Case Study 2.0: The grassroots initiative to rebuild a more resilient Palisades

About 30km west of downtown Los Angeles, the Pacific Palisades was once a bucolic enclave famous for its design-forward addresses and illustrious residents. But in January the area was hit by the worst wildfires in the city’s history – almost 7,000 buildings were destroyed. But as the flames subsided, property-developer brothers Jason and Steven Somers, third-generation Angelenos, set out to help save the neighbourhood.

The Somers brothers decided that the best way to rebuild quickly without making aesthetic sacrifices was to take inspiration from the Case Study Houses, a mid-century initiative that gave the city so many of its landmark residences, from the Eames House to Pierre Koenig’s Stahl House. The name of the brothers’ ambitious project? Case Study 2.0.

“We want to create cost-effective, time-efficient and fire-resilient solutions that are also beautiful,” Jason tells Monocle from behind the steering wheel of his electric Range Rover. The brothers are in the Pacific Palisades to meet with potential clients and contributing architects. Outside, solitary brick chimneys surrounded by heaps of ash and rubble dot the streets.

“No situation is more critical than building back a community,” says Jason. The Somers brothers are the owners of Crest Real Estate, an agency based nearby, which specialises in managing the process of obtaining permits for property developments. They also have a deep knowledge of southern California’s arcane land-use codes, as well as a handy network of architects. “Our company is based on fast-tracking the development process,” he says.

The aim is to build 200 houses. More than 50 designs have been commissioned so far, including a Spanish-colonial-style property with terracotta roofing and a gabled three-bedroom home with a pool and guest house. Protecting homes against fire is a must. Architect Michael Kovac, whose home we visit on the trip, explains the importance of fireproofing tweaks, including lava-rock landscaping and ember-blocking vents.

The brothers check in on Doug Hafford, whose 1940s bungalow burnt down, leaving only its garage standing. Hafford is keen on an L-shaped design with a glass-enclosed great room. Steven estimates that it will cost between $650 and $800 (between €570 and €710) per square foot, 20 per cent less than a custom build. “It’s about time as much as money,” says Hafford. “We were looking for an à la carte menu like this.”

The Pacific Palisades still faces headwinds. More than 200 lots have been put on the market as property owners seek to cut their losses. But having worked here their entire careers, the brothers believe that a critical mass of residents will remain. “It will feel like home again five years into the programme,” says Steven. “By year eight, the Palisades will be the most desirable neighbourhood in LA.” To achieve such a remarkable turnaround, speed is of the essence.

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How to get dressed: Atsushi Hasegawa, the head of creative at The Newt in Somerset

Atsushi Hasegawa, the head of creative at luxury hotel The Newt in Somerset, can be spotted wandering around its verdant grounds in a straw boater, longline linen shirt or even a kimono-inspired work jacket that he designed for UK gardening brand Niwaki. Hasegawa was born in Japan and became fascinated with fashion in the late 1980s, when he worked at Vivienne Westwood’s Tokyo shop. A passion for fly fishing brought him to Paris, where he worked at Maison de la Mouche, a shop that caters to the outdoors hobby. After about 10 years in the city, where he also worked in textile design, Hasegawa crossed the Channel to become the head of creative concept at footwear brand Clarks. Today he oversees The Newt’s visual identity, marketing activities and cultural partnerships. He tells Monocle about his spontaneous approach to getting dressed and his many sartorial obsessions.

How has your style evolved?
In the 1980s I went to university in Tokyo, the same one that Kenzo Takada [the founder of Kenzo] and Yohji Yamamoto went to. I would read magazines such as The Face and i-D, and I was into hip-hop. These things weren’t mainstream in Japan at the time. Since then I have been addicted to fashion. In Tokyo at the time, there were codes. If you were a skater, you’d wear Stüssy. If you were into reggae, you wore Kangol hats. You were either a Yohji man or a Comme des Garçons lady. Nowadays fusion is completely normal but it wasn’t allowed back then. So when I moved to Paris I loved the freedom. Parisians wear anything naturally. Now I dress according to how I feel. Sometimes I’m more expressive; at others I’m more humble in how I present myself. My colleagues would probably describe me as a peacock.

Do you mean that your style reflects your state of mind?
When life gets stressful, I become almost punk and more expressive. When I’m more relaxed, it’s reflected in my laidback clothing. Clothes protect you so I’m serious about what I wear. As I get older, I know that what matters is what suits your body, your height, your posture. I’m quite obsessed with understanding what kind of hats suit me or how a T-shirt is made. I collect clothes and never throw anything away. I still have clothes that I bought when I was 18 because I don’t want to be a part of throwaway culture.

How would you describe your everyday style?
I’m a chameleon. I like the unexpected. Yesterday I wore an all-pink jumpsuit to the beach and my daughters said that it was cool. In some ways, hospitality is like show business, so as head of creative I want people to see my outfits and think, “Oh, wow.” When I left Japan, I slowly understood that there is unique craftsmanship there and I’ve since become obsessed with it. I might mix a kimono with European clothes. I look to 1920s and 1930s society fashion for inspiration: white trousers, a chain, a funny way of doing a tie. I’m now enjoying this phase of my life and being myself completely.

Do you pre-plan your outfits?
No, I wake up and start from there. I’m a DJ and only mix with seven-inch vinyls with the aim of seamlessly connecting everything without planning. I like to do the same with getting dressed, almost in a half-stressed state and with only 20 minutes to get ready. I start with one item and then co-ordinate from there. Fashion is where I find joy.

Street style from Rome: what to wear in the Eternal City

If Italian cities could be personified, Milan would be a bejewelled grand dame and Florence a dandy cycling along the Arno in a linen suit. But Rome? The capital is too vast, ancient and complex to distil into one stereotype. The city has exerted its gravitational pull on the world for millennia. It has been a melting pot since the days of the Roman Empire, when every road was said to lead there.

The Eternal City has also been captured on screen by the maestri of Italian cinema, who used its Cinecittà film studio as a base in the mid-20th century. Directors including Michelangelo Antonioni, Bernardo Bertolucci, Federico Fellini, Roberto Rossellini and, more recently, Paolo Sorrentino have captured Rome on film in a seductive light, with leading men prowling the streets at night in tailored suits and tilted hats while their love interests dance at rooftop bars or splash around the Trevi Fountain (please don’t try this). Today, Romans navigating cobblestone streets in formal footwear or zooming past on Vespas stand out from the backpack-toting tourists. There’s a sharpness to Romans’ presentation and also in how they move through their city.

“Roman style is more sober compared to somewhere more eccentric such as Naples,” says master tailor Gaetano Aloisio when Monocle meets him at his atelier behind the Spanish Steps. Aloisio has dressed heads of state and royalty from around the world, receiving a knighthood from the president of the Italian republic in 2011 for his contributions to the country’s fashion industry. “I seek sophistication in every detail,” he says. “My aim is to craft suits that inspire strength and command respect.” One sartorial detail that Aloisio abhors is the shoulder pad. He prefers the fluid lines of Italian tailoring over the more military style associated with London’s Savile Row. And this soft shoulder has soft-power credentials – many city tailors and shoemakers rely on a moneyed global clientele from the US, the Middle East and France but rarely Italy. We hear similar stories at tailoring atelier Sartoria Ripense and shoemaker Bocache & Salvucci, where orders are more often placed from outside the Bel Paese.

But a younger generation is poised to take up the mantle of la bella figura. Throughout the day we spot students dressed for their graduation ceremonies, donning traditional Roman crowns of laurels instead of tasselled caps. In the afternoon we stop by Piazza de’ Ricci to meet the team behind Le Tre Sarte, a fashion brand spinning a modern take on formal womenswear and menswear. In its atelier, vests, dresses and jackets are crafted using end-of-roll materials – wool, linen, silk and velvet – from Italian factories. Customers can choose to dial up or down the saturation from a palette ranging from forest green and deep burgundy to light pinks, blues and a zesty yellow.

“In Rome, we’re surrounded by beauty,” says Camilla Voci, who co-founded Le Tre Sarte with Niccolo di Leonardis in 2021. “If you’re always surrounded by materials that are high quality – bricks, marble – it translates into how you dress and your taste in design.” Di Leonardis agrees. “There’s a heritage of bespoke,” he says, “and tailors are passed down through families.” Exceptionally well-turned-out Romans who wouldn’t go near flip-flops with a barge pole assure us that the city’s style can be described as somewhere between “relaxed and elegant”.

But perhaps Roman style isn’t something that can be bought or replicated so easily. It’s an attitude, the way that a jacket might be nonchalantly slung over one shoulder while strolling down the street, its owner holding a loud conversation on their phone. It’s the proud upward tilt of a chin, paired best with an aquiline nose. A fearless commitment to navigating cobblestones in heels rather than trainers. It’s thinking that a tailored suit paired with calf-leather brogues and a carmine red silk tie is a “sober, simple look”.

As the sun sets, we make our way to the Rhinoceros hotel and art space foundation for our final appointment. We meet Alda Fendi and her sizeable entourage in the gallery. The last Fendi shareholder of the namesake luxury fashion house (now majority owned by LVMH) is wearing head-to-toe yellow and spiky sunglasses that echo her energetically coiffed blonde hair. As she reclines in a La Mamma armchair by Gaetano Pesce, we ask the doyenne of the city’s fashion scene how she would describe Roman style. “How people dress here reflects the city when it scintillates at night,” says Fendi with a smile. “It’s romantic and mysterious. It’s poetry.”

The quiet life: A look inside Casa O, Enrique Olivera’s rural weekend residence

Enrique Olvera has 14 restaurants in cities from New York and Los Angeles to Mexico City but he likes to spend his downtime far from the hustle of a busy service. When Monocle pulls up at his wooden bungalow in Reserva Peñitas, a nature development in Valle de Bravo, a two-hour drive west of the Mexican capital, the chef is distractedly removing fungus from one of his 100 fruit trees. “It’s what I like to do with my free time,” says the Mexican chef with a smile. He acquired the site during the pandemic, built the Japanese-style residence, then set about planting local flora and helping it all thrive. “If a plant isn’t supposed to grow here,” he says, his fingernails black with soil, “then I must respect that.”

Dubbed Casa O, Olvera’s weekend residence is a long way from anywhere, marked only by a large steel “O” on a gate that even a neighbour struggled to direct us to. Here, Olvera – a man who changed the face of Mexican cuisine and put street food on the top table – seems almost anonymous. And, it turns out, that’s exactly how he likes it.

Olvera’s story began in 2000 with the opening of his debut restaurant, Pujol, in the Polanco neighbourhood of Mexico City. It would prove to be a rather revolutionary idea. He saw no reason why the street food traditionally consumed by blue-collar workers couldn’t be fused with the likes of tuna tartare, lobster ceviche and beef empanada. He was 24 years old and only just out of the Culinary Institute of America in New York but Pujol quickly became the revelation that launched his career and his hospitality firm, Casamata. “Until very recently, Mexican restaurants abroad reduced our cuisine to stereotypes,” says Olvera, his brow briefly furrowing. “Our gastronomy is often exported as fast food but in Mexico we eat healthily because we have always relied on seasonal produce found within our borders.”

Overlooking the gently swaying heather from the veranda, Olvera says that he’s still riding high from Pujol’s 25th-anniversary celebrations in May. Attendees at the dinner included the great and the good of the Mexican dining scene: Lucho Martínez of Michelin-starred Em, Diego Klein, Joaquín López-Dóriga and Gabriela Cámara of Contramar, and Edo López of Mexico City’s growing Japanese-inspired hospitality empire, who gathered in Olvera’s newly renovated space to toast his achievements. More than the star-studded guest list itself, what pleased Olvera was the way that it demonstrated how the scene had grown in the quarter-century since he started out.

The chef isn’t one to linger too long on an idea without leaping to the next. “There’s a misconception that Mexican food is expensive because in the US you pay $3 [€2.60] for an avocado,” he says pensively. “Here, the same amount will buy you a kilo because we have so many,” he says with an expansive gesture.

Olvera worked with Mexican architect and developer Javier Sánchez to build Casa O. Sánchez was a safe bet, having also designed many of Olvera’s other projects, including Pujol and mezcal bar Ticuchi. “The brief was to design a residence from which I could give back to the territory, rather than taking away from it,” says Olvera, explaining the adentro-afuera (“inside-outside”) nature of the sliding doors and wide apertures.

Brought up in Mexico City, where water rationing is common, Olvera has built a home that collects and recycles rainwater for self-sufficiency. He leads Monocle to the artificial pond where his labradors Maia and Uma, never far from his side, are lapping a little of the rainfall that has been collected. “It’s still the dry season,” says Olvera, who moves eagerly about amid the foliage and rarely sits down. “When I used to visit the area as a child, the wet season would begin in May but now it starts in June,” he adds, a cloud passing over his face as he considers the changing climate to which we’re all slowly adapting.

Is Casa O the vanity project of a wealthy chef? Olvera sees it as a long-term investment. “I built it for my children but also for my grandchildren,” he tells Monocle enthusiastically. Valle de Bravo’s climate allows him to grow tropical produce here. “We’re at the limit of the state of Michoacán,” says Olvera, pointing out his favourite tree, the floripondio, which is sprouting fragrant trumpet-shaped flowers. We might be hours from anywhere else but Olvera’s talk inevitably turns back to his obsession with plants and his restaurants. “At Cosme, we substitute the pumpkin flowers that grow here with rhubarb, which we don’t use in Mexico,” he says. “There are no good or bad ingredients.”

Olvera has trained some of Mexico’s most prominent chefs, including Jorge Vallejo of Quintonil, currently ranked seventh globally, and Gabriela López of Máximo Bistrot, a regular on Latin America’s list of its 50 best restaurants. But it’s not past successes that Olvera wants to discuss. Instead, it’s the possibility of fresh ones. “You won’t find these methods used anywhere else in the world,” he says of his famously outré flavour combinations, from coffee in mayonnaise and a mole containing 100 ingredients to the use of ants and creepy crawlies. “Eating Mexican food means being open to trying new things.”

We walk a little further and look back at the house, encircled by blackberry bushes, apple orchards and macadamia groves, as well as plum, pear and lemon trees. We see fat cucumbers, lettuce, crimson chillies, tomatoes and avocados, each crop planted according to the reserve’s sloping topography to give it the best chance of flourishing. There are two towering agave plants, one green, another brown. “The plant uses all of its energy to bloom and then it dies,” says Olvera, with the satisfaction of a botany professor eager for his student to understand his enthusiasm for the topic.

Olvera is the consummate host but it’s hard not to feel as though you were intruding on somewhere special to the chef while you’re here. “I try not to invite guests – I like to walk by myself,” he says. “I feel at peace because I can’t see or hear the neighbours.” Away from the city in which Olvera became a household name, the introverted chef prefers to spend his evenings experimenting with flavours or examining his crops.

So what does the future hold for the godfather of modern Mexican gastronomy? Olvera’s appetite for commercial success appears sated. “I don’t plan to conquer the world with Mexican food,” he says. “Every restaurateur’s dream is to be able to pay their producers fairly and to celebrate the value of the produce once it’s on the plate. If I have that, I’m content.” Right after saying this, Olvera admits a little ambition that subtly undermines his previous statement and opens up a conversation about a new hospitality project. “In a restaurant you have hours to impress your guests,” he says, his eyes lighting up. “In a hotel you have days.”
casamata.com

Street food is still a defining force in the culinary scene of Istanbul

When Cenk Debensason is hungry, he rarely reaches for a Michelin guide for tips. “Whenever I think of food in Istanbul, I think of this,” the chef behind the celebrated Arkestra restaurant tells Monocle as he stands beside a vendor while a fish sizzles on the grill atop a simple cart. Debensason is here by the edge of the Bosphorus for balik ekmek: mackerel with onions, parsley, sumac and cumin, served in a hunk of fluffy white bread. Alongside the simit – sesame-crusted rings that are sweetly caramelised outside and pillowy soft within – such simple snacks are the city’s staples. But for all of the tiled lokantasi (workers’ bistros), black-tea sellers and kebab shops, Turkish fare has undergone something of a reinvention of late.

Debensason trained in France and, with his wife and business partner, Debora Ipekel, creates simple yet sophisticated spins on modern European and Turkish classics, using ingredients grown and caught around the city. The Michelin guide arrived in Istanbul in 2022 (the inspectors went to the western provinces of Izmir and Bodrum a year later) and Arkestra, based in a discreet modernist villa in the Etiler district, was one of the establishments that earned a coveted star. It marked a major step up in the city’s culinary reputation.

Meanwhile at Turk, a sleek establishment with a months-long waiting list in fashionable Bomonti, Fatih Tutak fuses Turkish flavours with techniques that he learned during his 15 years working in some of Asia’s top restaurants. At Neolokal, set in the grand building that housed the Ottoman empire’s central bank, Maksut Askar riffs on the flavours of his home region of Hatay (Turkey’s gastronomic capital, according to some), adding a sustainable slant by using regional produce and providing a vegetarian menu – something that would have been hard to come by just 10 years ago.

There’s a fierce wind whipping across the Bosphorus when we arrive at the packed terrace restaurant of the Sakip Sabanci Museum. This landmark building in Istanbul’s affluent northern suburbs has one of the best waterside vantage points in the city and a menu to match. It is the training restaurant for the MSA (the Mutfak Sanatlari Akademisi, or the Culinary Arts Academy), Turkey’s premier school for chefs, meaning that the food here, as affordable as it is, reaches the standards of the city’s most elite institutions.

Here we meet Sitare Baras, the managing director of the MSA, and Sabiha Apaydin Gonenli, one of Turkey’s foremost sommeliers. Baras is keen to try the new dishes on the menu, so we order delicate slivers of beef tartare in a tangy sauce; icli kofte, tiny meatballs stuffed inside bulgur dough; hummus; and delicate lahmacun, crispbreads topped with meat and tomato. Dessert is a twist on an Istanbul street-food classic: candied chestnut, reimagined as a creamy mousse topped with feather-light whipped cream. “We didn’t have avant-garde chefs before the 2000s,” says Baras. “Turkish food used to be very local. We transformed the quality of the education in the country. Our graduates work in all of the biggest restaurants and a lot of them who came from Anatolia want to go back to their hometowns and raise the bar there.”

The MSA’s premises in Maslak, a bustling business district on the European side of Istanbul, is a mix of nostalgia and cutting-edge efficiency. In the foyer are glass-fronted cabinets stuffed with vintage food tins and wine bottles but the training kitchens are kitted out with stop clocks and viewing windows that allow visitors to watch the trainees in action, replicating the high-octane atmosphere of a working kitchen. Here, Baras hopes that chefs will be able to hone their skills to the millimetre-fine accuracy required in the top kitchens.

“We tell the students that it should be a reflex when they are cutting – their mind should be on the next stage,” says Sergin Keyder, one of the trainers, who started as a student at the school eight years ago. “At first I was working with a ruler and stickers on my cutting board. I ate carrot purée for two months.”

The MSA’s diploma is internationally recognised and its former students, who number about 30,000, have gone on to work in kitchens worldwide, as well as refilling the city’s culinary talent pool. Turkish cuisine is the school’s bedrock but it also teaches other styles, reflecting the increasing appetite for variety in Istanbul. Birol Can is one of the 2025 cohort. The 27-year-old had already completed a degree in cinema and was living in his home city of Tekirdag when he decided to pursue his childhood dream and sign up at the MSA. He hopes to open a French or Italian restaurant in his hometown once he graduates.

Turkish wine is also stepping up after years of obscurity. Apaydin Gonenli is a former chief of front-of-house operations at Mikla, an Istanbul institution where she was responsible for food and wine pairings. In 2019 she organised the first Root, Origin, Soil conference to showcase Turkish viticulture, an event that is now held biannually. “We were always drinking the same six Turkish grape varieties and I wondered why,” says Gonenli. “In Turkey we have about 800 unique varieties and I started promoting them. When I set out, there were 20 indigenous varieties available commercially. Now there are 60.”

The bottles are now making their way into high-end restaurants and a few pioneers are popularising wine bars. Chief among them is Foxy in Istanbul’s smart Nisantasi district, a venture by Maksut Askar and wine expert Levon Bagis, where an extensive and ever-changing selection of regional varieties is available by the glass, alongside fresh twists on classic mezze.

Above all – and despite the role that Michelin has played in internationalising and glamorising Turkish food – there is still something pleasingly democratic about the restaurant scene here. “Our customers come here for a good time, not to feel overwhelmed,” says Debensason, while explaining why Arkestra offers à la carte rather than the tasting menu often favoured by Michelin inspectors.

On the weekday evening that Monocle visits, the atmosphere at the restaurant is fittingly fun and informal. The tables are full but Debensason and Ipekel mingle with guests, explaining new dishes and recommending wine pairings. When Monocle asks where he would head for a taste of the city, Debensason suggests Donerci Engin, an unassuming hole in the wall with plastic furniture in Beyoglu that serves nothing more complicated than a classic doner kebab. Prices might be on the rise but don’t let anyone tell you an international reputation has cost Istanbul’s food scene its authenticity or its originality.

Tastes of the city
Here are some of Istanbul’s culinary attractions beyond the white tablecloths and polished dining rooms.

Pandeli
This canteen feels like a hidden palace and is the best spot in the city for a quick, inexpensive lunch with views over Eminonu port. Turkish staples have been served here for about a century and the quality has never dipped. Arrive early or reserve to secure the best table.
pandeli.com.tr

Karakoy historic fish market
You need to venture to the lesser known side of Karakoy to get to this market. Cross through the underpass that runs under the Galata Bridge and you’ll find it just a few steps beyond. This is where locals come to buy the freshest catch to take home. But you can also ask one of the adjoining restaurants to cook your choice for you or get it served in a sandwich or wrap to eat by the waterside.

‘Simit’ stands, citywide
You’ll find simit everywhere but if you want the freshest available, look for the vendors with the highest turnover. You can’t go far wrong at any of the city-centre ports, where thousands of people pass by every hour. One of the most atmospheric is the cart just outside Besiktas port, which has a lovely backdrop of the historic terminal and the Bosphorus beyond.

Basta!
Founded by two chefs who worked in Michelin-starred restaurants outside Turkey, this no-fuss spot has the best wraps (dürüm) in the city. The menu is tight, with options that you can count on one hand, but the flavour combinations are so well balanced that you’ll keep coming back for more. Try the lamb with harissa and yoghurt. The pavement seats make for prime people-watching spots.
bastafood.com

Kebapci Zeki Usta
Proprietor Yilmaz Omeroglu uses only the freshest meat for his kebabs and meatballs. There’s no doner here, however. Zeki Usta’s specialities are adana and urfa kebabs, richly spiced and served with pillowy pitta bread. This atmospheric café is in the heart of Kuzguncuk, a quaint neighbourhood of coloured houses and ancient churches on the Asian side.
Kuzguncuk, Icadiye Caddesi 31

Moda Tea Garden
Tea is a way of life in Istanbul and you’re never too far away from a seller brewing a fresh batch. Seek out the tea gardens if you want to retreat from Istanbul’s chaos and sip your drink in peace. Our favourite is in the Moda district on the Asian side, on a bluff overlooking the Sea of Marmara.
Caferaga, Park Ici Yolu, 34710 Kadikoy

How the leadership of Kate Gilbert helped put Boston on the map for contemporary art

A totem pole depicting a leprechaun stands on top of two boxes of tea in downtown Boston. In his hands is a musket and on his head a Puritan-style brimmed hat overflowing with a cornucopia of lobsters, Samuel Adams beer and a squirrel that might or might not be urinating. Entitled “Material Monument to Thomas Morton (Playing Indian)”, the 4.25-metre-tall sculpture by artist collective New Red Order pokes fun at two of the city’s sacred cows: its Irish diaspora and the Boston Tea Party. Placed outside Faneuil Hall, a meeting place for American Revolutionary War-era protests, the installation is the work of Kate Gilbert. As the executive director of the first Boston Public Art Triennial, which opened on 22 May and runs until 31 October, she’s pushing the buttons of a city that is known for its intellectualism but also a certain aesthetic conservatism.

“Our visual culture doesn’t represent how rich our assets are here,” Gilbert tells Monocle. Until Halloween, Bostonians will be able to gaze upon 20 newly commissioned works, from larger-than-life sculptures to delicate textiles woven between trees, all of which are designed to spark curiosity and debate – and none is a milquetoast crowd-pleaser. They are dispersed equally between upmarket and less affluent precincts, outside marquee museums and in under-visited parks, in order to encourage residents to explore beyond their usual neighbourhoods.

Gilbert, who moved to Boston nearly 30 years ago, is uniquely qualified to pull off an event that has the potential to put New England’s largest city on the global contemporary-art map. As a young painter, she was part of the scrappy artist community that fought with city hall over redevelopment schemes in the Fort Point warehouse district. That early taste of urban planning ultimately led her to advocate for art from inside the establishment during a pivotal moment in Boston’s recent history: the removal of an elevated highway through the city centre to be replaced by a park. “You’ve got a mile and a quarter of found land,” she says. “When does that ever happen in an old city like this?”

When the Rose Kennedy Greenway opened in 2008, few knew what to do with it. As a member of the green space’s conservancy, Gilbert spearheaded the cultural component, starting with a lavish $500,000 (€441,000) opening bash. “If you’re going to open a new park, that party should signal the values and the sort of vision for what you want that park to be and how people will use it,” she says. The opening included a temporary installation of bears made from timber and rusted steel. Children loved the bears and the area’s residents began using the park as a landmark. Emboldened, Gilbert helped secure a prominent canvas across from the city’s main train station for Brazilian street-art duo Os Gêmeos in 2011.

In 2015 she launched Now + There, a public art entity, and has spent the past 10 years acclimatising Bostonians to increasingly challenging work. “It has been an acculturation process,” she says. “Now people aren’t afraid of contemporary art.” The public’s willingness to play along is also a boon to the creative community, as local art schools mint graduates who might be more inclined to make a career in Boston if they see opportunities. Roughly half of the triennial’s artists live or work in the city, with the rest hailing from further afield – Berlin, Los Angeles, Rio de Janeiro, Alaska. “A measurable outcome is that artists will stay here,” she says, noting that the city ranked third in a 2024 index of the most vibrant US cities for their sector. A large part of that is down to her efforts.

Interview: Philippe Delhotal, the creative director of Hermès Horloger

When Philippe Delhotal joined Hermès as its creative director of watches in 2008, he was tasked with establishing the French luxury house in horology – a highly competitive field dominated by Swiss specialists with centuries of watchmaking experience. Earning respect in the sector isn’t easy, even for a powerful luxury player such as Hermès. But Delhotal, who usually wears a T-shirt, loosely tailored trousers and brightly hued Hermès silk scarves (a far cry from the formal suiting that seems to be the watch trade’s uniform), approached the task with an open mind and a sense of humour.

Rather than adhering to the industry’s playbook, Delhotal began rewriting the rules and asking questions about the concept of time. “If you can’t differentiate yourself, you can’t exist,” he says. So he introduced Le temps suspendu (French for “suspended time”), an award-winning complication that allows the watch to be stopped with the single press of a pusher.

The innovative idea brought the house the acclaim that it had sought among the watchmaking community. It also created new opportunities to tell stories about the ultimate luxury that is time, riffing on themes such as the importance of having moments to yourself and being able to enjoy the present. This year the house has reintroduced its Le temps suspendu complication in refreshed versions, featuring an openworked dial and available in deep-blue, red or brown colourways.

The summer months are a time of sunny getaways and seeking a slower pace of life, and Delhotal seems to capture the spirit of the season with his optimism and relaxed demeanour. He has often turned to nature for inspiration. Some of his sportier, more casual designs, such as the Hermès H08, are fitted with an array of yellow and blue straps, which look particularly good on the beach. The Hermès Cut, another recent hit featuring a round, satin-brushed case and sharp angles, was introduced last year on the Greek island of Tinos. Alongside marble artisan Giorgos Palmaris, who works in an open-air workshop in the village of Pyrgos on the island, Delhotal spoke about drawing inspiration from the ways in which materials such as marble and steel are shaped.

The creative director of watches has made Hermès well-known for artistic, one-of-a-kind pieces featuring hand-painted dials and the same kind of intricate drawings that you’ll find on the house’s silk scarves. Now he is also experimenting with jewellery watches, rethinking what a watch should look like and how it should be worn. His latest design, Maillon Libre, can be clipped on a sleeve, pinned on a lapel or strung on a leather cord and worn as a necklace. Here, Delhotal tells Monocle about breaking design rules and viewing timekeeping through a new lens.

How did you approach the challenge of establishing Hermès as a serious player in watchmaking?
It wasn’t easy because from early on we were up against intense competition and a lot of important watchmakers. When it comes to mechanical movements, the big challenge is creating something different. We aren’t a watch brand – we’re a house that specialises in 16 different métiers – so we needed to have a movement that would prove to the horology community that Hermès was capable of entering this territory legitimately. In other words, we needed to chart our own path and come up with a compelling story. I quickly realised that this story should revolve around the concept of time. I wanted to talk about it in a different way than the rest of the industry and be a little unconventional. So we began discussing time that runs, stops and speeds up, as well as precious moments. Then we decided to explore the notion of stopping time and created a new complication based around this idea. We presented it in 2011 at Le Grand Prix d’Horlogerie de Genève and won. It was both a joy and a surprise. It allowed us to talk about Hermès as a maison that was daring to be different, to offer something that you wouldn’t find anywhere else. That’s our mission.

Why do you think the concept of suspending time has proven to be so compelling?
Horologists have always been making complications that are extremely precise in terms of telling the time but what we did is turn the concept on its head. When you stop time, it’s a moment of privilege that you can dedicate either to yourself or to others. Imagine a meeting in which you can talk without worrying about how much longer you have left or being in a space where nothing else exists aside from the present moment.

Le temps suspendu put the house on the watchmaking map more than 10 years ago. Why did you choose to return to it this year?
It has been three years since we activated the relaunch of the concept. But three years ago we weren’t in the situation that we’re in today, facing huge uncertainties both politically and economically. We all feel the need to escape, to talk about something else and take advantage of the present moment because the future seems so precarious.

Is that also why you’re doubling down on humour with this year’s limited-edition art watches?
Yes. We presented a watch that depicts a horse whose tongue sticks out because it’s funny. Watchmaking is a craft that is very serious. I have worked for many traditional watchmakers and that’s how they tend to be. At Hermès, it’s not that we’re not serious but we are different. We do things with lightness and people enjoy it. These days we need that, as well as a sense of fantasy that encourages us to stop and take a breath.

Do you draw inspiration from other departments of the house?
I’m always inspired by the silks, which are a canvas for so many types of drawing and colour experimentation. I find leather interesting too, especially when I’m researching colour. There’s a certain exchange between us and it’s interesting to see the collaboration between the silk, leather-goods and accessories departments. We share experiences because we are ultimately one house and all of our creations need to have stylistic coherence. The Métiers d’Art range of artistic, hand-painted dials is a signature because it reflects the drawings of our silk scarves. There’s so much richness and history in these drawings and every square also encourages us to speak about our heritage and play with colour.

As well as unique Métiers d’Art watches, you have also introduced more casual, sporty designs, such as the Hermès H08. Why is it important for you to have such a wide repertoire?
There are people who only wear one watch but others prefer to adjust to different situations. I would wear the Hermès H08 on the weekend because it’s more casual, while the Arceau is a watch that you can wear throughout the week. Every design has its own community. We have customers who are extroverted and fashion-forward and others who are a little more discreet. The diversity of our customer base is what makes it so interesting. Different times of the year also call for different watches. Sometimes people lean towards watches that are more elegant and jewellery-inspired, while at others they prefer something more sporty. We need to take advantage of this with a sufficient offer that caters to various types of people and occasions. If you only focus on one category, things become more complicated.

Your new designs, including the Hermès Cut and the Hermès H08, have been very well received by collectors. Do you see them becoming future icons?
The making of an icon happens naturally. You can’t control it. In perfumery, for example, there are certain scents that are iconic – Chanel No 5, Mugler’s Angel and so forth. But when they were being created, no one could have imagined that they would achieve this status. Even if you try to design an icon, it won’t necessarily become one – only time can tell. I simply design a watch and it’s either welcomed by the community or not. Sometimes it might not be the right time; at others, everything just aligns, from the trends of the moment to people’s interests. I hope that all of our watches will become icons but for the moment they’re not. We need to wait and see. It’s just like in the film and music industries: when an actress or a singer makes a great movie or song, people are quick to call her a star but in reality she’s not. A star is someone with a 30- or 40-year career.

You have been experimenting with making jewellery watches, including the brooch watch, which nods to the house’s anchor chain motif and also challenges a lot of watchmaking conventions. Was that your intention?
We had this idea of offering a new watch and a new way of wearing it. The anchor chain motif has existed for a century on our bags, on our belts and on our pocket watches – so why not tell a new story with watches and break some rules? That’s what makes you original. There’s nothing more boring than things that look identical. There are so many parallels in other industries as well: just look at cars or even clothing.

Having now firmly established the house in the world of Swiss watchmaking, what’s next?
We want to be more creative and audacious. Once you have built a solid foundation, you need to continue doing better. Every year we try to build on what we already have, just like in life. In this industry, you always need to be proving yourself and your ability to make things well.

How Diego Della Valle grew Tod’s into an Italian success story

The Milan offices of Italian fashion house Tod’s feel more like a high-end hotel than a commercial HQ. On the third floor of the Corso Venezia palazzo, past immaculate wooden and marble fixtures, Monocle is being served coffee in a light-filled room while awaiting the arrival of the brand’s patriarch and group chairman, Diego Della Valle, the third-generation family owner. He soon walks in through a side door, dressed in a navy blazer, his shirt collar riding up over a dark silk scarf. He sits down at the head of our table, placing a yellow notepad headed with his initials in front of him.

Della Valle oversees an Italian success story. In 2023 Tod’s reported annual sales of about €560m, while group figures (the Tod’s Group portfolio also includes labels such as Paris-based Roger Vivier and Hogan) topped €1.13bn. The company, which Della Valle’s grandfather started as a humble cobbler’s workshop, is now a global powerhouse. It’s still renowned for its shoes but has also branched out into everything from bags (Princess Diana was a fan and has a bag named after her) to ready-to-wear, the latter since 2005. The company is based in the family fiefdom of Casette d’Ete in the central Marche region and production remains in the area to this day.

Its continued investment in Marche’s artisan community, known for its mastery of leather, is what sets the company apart, says Della Valle. “We’re always looking to do difficult things,” he says, in a hushed, considered tone. “That means products that are difficult to make and also hard to copy.” He adds that, unlike a bag with a big logo emblazoned on the side, you can’t fake superior quality. “Every leather hide is different.”

As you might expect from a fashion player such as Tod’s, embodying Italy’s lifestyle – including its craft prowess, as well as its flair for quality and slower living – is part of its raison d’être. Indeed, one of the reasons why we are sitting around the table at the Milanese outpost of Tod’s is to celebrate the company’s new book, Italian Hands, the latest instalment in its coffee-table collection. The book tells the stories of Italian creatives and the artisans with whom they collaborate, from a glassblower in Murano to a master of terracotta. The limited-edition book, which puts the spotlight on what Della Valle calls “Italian good taste”, is filled with images of bag straps being braided, Gommino loafers being stitched and ceramicists’ brushes being dipped in sunny yellow pots of paint. The idea is to capture the company’s ethos of celebrating handcraft. There are barely any commercial or marketing objectives, with the edition only available to private customers.

For Tod’s, investing in the quality of life of in-house talent, as well as that of the broader community, is a priority. Whether it’s providing a crèche at the Marche headquarters and helping build an elementary school or financing the restoration of the Colosseum in Rome and Milan’s city hall, Della Valle is a strong believer in the positive social and cultural impact that successful companies can make – an ethos once followed by the likes of Olivetti and more recently Zegna, which has invested heavily in the Piedmont countryside. Della Valle talks about “the leadership role” that powerful companies must assume and the importance of helping to build something for their countries.

The publication of Italian Hands is also designed to celebrate the Gommino shoe – perhaps the best-known product in the Tod’s portfolio. Blending a leather driving loafer with a more technical rubber-studded sole, it became an instant hit on its launch in the late 1970s. The key was creating a shoe that could accompany both dress-up and dress-down looks and, by extension, be used throughout the whole week.

“At the time there was a world of elegant things but they were all formal,” says Della Valle. “And then there were things for the weekend but they were almost always technical and sporty. So what we did, quite intentionally, was to turn designs that were originally used for moments of relaxation into products that could also be worn with work clothing.” Part of the job involved what he calls “nobilising” rubber, which had previously been looked down upon in bourgeois circles, despite how practical and versatile it could be. Today you’ll spot as many pairs of Gommino shoes in boardrooms as you will in beach clubs – the most stylish wearers usually pairing them with linen shirts and bright-coloured trunk shorts, only to swap them for open-toe sandals moments before stepping on hot sand.

Della Valle might have been central to the Gommino’s genesis but he likes to credit the team around him, as well as his father, Dorino, who died in 2012 at the age of 87. Together they created a design icon that allowed Tod’s to enter fashion’s big leagues. However, around the same time in the early 1980s, Della Valle realised that the company needed to move beyond the family surname that it was using at the time. “My only request was to have a short name that was easy to pronounce,” says Della Valle. The idea was to move on to something that better reflected the company’s increasingly international market.

In 1984 the company was rebranded and renamed JP Tod’s (the initials were officially dropped in 1997), a choice that has plenty of lore around it. Some have suggested that the name was picked from a US phone book – a story that Della Valle says is only true in part. “Having a name that was a bit Americanised was a concept that was very much in vogue at the time among the big brands,” he says. “The people who came up with [our rebrand] were me, the typographer from my village and the owner of the printing press. Now there are 3,000 people doing that work.”

Like most large companies that are invested in makers, Tod’s has a talent pipeline to think about. Ensuring that people have “the desire to do [the work]” is at the forefront of Della Valle’s mind as he tells Monocle about the pride of the sewers who work at the Marche factory. Bottega dei Mestieri, a programme created in 2012, is a key part of this nurturing process. Artisans nearing retirement are paired with interns who often go on to work for the brand. “Young people give a bit of energy to the [older artisans] and they give back their wisdom in return,” says Della Valle, adding that instead of simply asking workers to show up and put their heads down, the scheme fosters dialogue between generations. “The artisan manages his own hands,” says Della Valle, turning philosophical for a moment. “It is very important for young people to understand the concept that if you are a craftsperson, you are truly free.”

As well as its nationwide largesse, Tod’s continues to build abroad. Recently the brand explored digital product passports to ensure that its supply chains are more traceable. It has also shaken up its ready-to-wear offering, with Matteo Tamburini, formerly of Bottega Veneta, joining as creative director in 2023.

Meanwhile, last year, Tod’s Group made the decision to delist and go private – a move that involved Della Valle stepping away from his role as CEO. (John Galantic, formerly of Chanel, now holds this position.) “It was the right moment to leave [the stock exchange] because we need to invest a lot in future development, which potentially is enormous,” says Della Valle.

As for what that future looks like, the chairman of the board and owner won’t give too much away, though he admits that he is interested in furniture and leather jewellery. And while he might be slightly less involved in the day-to-day running of the company these days, there has been no dip in his enthusiasm and his travel itinerary remains packed. He is already planning a swift return to Marche following his meeting with Monocle, then on to Morocco.

The key thing seems to be to stay true to what the brand does best: producing wares to the highest standard and achieving that delicate balance between novelty and continuity. “It’s important for companies like ours to never betray the quality,” says Della Valle, summing up his – and by extension, the company’s – ethos. “And we need to be absolutely modern.”
tods.com

An architects’ retreat where mid-century cottages stand amid unspoiled Finnish woodland

Pia Ilonen first visited Vähä-Kiljava when she was 12 years old. It was the 1970s and her architect parents, Pirkko and Arvi, were building a family cottage in the village, a popular holiday destination about 50km north of Helsinki. At the time, her mother and father were designing petrol stations for US petroleum company Esso; they decided to order one of the ready-made station structures and convert it into a house. Pia remembers the building site: initially, there was only the bright-yellow metal station skeleton with a hearth in the middle. “All of our neighbours remember our family,” says Pia. “We would be grilling sausages in the fireplace with nothing but a steel frame surrounding us.”

Some 50 years later, Pia’s car is under the cottage’s parking canopy and her two grandchildren are playing inside the house. The building no longer looks like a pit stop on the side of a highway; it now has a green wooden façade and a happily cluttered interior with large windows, an Alvar Aalto seating arrangement and tapestries on the walls. It has served as the family’s summer home for decades and Pirkko often hosted pancake parties on the terrace for all of the children in the village. Pia, who grew up to become an architect like her parents, is now trying to work out how to renovate the cottage, which her neighbours still refer to as the “Huoltoasema” (petrol station). It’s in need of new windows, a new roof and a fresh lick of paint.

Today the Ilonens’ house and most of the other cottages surrounding it belong to the Finnish Association of Architects (SAFA), a public-facing organisation that counts more than 70 per cent of practitioners in the country as members. It co-ordinates building competitions, consults on new legislation and represents the interests of Finland’s architects.

But SAFA also has a less publicised role: managing Vähä-Kiljava’s 25 mökki (cottages), which were built between 1940 and 1970, and most are rented to SAFA members. This curious collection of houses serves as a kind of open-air museum of Finnish mökki culture, as well as an extended experiment in what happens when a group of architects decide to spend summers in the wilderness together.

Vähä-Kiljava was established in 1936 when Väinö Vähäkallio, a prominent architect and the then-head of Finland’s building commission, decided to donate 30 hectares to SAFA for the purpose of providing a “recreational and holiday-making place for architects”. (There are competing explanations as to why he did so: some say that it was simply out of altruism, while others claim that he was in trouble for handing himself commissions and needed to curry favour.)

The plot was pretty: a gently sloping moraine covered in moss, spruce trees and porcini mushrooms, with a sand beach bordering the crystal-clear Sääksjärvi lake. The founding document spelled out the rules of the place: in addition to building a central venue with hotel rooms and a communal dining hall, plots would be given over to architects on which to create cottages. The document also specified that after the original tenant’s death, every house would become the property of SAFA and rented out to other members.

The community is still governed by these rules, says Jukka Karhunen, a founding partner at Hyvämäki-Karhunen-Parkkinen (HKP), the firm that designed the Helsinki Opera House in 1993, as well as many other public buildings. He welcomes Monocle to Vähä-Kiljava on a balmy summer’s day. “It’s the perfect combination of isolation and togetherness,” he says. “There is a community but nobody comes knocking on your door unannounced.”

Karhunen, who is wearing a striped T-shirt and shorts, is in a decidedly laid-back mood. He offers us a sparkling drink made from blackcurrant leaves. He and his architect-poet wife, Kati Salonen, are longtime residents of Vähä-Kiljava, spending several months there every summer. They read, swim, go mushroom picking, barbecue and wash dishes outside, before taking turns in the communal sauna in the afternoons. “We all agreed that you don’t talk about work in the sauna,” he says.

This mökki lifestyle – in which people of all walks of life spend their summers in the forest, ideally with no wi-fi or even running water – has become a trope of Finnish culture. Social equalisers of this kind are far less prevalent abroad, even in neighbouring Scandinavian countries. “In Sweden, those who were better off used to build seafront villas instead,” says Karhunen, pointing out that the mökki tradition is younger than many Finns imagine, only emerging in earnest in the second half of the 20th century. When planning started for Vähä-Kiljava in the late 1930s, it was still highly unusual to own a second home. “At that time, it would have been extremely rare for somebody to have a cottage,” says Karhunen. “Most people didn’t have a car.”

Nonetheless, Vähä-Kiljava thrived from the start. The people behind it first had to decide on the initial designs for a master plan, as well as a name for the site. Among proposals such as “SAFA-RI”, the association settled on the idea of borrowing the name of a nearby village, Kiljava, and adding a prefix paying tribute to the project’s commissioner, Vähäkallio. After completing the so-called “Kasino” – not a gambling den but an airy, functionalist communal building with a sea view and Artek-furnished interiors – the association announced a contest sponsored by a construction company to build a single-family cottage. The winning entry was a proposal by Jorma Järvi: a traditional red puutalo (wooden house) with asymmetrical windows and a sloping wall on one side. The jury, which included Alvar Aalto, praised the design for its “fun” and “thought-through” structure. The angular space contained a sleeping cupboard for children, so that a family of seven could fit into just 24 sq m. This foreshadowed the standard mökki construction that persists to this day – a spartan structure made from found materials at minimal cost.

The designers also took cues from Norwegian and Swedish sporting huts (or sportstuga), which were built out in nature and intended for sleeping in after days spent outdoors. This influence is clearest in Rake, a red-stained cottage that was completed in 1943. Designed by Kaj Englund, this compact square house is lined with bunk beds on two sides and wooden benches on the other two. It’s pared back and dimly lit, partly because it was built during wartime shortages. It’s also a favourite of Sari Nieminen, an architect who completed an exhaustive survey of the buildings in Vähä-Kiljava in 2013. She points out that the small windows are strategically placed so that somebody sitting at the table has a view out in all four directions. “Nature becomes part of the interior,” says Nieminen. “This is skilled planning based on how people would inhabit the space.”

Rake is complemented by a dozen or so summer residences, which were completed in the 1940s and 1950s, when the lakefront started filling up with baby boomers and their families. Households of seven could often be found packing themselves into tiny cottages. “I have never spent a summer anywhere else,” says Harri Hagan, who first arrived at Vähä-Kiljava in the 1950s. His family first lived in one cottage, which his architect father expanded. When Hagan started a family, he renovated the Vesikari cottage, which was originally built in 1946. “This was the Finnish Association of Architects’ land, so of course there were never any building permits,” says Hagan. He still spends almost half of the year in the well-tended cottage, which is set on a steep slope with a herb garden and has a generously proportioned firepit.

More experimental types of construction arrived at Vähä-Kiljava in the 1960s. Up the hill from Hagan’s house is the Mustikka, which is Finnish for “blueberry”, taken from the wild berry shrubs surrounding the house. Built in 1968, the cottage is believed to be a version of architect Kristian Gullichsen’s Moduli 225. This was one of Finland’s first prefabricated houses, for which all of the parts were factory made and could be assembled on site in less than a week. Its first resident, Riitta Thuneberg, had wanted the house to “touch the planet as lightly as possible” (like most of the houses, it is built directly on rocks) and insisted that everything in it be either yellow, white or orange. Though its current resident, Peter Solovjew, has relaxed the rules on interior decoration, he is strict when it comes to not harming the surrounding nature. “I don’t let anyone step outside the paths,” he says, as Monocle tiptoes away.

Further along the crest of the moraine is Pirunpelto, the cottage that marks the far end of Vähä-Kiljava. This house was built in 1966 by Ilkka Pajamies, who picked a remote plot next to an ice-age boulder formation known by the same name, meaning “devil’s field”. The starting point for Pirunpelto’s design was 17 pairs of glass doors, which Pajamies salvaged from an old building in Helsinki. These now make up much of the cottage walls. The architect spent an entire summer sleeping in a tent on the site before deciding on the placement and orientation of the building.

“He wanted to understand how the light changed,” says Pirkko-Liisa Schulman, its current occupant. When the architect moved in with her biologist husband, Alan Schulman, they were amazed how the midnight sun shone in through the patio and the full moon rose directly in front of the bed in August. “If you hang up anything, you ruin it,” she says. The couple have kept the original interiors with a fold-out dining table and kitchen that’s hidden behind Japanese-style sliding doors.

Construction at Vähä-Kiljava ended with the Ilonens’ petrol-station home in 1970 but the concepts pioneered at Vähä-Kiljava spread throughout Finland. The 1970s and 1980s were the busiest decades for mökki building, with the most common type becoming the modular wooden cottage that could be assembled on site. But while the level of mökki amenities has slowly risen – today most new builds are kitted out with proper heating and running water, if not a jacuzzi – Vähä-Kiljava has remained proudly primitive. There’s no tap water or sewage system and even electricity only arrived recently. “There’s often a discussion about installing water pipes and somehow improving the living standards here,” says Hagan. “But this is the enamel-bowl-and-root-brush lifestyle and it’s a good thing that it can still be found somewhere.” The traditional way of life also keeps the community closely knit, since only certain kinds of people are willing to sign up for carrying their own water, washing their clothes by hand and composting a dry toilet. “We’re trying to uphold the 1950s way of spending the summer,” says Karhunen. “It requires work. You can’t just arrive and fold out your deck chair.” Most maintenance at Vähä-Kiljava is carried out through talkoot: everyone in the community has to come together to carry out heavy tasks, with the reward of a barbecue and a spell in a sauna at the end. The midsummer festivities are famous and there’s an annual crayfish party that all SAFA members can join. Friendliness is essential, given the layout of Vähä-Kiljava, where there are no clear demarcations between adjacent properties. “One time someone put up a fence,” says Karhunen. “There was a village war.”

The values inherent in Vähä-Kiljava – besides providing a framework for designing a restorative holiday space – continue to guide architects towards a way of building that’s efficient and in tune with the environment. The houses are constructed with minimal resources and a do-it-yourself approach. It’s thanks to this that they all have ingenious space-saving solutions, elegant examples of recycling and reuse, and a sense of true closeness to nature. The village now draws a younger generation of Finnish architects, who can rent a mökki on a weekly basis, as well as international visitors, who can rent rooms in the Kasino.

Perhaps inspired by the upkeep required for their summer homes, many of the architects who spend time at Vähä-Kiljava have turned to preservation in their professional lives. Rake’s resident, Henna Helander, played a key role in ensuring that Aalto’s Paimio Sanatorium was preserved and turned into a foundation. Pia Ilonen helped to found Helsinki’s Cable Factory, an early example of an ex-industrial building-turned-cultural hub.

In her teaching, Ilonen often refers to Vähä-Kiljava. She points out how her parents didn’t worry about expensive finishes but instead thought about how the family would use the space, building private, tiny bedrooms and a flexible, light-filled living area. “I always make my students draw the floor plan of this house,” says Ilonen. Perhaps there’s more to learn from the mökkis that Finland’s modernist architects built in their downtime than the shopping malls, offices and petrol stations that they drew up during office hours.

Five Vähä-Kiljava cottages
With a host of Finnish architects calling Vähä-Kiljava home (at least, for the summer), there are many outstanding works on site. Here are five of our favourites.

1.
Aalto (1949)
This cottage was built by a lesser-known Aalto, Arvo, an architect whose firm designed Helsinki’s functionalist office building Lasipalatsi. The mökki represents a return to tradition that was in vogue in the late 1940s, with a pitched roof, painted windows and untreated wood. The cottage also has a spacious atelier.

2.
Koiso-Kanttila (1953)
Erkki Koiso-Kanttila built this cottage for his large family in 1953. There are small sleeping booths and a living room with floor-to-ceiling windows with a view of the lake. In an open competition in 2021 the Finnish National Museum picked Koiso-Kanttila as the quintessential Finnish cottage. The house will be moved to an open-air museum in Helsinki next year.

3.
Sommelo (1960)
This 1960 building by Pertti Luostarinen was thoroughly renovated by its current tenants, Ulla and Lasse Vahtera. The roof, wooden sheds, and entire garden were redone and the interiors were freshened up to take full advantage of the floor-to-ceiling windows facing the lake. The warm, airy space is now finished with an open kitchen and Artek seating in blonde wood.

4.
Savolainen (1967)
To build this house, Sulo Savolainen purchased a decommissioned bus, towed it to Vähä-Kiljava and placed it on a concrete base. The vehicle is covered by a wooden façade but the entrance is still a door of the bus and the beds are where the seats used to be. The bathroom is in what was once the driver’s cabin.

5.
Mustikka (1968)
This 30 sq m cottage is thought to be an interpretation of Moduli 225, one of the first modular houses in Finland. The system was designed by Kristian Gullichsen and features a series of square rooms that can be assembled according to need, featuring bright colours and wooden brise-soleils. The Mustikka is a one-bedroom version with a hearth that opens out both to the living room and the patio.

How three family-run French labels found new relevance in a crowded market

In France, the idea of patrimoine runs deep: the belief that knowledge and craft can sustain a business as it’s passed down generations. The small or medium-sized businesses associated with this notion are often inextricable from their communities, buoying local livelihoods while pulling in profit. But many heritage businesses have folded after decades of struggling against cheaper overseas competitors. Here, we meet three historic or family-run French brands that turned things around in choppy waters, leaning into their values to find new success.

1.
Heschung
Shoes

“This is the house where my grandfather lived,” says Pierre Heschung, the CEO of the Alsatian shoemaker that bears his family name, as he walks with Monocle past a building in his company’s compound. “My mother still lives here today.” Pierre’s daughter Salomé, who heads the company’s marketing and communications, introduces us to her grandmother, Suzanne, who is taking in the sun in a deckchair between the house and the factory entrance.

Pierre’s grandfather Eugène started Heschung – which now employs 35 workers nationwide, including 20 artisans at its headquarters – in 1934. After years spent working in a shoe factory, Eugène struck out on his own and began making the water-resistant boots that his brand has become famous for, using a special technique known as Norwegian welting. This involves sewing the shoe together using threads soaked in a special pitch; once the sole is stitched to the upper, the pitch hardens and seals the needle holes for extra water protection. The technique remains Heschung’s speciality.

The brand shot to national prominence in the 1970s after manufacturing the French Olympic team’s ski boots. In the 1990s it transformed into a fashion brand selling dress shoes and ginkgo calfskin footwear. In recent years, however, it has faced significant challenges. Sales were hit hard by the gilets jaunes protest movement, which forced shop closures as thousands took to the streets in Paris. The coronavirus pandemic followed soon afterwards and Pierre had to seek outside investors to rescue his now-endangered family firm.

The idea of merging the company with another shoe brand was briefly floated, with an eye towards exporting to China and the US. Some investors pressured Pierre to move production away from Alsace to cut costs but he fought back. The company eventually found a more like-minded partner in Philippe Catteau, the owner of the One Nation shopping mall in Paris’s affluent western suburbs, which pays special attention to showcasing premium French brands.

“I couldn’t let nearly 100 years of crafts- manship disappear,” says Catteau. He acquired 75 per cent of Heschung and invested €2m in machinery. A further €2m went towards estab- lishing new shops in Paris, the latest of which can be found on Rue des Saints Pères, a stone’s throw from Le Bon Marché. “Lowering the quality for short-term profits would have doomed the business,” says Catteau.

With Pierre nearing retirement, Salomé is preparing to succeed him as CEO. This allows the family’s partners to better plan for the future. “We’re thinking 20 or 30 years ahead,” says Catteau. “Naturally, it’s all about quality and being present in the market.” A young workforce and new cutting-edge equipment means that Heschung’s manufacturing operation is ready. “I hope to one day open the doors of our factory to our clients,” says Salomé. “I want them to be able to see for themselves how passionate we are about preserving our know-how.”

2.
Duralex
Tableware

Duralex’s general manager, François Marciano, is showing off one of the French tableware maker’s classic Picardie glasses. As he turns it in his hand, he fumbles, causing the dark-blue glass to fall and Monocle to scramble to stop it from smashing. When it happens a second and third time – the glass bounces harmlessly against the showroom floor on each occasion – it becomes clear that this is a party trick to demonstrate how durable Duralex is. “We’re the only glass-maker doing tempered glass like this,” says Marciano, explaining that the brand’s glass is several times more solid than the conventional stuff.

With its enduring design and almost unbreakable product, Duralex – a global household name – is a staple of school canteens and domestic kitchens. Established in 1945 near Orléans, its factory HQ is the sort of place that politicians visit during their campaigns to herald a titan of French industry. But the company’s recent history makes for less auspicious reading. It was sold by its then-owner in 2021 to the International Cookware group, the parent company of Pyrex; at times, the leadership seemed more interested in shareholders than safeguarding Duralex’s future. It has experienced six insolvencies since 1996.

When the company was placed into receivership last year, Duralex’s employees decided that enough was enough – it was time to return the brand to its former glory. They put forward a plan for co-operative ownership, known in French as a société coopérative et participative (Scop). Their proposal was accepted in court. Of the brand’s 236 employees, 64 per cent opted into becoming owners, which required a minimum investment of €500.

Drafted in at the time of the co-operative takeover, Vincent Vallin has spent a career at multinationals, including a stint in the UK. The cool-headed director of strategy and development is realistic about the task at hand. Talking to Monocle in a slightly old-fashioned boardroom with brand photos hanging on the walls, he is keen to point out that Duralex’s new ownership isn’t interested in austerity or cuts. There’s a clear plan in place. “The project is based on generating more cashflow by selling more and better, increasing the top line and the margin,” he says. “We also need to streamline the product assortment.”

Because banks won’t lend to Duralex as a result of its financial record, the company has generated funds by selling its HQ to the local municipality and leasing it back. These liquid assets should buy Duralex three years to turn things around, which Vallin believes is time enough. He intends to emphasise the brand’s simplicity and good design, as well as the fact that almost everything that goes into making the glass is French, including sand from Fontainebleau. The team must “extract more value out of the market and make Duralex more premium”, says Vallin. In short, it needs to be seen as more than just a basic tableware staple. It’s also becoming more entrepreneurial. “When I came in, there were only three sales and marketing employees,” says Vallin. “I hired three more for sales in France, five for export and five marketeers.”

On the factory floor, orange molten glass zips around the production line as automated arms hiss and thud. Even to non-expert eyes, it’s clear that the facilities need an update. But Duralex has one thing in abundance: heart. “I’ve given my life to this job,” says Stéphane Lefevre, a team leader who, like everyone else on the factory floor, is dressed in blue work overalls. “The co-operative wasn’t a choice. It was an obligation.” Lefevre has spent more than 24 years at the company and isn’t ready to give up on it yet.

There’s clearly a feeling that Duralex is finally in the right hands and it is ambitious about the future. Back in the showroom, Marciano is hovering around the glassware and food containers on display and enthusing about new items, from the recently released black espresso cups to premium pint glasses that are set for release next year. A new website launched in June, while in May, Duralex opened Café Duralex, its first bricks-and-mortar outlet in the French capital, collaborating with grocery shop l’Épicerie de Loïc B. (Another opened at the end of last year in Orléans.) There are also plans for a factory shop and a museum in La Chapelle-Saint-Mesmin in the next few years.

Duralex might be hitting the gas after its years of torpor but a slow-and-steady approach is still the order of the day. Marciano, the glass-dropping joker, turns serious for a moment. “With a brand like ours,” he says, “you can’t make mistakes.”

3.
Fournival Altesse
Brushes

The Oise department is best known for its chateaux and peaceful villages but this leafy enclave an hour north of Paris is also the last stronghold of a vanishing craft. Oise was once France’s brush-making capital, where artisans specialised in crafting elegant tools fit for the vanity tables of royalty. “At the peak of the industry, there were almost 100 companies making hairbrushes here,” says Julia Tissot-Gaillard, the CEO of Fournival Altesse, as she 1 welcomes Monocle to her company’s historic factory. “We are the only ones left.”

In a light-filled meeting room, rows of glass cabinets display Fournival Altesse’s detangling brushes, beard combs and more. Tissot-Gaillard picks up a wooden hairbrush made from boar hair, running her thumb across the bristles so they make a dry, satisfying sound. “It has to be stiff,” she says. “If you get one of these under your nail, it hurts – and that’s how it should be. If it’s too soft, it’s useless.”

Founded in 1875 by Léon Étienne Fournival, Fournival Altesse originally fashioned toothbrushes using ox bone, horse 2 bone or ivory. The business later expanded into hairbrushes, which became popular in Parisian pharmacies, perfumeries and salons.
It remained in the family for five generations until the early 2000s, when cheap imports began replacing the more labour-intensive French products. By the time Tissot-Gaillard stepped in to take over in 2016 (when she was just 28 years old), the company had been losing money for a decade. Her stepfather, Jacques Gaillard, a former owner of La Brosse
et Dupont group and a third-generation brush-maker, bought it in 2005 when it was about to go under. “He said to me, ‘Close the 3 company if you think that there’s no hope or bring it back to life,’” says Tissot-Gaillard. “It was a challenge but that’s exactly what I did.”

Tissot-Gaillard immersed herself in the manufacturing process, learning from the craftspeople. She soon realised that she had to raise prices. “We were making amazing, high-quality products, with so much skill and passion, but we were undervaluing them,” she says. “I told our clients that we were increasing prices by 100 to 150 per cent. Either that, or we closed. Thankfully, most of them stayed.”

Today, Fournival Altesse makes hairbrushes for brands such as Dior, Kérastase and La Bonne Brosse. “Almost all French-made hairbrushes of this kind in the world, no matter the brand, come from our company,” says Tissot-Gaillard. But the company also has its own flagship brand, Altesse Studio, to showcase its ancestral know-how. “For purists like us, a brush has to be made from wood and boar bristle is the only fibre that brings genuine benefits to your hair,” says Tissot-Gaillard. “A good brush will massage your scalp, stimulate blood flow and help nutrients reach the tips of your hair. It’s the most important haircare tool.”

In 2017, Altesse Studio earned the Living Heritage Company label, a mark of distinction from the French government for excellence in traditional skills. The factory, still on its original site, employs 50 people and most of the production is still done by hand, from shaping the handles to tipping the bristles. The only mechanised step – inserting the bristles into the brush – is done by 1950s machines, though the owners recently invested in modern models. “They’re the first machines that the company has bought in 30 years,” says Tissot-Gaillard with pride.

As consumers seek personalised, lasting tools that suit their hair types, consumer appetite for artisanal brushes is rising. Luxury haircare, which boomed during the coronavirus pandemic, continues to grow as a sector and is expected to be worth €28.58bn globally by 2032, according to Fortune Business Insights.

To satisfy this growing demand, Altesse Studio has a ‘Prestige’ collection, consisting of brushes made entirely by hand with olive wood and boar bristles of the highest quality, using a 19th-century hand-tufting technique. Costing €350, each brush takes six to seven hours to produce and is numbered, repairable and crafted to last. “We have adjusted the tufting technique and the bristles to suit any hair type, so a grandmother could pass it down to her granddaughter,” she says.

With those difficult years now behind it and a 150th anniversary on the horizon, Fournival Altesse’s future looks bright. The business is not just preserving heritage but proving that it still has worth. “Human values are important to us. If people are happy, they’ll do their best,” says Tissot-Gaillard, as laughter peals from the canteen nextdoor. “At lunch, we play cards. That’s part of it too.”