proof the cabins,” says Pirkle. “And every cabin was sitting on bedrock. We had to dynamite it to put in the plumbing underground.”

Reading nooks and wood-burning stoves now appear in irregular corners, lighting cords were sourced from Quittner and out-of-stock tiles and matching sinks and toilets were hunted for. Pirkle insisted on handmade Penobscot daybeds from Maine for the front porches and on a handcrafted banquette from local artist Brett Miller of Jack Rabbit Studios who, he says, “should be an international superstar”. “His work is so special and we could only afford one piece but I had to have it,” he adds.

The Camptown pool opened in late August featuring Sundrella umbrellas (reportedly the only standing aluminium umbrella manufacturer in the US) and custom-made waterbeds. “Where else would this generation get to experience a waterbed?” asks Pirkle. The invite to a party at the Piscina reads: “Better late than never.” And, whether it means the pool or the arrival of a hotel that the area deserves, there’s certainly some truth in the sentiment.
camptowncatskills.com

On the go

Bathys headphones
Focal

These headphones from Focal have just had an update. First, there is a new colour: a sandy shade to go with the previous silver and black versions. Then there’s the software improvement: you can now tune the headphones to your particular hearing by using the Mimi hearing test, which creates a listening profile that can boost the sounds and frequencies your ears might not usually hear. Mimi analyses how you respond to background noise to help with this too. Mind you, the noise-cancelling is excellent already.
focal.com

iPhone 15 Pro Max
Apple

Once a year, Apple releases its new smartphones. The latest represents a subtle but significant change. First, the new Pro model has a titanium chassis that clocks in 19g lighter than last year’s model with stainless steel. Second, it includes a new telephoto camera with 5x zoom (the smaller iPhone 15 Pro has a 3x zoom). It also encourages advanced photography by adding extra virtual lenses. By cleverly manipulating images with the main lens, it can provide extra focal lengths to create a more versatile camera experience. You can choose from 13, 1.23 or 1.53 zooms and, if you have a favourite, you can set that as the default option. Whatever the science, it takes rich, faithful and beautiful photographs. Elsewhere, the side switch that turns the phone ringer on and off has been replaced by a button that you can configure to, say, launch the camera or turn on the torch.
apple.com

633 Magnetic battery
Anker

However good batteries are on the newest gadgets (and they’re far from perfect), it’s always wise to find a secondary source. The latest magnetic battery from Anker is chunkier than previous models because it packs a lot more punch. There’s enough juice for more than one full charge of an iPhone 15 Pro, for example. It also has a neat kickstand that folds out, handy for positioning the iPhone for Facetime calls. For a faster effect, you can even attach a cable and charge it from that rather than wirelessly.
anker.com

Fall guy

Renaissance man

Remo Ruffini is dressed head to toe in navy: navy jacket, navy T-shirt, navy trousers. The only item that differs from this monochrome look is a small vape that he discreetly draws on, standing it on the table in front of him in between puffs. Reserved and softly spoken, the chairman and CEO of Milan-based Moncler – the high-end fashion brand renowned for its puffer jackets and ski wear that made more than €600m in net profits last year – is explaining the secret of staying relevant. “The game today is to attract different communities,” he says. “The luxury community is one but there are a lot of interesting micro-communities around the world. And our job is to really attract them.”

Few would question Ruffini’s ability to attract new tribes since he took over in 2003. When he bought Moncler, founded near Grenoble in the French Alps 71 years ago, it was struggling. “In the 1970s and 1980s it was a huge brand for people living in northern Italy and going skiing every weekend,” he says. “Then in the 1990s it didn’t have a good moment.” Ruffini put the decline down to losing touch with customers. Previously reliant on wholesale and distributors such as Decathlon, Ruffini set about a radical restructuring in a belief that the brand was “very solid”. Shops were opened as part of a direct-to-consumer model, archive pieces were revived and the brand pivoted to high fashion through runway shows and collaborations with Thom Browne and Giambattista Valli. But that was then. Once Moncler had completed the methodical work of reorienting the brand, including successfully going public in 2013, it was time to try something new. “After 10 years I was bored and decided to move the strategy to this Genius approach,” says Ruffini. He’s talking about the decision to end the Gamme Bleu and Gamme Rouge collaborations with Browne and Valli and switch to Genius, a daring venture established in 2018 that joined Moncler’s core collection and ski-centric Grenoble line.

Genius is based on a fluid collaboration model that might see Moncler team up with artists, designers or musicians on collections released eight or nine times a year – potentially appealing to different “micro-communities” each time. To date, everyone from Pharrell Williams to Alicia Keys (a collection inspired by New York), via designers Simon Rocha and Noir Kei Ninomiya, have been involved.

Genius is a savvy move that appeals to the much-coveted Gen Z consumer bracket. It shifts the brand towards a younger, hipper demographic by creating the sort of social media buzz that leads to queues outside bricks-and-mortar shops. Ruffini says that Genius is “more of a street approach”, though he won’t go as far as calling it streetwear. And while he says that it was a turning point for Moncler in terms of communication, he argues that it goes beyond this. “It’s also a way to learn a different approach from different designers.”

Located in a red-brick former industrial building in southwestern Milan, Moncler’s HQ is a temple to the brand. There’s a suited security guard on the door and stepping inside feels like entering a minimalist five-star hotel, with dark marble dominating the reception area. In a high-ceiling atrium filled with exotic plants, breakfast is being served. Staff chat over espressos dressed in T-shirts bearing the brand’s tell-tale tricolour stripes. Others are decked out in Stone Island, the brand Ruffini acquired in 2020 for an eye-watering €1.15bn. Moncler’s “M” logo is stamped everywhere, from the glassware to the floor.

For many industry watchers, the reason that Moncler continues to surpass expectations (Moncler Group sales were up by 24 per cent for the first half of this year) is down to Ruffini’s management. “He pays very close attention to where the consumer is moving and how consumer behaviour is changing,” says Lauren Sherman, a Los Angeles-based fashion correspondent at news website Puck. “He prides himself on that and takes it very seriously. I would say that he is a scholar of consumer behaviour.” Indeed, during his Monocle interview, Ruffini launches into a detailed analysis of global macroeconomic conditions and their effect on luxury, from the real- estate crisis in China to post-pandemic slackening in the US. “The world is not easy but in general, the economy of the luxury world is quite healthy – especially for a good company,” he says.

Ruffini is also an avid people watcher. According to his communications team, when he travels somewhere new he likes to observe people’s habits by heading down into the metro. It helps him get a sense of where trends are going and be able to “move around the world with the right taste”, as he calls it. What he means is that Moncler needs to be agile enough to react to shifting consumer conditions and tastes, and he often likes to say in interviews (including this one) that Moncler thinks like a start-up. According to Ruffini, “streetwear is almost dead” and there is a move under way to higher sophistication, with cashmere proving popular. “He has a great sense of what the market wants,” says Luca Solca, Geneva-based managing director for luxury goods at financial services firm Sanford C Bernstein.

Soon Ruffini will embark on a multi-city tour of the US, another example of his hands-on approach. He plans to check out cities such as Austin and Cleveland to see if there is the right luxury market to justify a shop opening. When it comes to its retail strategy, Moncler has been planning to open about 40 new boutiques between last year and next year, with a particular focus on the US, where wholesale previously dominated, and Asia. But perhaps more interesting is that during the same timeframe, Moncler plans to move, refurbish or expand about 60 shops. The brand has, for example, already relocated its Shanghai outpost from the lower-ground floor of Plaza 66 to the more prestigious ground floor. “Relocation is super important in order to give more space to the customers, to the services,” says Ruffini. It’s not just about footfall on the street outside but the way the brand is able to communicate with buyers inside, especially for a company that has injected what Solca calls “huge doses of creativity” into its offering. Moncler is renowned for its visuals – from shop interiors and window dressing to its highly sensory fashion events – so having the best possible retail space makes sense.

Moncler might have evolved over the past few years but Ruffini isn’t in a rush to turbocharge it. The chairman and CEO constantly talks about “the heritage and DNA” of the brand and he won’t consider anything that falls outside that remit. “One thing he has done really well is keep the hero product evolving,” says Puck’s Lauren Sherman of the brand’s down jackets. “Some brands go too far to grab new customers.” This means that Moncler isn’t about to abandon its Alpine heritage anytime soon, even if lighter pieces have been slowly introduced to its core collections to capture more of a year-round market.

Taking things slowly seems to be the order of the day. For one, there’s the mammoth task of sprinkling a bit of the Moncler stardust onto its new acquisition, Stone Island, including weaning it off its wholesale addiction. Ruffini is quick to dispel any suggestions of further expansions. “No, no, Stone Island is more than enough,” he says and adds that there is no current interest in selling up either, despite the constant stream of interest, including reportedly from French luxury behemoth Kering. “Our journey is not over,” he says. “But for sure we are on the right path.”

Silver Surfing

The archive of Danish company Georg Jensen – a maker of fine jewellery, watches, silver and steel homeware that has long been a purveyor to the Danish royal family – is in an undisclosed location inside its Copenhagen headquarters. To enter, written permission must be obtained and journalists have to agree that no windows are pictured in photographs of the space so as not to show neighbouring streets and inadvertently reveal its location.

The archive is currently in the company’s possession but an agreement involving the Danish government’s committee on cultural values in 2000, when the company passed hands from Carlsberg to Royal Scandinavia, specifies that any future owner needs to respect that it is an essential part of Denmark’s cultural history and must be kept on its territory. If Georg Jensen were unwilling or unable to run the archive, the Design Museum would have to approve what would happen to the more than 5,000 objects, 20,000 sketches, press clippings and miscellaneous memorabilia collected since the company was founded in 1904 by its namesake master silversmith.

The agreement ensures that the archive will stay rooted in Denmark, despite investment from abroad. The move shows some forward-thinking from the Danish design community, which, more than 23 years ago, foresaw the global appeal of Georg Jensen. The brand was bought by Finland’s Fiskars Group this September, having been owned by Bahrain-based private equity company Investcorp since 2012. And, since 2003, part of its production moved to Chiang Mai in northern Thailand (though all of its silver hollow-ware is still made in Denmark).

Despite these tight bureaucratic controls, the atmosphere when Monocle gains access to the archive is surprisingly laid-back.

Teapots, jugs, plates, cutlery, hollowware and more niche objects such as chauffeurs’ hats, baby rattles and cantaloupe knives are piled on shelves or displayed on tables and counters. A tan-leather Egg chair by Arne Jacobsen from 1958 sits in the corner near a small library, flowers decorate a central table and pictures on the walls imbue the space with the warmth and hygge of a Danish living room.

Georg Jensen’s friendly heritage and archive manager, Ida Heiberg Bøttiger, shows Monocle various silver pieces stored on shelves and in olive-green safes, explaining how every object links across time and aesthetic movements. “Working here, you can’t help falling in love with the history and the stories of the products,” says Heiberg Bøttiger, who assumed her current role in 2011, taking over from two retiring archivists who left her a manual of instructions, a paper model of the archive and a Post-it note with a phone number should she have any questions. “Passing that on is the best part of the job.”

In civic-minded Denmark, the decision to keep a design archive off limits to the public might seem out of step with the national character, especially when heritage firms such as Fritz Hansen are upping the ante by opening their own museums. But pieces from Georg Jensen are regularly found in public institutions in Denmark and beyond (latest example: the loan of jewellery designed by Nanna Ditzel in the 1950s for an exhibition at the Trapholt museum in Jutland). “This isn’t a public place,” says Heiberg Bøttiger. “For now we collaborate with museums and institutions such as the kea Copenhagen School of Design and Technology. I also spend a lot of time answering questions from customers who want to know more about the history of their Georg Jensen objects. That’s how we try to make our archive useful to the public.”

The true use of the archive, however, comes to the fore when new Georg Jensen pieces are being developed. On such occasions, the silverware and jewellery are handled and used as references. The company’s team of internal product designers also use its objects as inspiration when creating new tableware or expanding existing ranges. If a particular piece from the archive is being reissued, it is Heiberg Bøttiger’s job to pull out as much information as possible to help Georg Jensen’s silversmiths to craft it anew.

This year, a large tureen is being painstakingly recreated by silversmiths who have spent months hammering out the bowl and the intricate decorative details. And while the archive is expansive, it is not yet comprehensive; should a designer or silversmith need to refer to a design that’s not physically in the collection, an array of sketches, images, film negatives and composition notes can be used to help fill in the gaps. Finding them, however, can be a challenge: up until Heiberg Bøttiger took over the archive, every record was kept in an analogue format. “Everything up here used to be registered by pencil on paper,” she says incredulously. Over the past decade, she has been making strides towards digitising the inventory.

When designers are invited to collaborate with Georg Jensen, they start by visiting its smithy in Frederiksberg, just west of Copenhagen’s city centre. They are then invited to the archive to get a sense of the craft and history of the company. Despite being responsible for a collection of rarities and priceless objects, Heiberg Bøttiger is not one for being overly precious, allowing her visitors to touch and feel the silver without gloves, even if it leads to tarnishing. “Designers need to see with their fingers,” she says. “Some archivists swear that you should always wear gloves but, in my opinion, they make you clumsier. And we can always polish the silver when it’s time for display.”

One of the teapots in the archive belonged to regular Georg Jensen collaborator Henning Koppel’s daughter and shows the marks and traces of a long and useful life. Many of the preserved objects were designed to fulfil a specific daily function, be it as a tureen for soup, an eel dish or butter knife. “It’s not a matter of staying in the past; it’s a matter of understanding it so that we can create the future,” adds Heiberg Bøttiger. “Georg Jensen wasn’t founded yesterday. We’re proud of our heritage and history; it’s something we lean on every day.”

This spring, when creating a jewellery collection for Georg Jensen, Danish knitwear designer Amalie Røge Hove took inspiration from the silver beads found on the Moonlight Grapes range of tableware from the 1920s. A recurring collaborator, Danish architect and designer David Thulstrup, has dived into the archive on two occasions: once when designing Georg Jensen shops and, more recently, to create the silver sculptural hollow-ware piece Penumbra, released earlier this year. “Being Danish, I grew up with Georg Jensen in my veins,” says Thulstrup. “The archive is a treasure trove with an overwhelming amount of beautiful objects, many of which I had never seen before. I found inspiration from large hollow-ware made between the 1900s and 1940s and the more functional pieces by Sigvard Bernadotte, who worked a lot with very linear and strict shapes.” Penumbra, like any new addition to Georg Jensen’s expansive collections, will become part of the archive and, in turn, part of Danish silverware history.

It’s a prospect that might seem daunting, with new works landing alongside pieces by mid-century masters such as Verner Panton. “Designers like the challenge of creating for longevity,” says Heiberg Bøttiger. “Many of our silverware objects from the mid-century look contemporary and remain bestsellers to this day, such as the Pregnant Duck jug by Henning Koppel from 1952.”

Heiberg Bøttiger draws monocle’s attention to a tea set designed by Australian industrial designer Marc Newson. The rounded, hand-hammered silver pots, sugar bowl and creamer feature bases with rattan weaving and handles made from mammoth tusk (yes, you read that right). The five-piece collection was released in 2015 as a limited edition of 10 sets that sold for €93,500 each. “It wasn’t in the archive but it’s so special that we obtained permission to make the 11th iteration, so we could have a copy for reference.” Given how covetable such a tea set is, maybe keeping the location of this archive secret isn’t such a bad idea after all.

Warm reception

Loro Piana
Italy

Milan-based Loro Piana has repurposed old prototypes and knitwear leftovers into new items as part of Loro, a new capsule collection of recycled cashmere pieces for autumn. The process of upcycling surplus fabrics from the brand’s mills in northern Italy began with selecting individual items before unravelling each yarn by hue, categorising them by colour and respinning them with virgin, undyed cashmere to create high-quality blends. “This collection showcases our know-how and savoir-faire when it comes to fibre,” says the brand’s product development director, Alessandra Varianini. “We went through the materials manually to ensure that the textiles didn’t get stressed too much. This is a process that no machine can do.”

The new collection, the first of its kind for the brand, consists of jumpers, a scarf, hat and pair of lightweight trainers, all crafted using upcycled fibres. In true Loro Piana style, the colour palettes are neutral and the silhouettes relaxed. “We could not overdye the final yarn because that would affect the fibres,” adds Varianini. “Plus, we didn’t want anything too bright or decadent.”
loropiana.com

Perfumer H
Hong Kong & Taiwan

Based in London and known for its modernist retail spaces and unconventional scents, Perfumer H is now expanding to Hong Kong and Taipei. In-house spatial designer Kathryn Pell and founder and creative director Lynn Harris have been working on the shops’ interiors to marry the design signature that they established in London with new features and local materials. In Taipei, the boutique’s front desk and display cases are made using batu wood, while its façade is framed with handmade clay tiles. Inside, olfactory testing shelves feature handblown glass bottle stoppers suspended in test tubes.

Behind a pair of linen curtains in the new Hong Kong shop, you’ll find a laboratory where Harris and her team prepare bespoke formulas and refill candles. “Our clients appreciate the level of detail, from the product to the shop design; they want something that highlights their individuality,” says Harris, who looks to Taiwan, Hong Kong and Japan for inspiration.
perfumerh.com

APC x JW Anderson
France & UK

Jonathan Anderson is the latest designer to participate in APC’s ongoing collaboration series – or “interactions”, as the Parisian label likes to call them. Anderson was thinking about his own dream wardrobe when designing the line with apc founder Jean Touitou. It ranges from rocker-inspired fitted biker jackets to looser knits and traditional British duffle coats made with rough, textured wool. The Northern Irish designer, whose JW Anderson label is known for its experimental silhouettes, also encouraged APC to divert ever so slightly from its purist design ethos, adding raw edges on denim and bursts of colour on knitwear. “Thanks to Jonathan, we were able to go a little further than usual,” says Touitou.

“Our work meetings have been like a very quick and productive ping-pong game. When I brought an idea, he immediately transformed it into something better,” adds the designer, who sold a majority stake of APC to LVMH investment fund L Catterton earlier this year.
apcstore.com

Descente
Japan

Osaka-based skiwear brand Descente works with designer Mitsuru Yamada on its line of everyday clothing, Descente Allterrain. Yamada, who developed the outerwear worn by Japanese athletes at the 2010 Winter Olympics in Vancouver, is best known for his ability to marry technical materials and sportswear details with more classic designs. This black suit is a stellar example: it is made from a quick-drying polyester twill, a utilitarian fabric that was initially developed by Descente for the slopes. Better suited to streets (and boardrooms), it’s also wrinkle-free and has a hidden elastic waistband for extra comfort. We will be wearing this handy two-piece on our next transpacific flight and keeping it on to attend business meetings. All terrain, indeed.
allterrain.descente.com

Maison Kitsuné x Barbour
Japan & UK

French-Japanese label Maison Kitsuné is lending its irreverent spirit to Barbour’s waxed jackets as part of a newly launched autumn collaboration. The capsule collection consists of waxed jackets updated with oversized fits, sharp military jackets featuring playful tartan linings, as well as matching bucket hats and soft Shetland wool jumpers. The Maison Kitsuné fox, the label’s popular mascot, has also been embroidered across sweaters and T-shirts – all dressed up in a sage-green Barbour jacket.
barbour.com

Burberry
UK

Burberry’s autumn/winter collection, the first designed by chief creative officer Daniel Lee, has made its debut. The launch is part of Burberry’s extensive rebrand, which includes a new logo, refurbished London flagship shop and a return to the equestrian knight motif. Lee, who grew up near Castleford, where Burberry’s trench coats are made, is striving to reclaim its British identity, having shot campaigns against London landmarks and taken over the Bond Street Tube station.

On the sartorial front, there has been a return to brand classics too, with check patterns and smart gabardine overshirts taking centre stage. We have our eye on a loose forest-green car coat.
burberry.com

Shiro
Hong Kong

Are these the perfect socks? They are made in Brescia, Italy, using the finest merino wool and are inspired by the spirit of US sports. “I wanted to create something that customers could get pleasure out of daily,” says Shiro’s founder, Jonathan Kam. “I love the idea of an item that’s so indulgent yet hidden within a shoe.” Kam came up with the design after seeing a pair of sports socks from 1985, which inspired the fit: neither too baggy, nor too tight, with an ultra-soft feel. Offered in a variety of neutral colours, Shiro socks are now available on the brand’s online platform and in speciality shops worldwide. Head to the Clark Street Mercantile in Montréal or Chickee’s Vintage in New York to replenish your sock drawer.
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Prime time

As modern luxury develops, traditional values of handcraft and timeless design are gaining renewed relevance. It’s partly why the watch industry has continued its growth trajectory despite wider economic challenges, ranging from inflation to the effects of the coronavirus pandemic. Indeed, waiting lists for classic designs – be it a Rolex Daytona, Cartier Tank or Audemars Piguet Royal Oak – have never been longer. 

Luxury fashion houses are venturing into the category to take advantage of the lucrative opportunity. Gucci, for example, has just opened a manufacturing facility in Cortaillod, Switzerland, while Louis Vuitton is investing heavily in the sector with its new range of sporty Tambour watches.

This recent flurry of activity has resulted in a wider range of designs and prices, opening up the market to new audiences. Today brands are investing in training the new generation of watchmakers, offering more playful designs and experimenting with innovative retail concepts – Jaeger-LeCoultre, for instance, has recently opened a pop-up shop, café and cinema at London’s Battersea Power Station. Female watch buyers have also risen in prominence, so jewellery watches and an array of delicate, art deco-inspired designs are diversifying the market even further.

Demand is rising but the sector remains far from the point of saturation. “This is probably the market with the biggest growth potential,” says Antoine Pin, managing director of Bulgari’s watch division. “The creation of timepieces has sustainability at its essence, so these are products that represent very modern values. Part of the beauty of it is that you can simultaneously invest in new technologies and handcraft principles established hundreds of years ago. From a strategy perspective, that makes the business future-proof.”

Here, we speak to Pin, alongside executives from Japanese luxury watchmaker Grand Seiko and Paris-based Van Cleef & Arpels, to find out how they are carving their own niches in the competitive sector – and where the biggest opportunities lie.

The value of a high-low strategy

Antoine Pin
Managing Director
Bulgari watch division

Bulgari made headlines last year when it released the world’s thinnest watch, a version of its Octo Finissimo with its octagonal case reduced to 1.8mm. “It helped us to make enormous improvements in the way that we’re manufacturing all of our products,” says Antoine Pin, managing director of Bulgari’s watch division. “It’s a divisive watch but we’re passionate about design, so we love to push the boundaries.” Since its launch in 2014, the Octo Finissimo has become a brand signature and is coveted by collectors. “I wouldn’t call it an ‘icon’ because it can take a long time for icons to establish themselves but it has made a mark on the industry,” says Pin.

This year the Italian brand has been looking to new segments of the market, from chiming watches to entry-level timepieces such as the Octo Roma, which was given a design refresh and is priced between €7,900 and €9,970. “We decided to differentiate it from the Octo Finissimo by softening the edges, tweaking the case and ensuring that every element is considered to make this the most exceptional design at this price range,” says Pin. He points out the watch’s easily interchangeable straps. “Versatility is important because when you are buying a watch at this price point, it might not be your first but it’s probably not your 10th either.”

Bulgari is going against the current. Most of its luxury peers have focused on the premium end of the market, which is less likely to be affected by challenging market conditions. “The entry-level segment is actually more important during tough economic times,” says Pin, who warns of a 10 per cent rise in costs across the sector and a “shortage of everything”, primarily manpower. “You have to get new customers onboard and explain to them the value of watchmaking,” says Pin. Offering entry-level watches might be a strategic move but it also reflects the Italian house’s broader ethos. “The passion for watches shouldn’t start at €20,000,” he says. “We need to find ways to be cost-efficient and offer as many products at between €4,000 and €10,000 as we do €50,000 ones. It might be easier to remain a niche premium brand but that doesn’t align with our values.”

Instead, the brand is betting on personal relationships, whether that’s with a customer who is starting their journey as a collector or the next generation of artisans. The company has recently appointed a new head of education for its watch division, dedicated to training apprentices, helping employees to diversify their skills and giving retirees the opportunity to stay involved by teaching. “At the end of the day, luxury is about people,” says Pin.
bulgari.com

Catering to the women’s market 

Nicolas Bos
President and CEO
Van Cleef & Arpels

When French jeweller Van Cleef & Arpels started focusing on developing ambitious complications for women’s watches in the 2000s, many raised an eyebrow. “The consensus was, ‘No, you’re not going to create such complicated movements for women – it doesn’t work like that,’” says Nicolas Bos, the company’s president and ceo. “But we tried anyway.” The brand had identified an opportunity in giving the under­developed women’s market a distinctive design perspective. “A woman’s watch isn’t necessarily a man’s watch made in a smaller size, with a pink dial and some diamonds on the bezel,” he says. “You can offer an entirely different point of view.”

These days, Van Cleef & Arpels regularly has one of the busiest booths in Geneva’s Watches & Wonders fair, where collectors line up to see its one-of-a-kind objets d’art and watch collections. Much of the excitement this year revolved around the re-edition of the Ludo, an art deco bracelet launched in the 1930s, featuring a hidden watch. The house has carved its own niche with jewellery watches but has equally become far more confident in its capabilities as a watchmaker, with a growing in-house workshop that specialises in engraving and customising movements.

Demand for the brand’s watches has steadily increased as the sector has begun to pay closer attention to female customers. “In the past 20 years, the wider industry has realised that women exist,” says Bos. “Now there is no brand that doesn’t have its own versions of feminine watches. That has opened up the market. There are more perspectives and designs that are less driven by commercial strategies, and larger audiences. It used to be all about big watches one year, then chronographs the next. But today every brand can express its identity more freely.” 

These changes in the market – coupled with a global fascination for heritage brands such as Van Cleef & Arpels, which was founded in 1906 on Paris’s Place Vendôme – have created lucrative growth opportunities for the Richemont-owned business, including in Asia. But growth doesn’t always have to be the “ultimate objective”, says Bos, who believes that brands should focus more on simply “maintaining their activity and continuing to exist”. New opportunities are cropping up in markets such as India, which is just beginning to open up to European luxury houses. “We’re going to see a period of stability,” says Bos. “But we are confident enough to continue investing in the future. That means plenty of new collections, workshops and training schemes for young craftsmen.”
vancleefarpels.com

The power of brand Japan 

Akio Naito
President
Seiko Watch Corporation 

You might think of Grand Seiko as a relative newcomer. Though the luxury brand has been operating in Japan since the 1960s, it made its international debut in 2010 – and it wasn’t until 2017 that it started to command the attention of retailers and collectors in the West. Its roots go back to 1881, when Kintaro Hattori, founder of the label’s parent company, Seiko, opened a shop in Ginza that sold and repaired watches. He created Japan’s first wristwatch in 1913; the company also launched the world’s first automatic chronograph with a column wheel and vertical clutch in the 1960s.

Despite this heritage, establishing Grand Seiko as a premium label in a global market dominated by Swiss timepieces was an uphill climb. “Seiko’s existing business focused on mid-market department stores, so it was hard for us to build luxury distribution for Grand Seiko,” says Akio Naito, president of the Seiko Watch Corporation. “Retailers assumed that Japanese watch brands could only operate in that mid-price range.” Yet a new logo and a series of events with watch connoisseurs who saw the value of the brand’s meticulous designs created new momentum. “We showed that we had cult followers across the US,” says Naito. “That convinced retailers to start working with us.”

For collectors, the company’s Japanese heritage is a major draw. “These are people who don’t trust big celebrity campaigns,” says Naito. Brand Japan has consequently become a key part of Grand Seiko’s identity. “Today the country isn’t just an exotic place in the Far East. Ramen, animé and sushi are part of people’s everyday lives and there’s a better understanding of our craft heritage.”

Naito has been focusing on expanding the brand’s global retail footprint with boutiques on London’s Bond Street and New York’s Madison Avenue. He has also negotiated its presence at the Watches & Wonders fair. “It was important to get the same treatment as the Swiss brands,” he says. “After six months of discussions, we became the first non-European brand to attend.”

Interest in the art of watchmaking is particularly strong in Japan, so Grand Seiko doesn’t have to contend with a shortage of new talent like most of its European counterparts. “I have no concern about keeping up with increased demand,” says Naito, proudly citing the Japanese team’s ongoing pursuit of design perfection and the recent launch of the Kodo watch, which won the chronometry prize at Geneva’s Grand Prix d’Horlogerie last year. By reaching these milestones, the brand is claiming its seat at the watch industry’s top table and creating a new generation of classics along the way.
grand-seiko.com

Light touch

Barbara Arts only had to see the front door to know that she wanted to move in. In Lier, a medieval town on the outskirts of Antwerp, the house is hard to miss. Its polished stainless- steel door, which is flanked by pillars clad with golden tiles, distinguishes it from the town’s brick townhouses that line the river Nete. Arts lived around the corner with her husband, Gregory D’Hulst, and two children, and would often walk by. When the house came up for sale, she didn’t hesitate to take the whole family for a viewing. That was when her 11-year-old son, who proved less enthusiastic about the entrance, tried to put a stop to the plan. “Our youngest didn’t go further than the hallway,” says Arts. “He said he would never live here.”

What put him off was exactly what charmed his parents. The vault-like door opens onto a dim hallway with wood-panelled walls, dark-green terrazzo floor and old, scuffed-up furniture. The house was designed in 1932 by Jozef Meulepas, who served as the city architect for much of the first half of the 20th century (who else to have the most eye-catching entrance in town?). Meulepas stuck to a quite conservative, neoclassical style in the buildings he planned around Lier but when it came to his own home, he revealed a taste for the avant garde. The house combines art deco elements – that gilded entryway – with hallmarks of modernism, visible in the streamlined balcony railings above. The house had remained in the family (a recent resident was Meulepas’s octogenarian niece) and was almost fully preserved, down to the stained-glass window, yellow kitchen tiles and even an in-built aquarium in the stairwell. Such features saw the house placed under monument protection in 1995 as an example of early modernist architecture. So, despite their son’s protests, Arts and D’Hulst didn’t budge but negotiated. “We had to promise him a dog,” says Arts, laughing.

Having overcome their first obstacle, Arts and D’Hulst set out to tackle the house itself. The couple were well suited to the task: Arts is an executive architect at Bureau Bouwtechniek, where she focuses on major renovations such as, most recently, Antwerp’s Royal Museum of Fine Arts. D’Hulst grew up near Lier and his brother, David, is an architect with a solo practice, Studio Ambacht, that specialises in residential projects (the couple met through David, who was Arts’s friend at architecture school). The building’s listed status still left room for modernisation: the rear of the structure had been cheaply modified in the 1970s and didn’t fall under heritage protection. “We probably wouldn’t have moved here otherwise,” says Arts. Everybody agreed that the house needed more light.

For David, the commission combined two potentially tricky clients: a sibling and another architect. But the collaboration ran so smoothly that the trio look perplexed when asked whether there were dust-ups. “I’ve always seen it as something positive that we were many architects focused on this project,” says David. “We were all working towards the same goal.”

The renovation’s challenges, instead, were caused by bureaucracy. In Belgium, buying a listed building is incentivised with a tax credit but to qualify for it, the new owners’ previous home has to be sold within a year. “It had to be a lot faster than usual,” says David. In December 2020, three months after purchasing the house, Studio Ambacht filed a planning application for rebuilding the back façade with glass, extending the first-floor bathroom by reducing the number of bedrooms from five to four, and adding a roof terrace. Soon, an inspector from the heritage protection office came on site to catalogue the valuable parts of the building. With a few tweaks – all corners of the kitchen had to stay, for instance – the scheme was given the green light.

D’Hulst brought in a trusted local building firm, Oostkaai. The kitchen was opened up by taking down one wall and putting in a sliding glass door (the yellow wall tiles were saved and tucked into a basement cupboard for any future needs). What had been a storage room behind the kitchen became a light-filled sitting area with a sunken floor, double-height window and a skylight. Next to the kitchen was a small patio, built in the 1970s, where orange floor tiles were replaced with a muted terrazzo, and the space turned into a glass-walled winter garden. The most stressful moment, says David, was when the high glass panes had to be lifted over the building into the garden and fitted, with very little room for error.

Meulepas kept a meticulous archive and when Arts and D’Hulst bought the house from his heirs (all 11 of them), they handed over a trove of plans, invoices and receipts from the original construction. Despite the heritage protection, Arts and D’Hulst didn’t need persuading that as much as possible needed to be saved: Meulepas hadn’t been stingy with materials and many features would be impossibly expensive to put in today. Additions in most rooms are negligible; in the bathroom, a bathtub of solid yellow terrazzo was simply fitted with a new tap. Even where the finishes needed updating, the interventions were minimal. In the bedrooms, a brown laminate floor was peeled off to reveal wooden planks that only needed to be sanded; the old wallpaper had been covered up but preserved.

The touch-ups only served to highlight Meulepas’s original design. “He was really inventive,” says David. In the downstairs dining room, part of the ceiling is lowered and painted a mint green with wooden accents. Directly upstairs is a wooden bench running along the side of the wall. The bench was Meulepas’s way of cleverly integrating a large concrete structural beam into the interior. Interestingly, almost every room has what looks like an enclosed stove, even though the house is heated with radiators. The new owners suspect that the faux fireplaces, built with terrazzo and glazed tiles, were designed to have no other function than to create the warming sense of a hearth in the house.

Once the renovations were complete, the furnishings fell into place quickly. Sofas and beds were driven over from Arts and D’Hulst’s old house a few hundred metres away and thanks to all the built-in cabinetry, not much more was necessary. Meulepas’s old dining table still stands in the living room, now flanked by mid-century chairs. Under the bathroom’s new corner window stands a rattan lounger. The trickiest part was to decide on kitchen counters that would neither imitate nor clash with the 1930s interiors. It was Arts’s idea to put in a brushed-aluminium kitchen from German firm Bulthaup, which both echoes the house’s stainless-steel front door and goes surprisingly well with the sunny yellow tiles. “When the morning sun comes in, it all looks golden,” she says.

When Monocle rings the doorbell next to the sizeable steel plaque saying “J Meulepas”, there’s no time for handshakes before Luca, an excitable sheepdog, bounds up. He’s no longer a puppy: the family moved in more than a year ago, having just made the tight 12-month deadline for the renovation. Now only the hallway remains dark, while the rest of the rooms are bathed in light. For the most part the house has kept its personality: the stately bureau of the city architect now stands in the upstairs office. “The heirs are happy that an architect is again living in the house,” says Arts.

And how about the children? Today their son is finding little cause for complaint in the historic house and goes to school in a building also designed by Meulepas. “He’s totally fine, of course,” says Arts. The wonders that one year, and a dog, can do.