It feels appropriate that Lisa der Weduwe is wearing a T-shirt emblazoned with the words “TIME IS NONLINEAR”. As Archive Projects Manager at Camden’s newly opened Museum of Youth Culture, the 33-year-old is partly responsible for ensuring that this monument to youthful innovation is anything but a staid walkthrough where one historical event dutifully follows another. Instead, the colourful museum is vibrant and alive, with intermixed eras, cultures and formats all jostling for attention.

“One of our big arguments,” explains Lisa der Weduwe, holding court in the café on the museum’s ground floor just a few days after its grand opening, “is that the creativity and ingenuity of young people are what drives society forwards. That isn’t acknowledged, but I think it’s really important. Young people are so often at the forefront of social justice movements. Look at Extinction Rebellion and Black Lives Matter: young people have really been pushing them forward, changing things and opening up new conversations.

“It’s a potent mix where you have a sense of independence, but you don’t have the responsibilities of being an adult. You’re looking at the world with new eyes because you’re trying to set yourself aside from the generation that’s gone before you. Because of your brain development, you’re also more likely to take risks and go into things head-first. That has led to so much positive change and creativity, and we should be celebrating that.”

Der Weduwe and the team have certainly risen to this brief – not least because their cultural hub has no permanent exhibition; rather, three temporary displays pay tribute to adolescent rebellion. Like youth culture itself, the museum has many guises. To ensure its accessibility, you’re invited to choose a price for entry. It’s capped at £10, but if your price happens to be ‘free’, so be it.

The world’s first youth culture museum dates back to 1997, when London-based photographer and Sleazenation magazine co-founder Jon Swinstead launched the Photographic Youth Music and Culture Archive (PYMCA), a library of images from youth culture that he collected and maintained in his garden shed. From 2015, with the help of curator Jamie Brett, it became a public digital archive consisting of more than 100,000 items. After a brief period at the sadly shuttered Printworks in south London, the latest site is the museum’s first permanent physical home.

Ahead of the move to Camden, der Weduwe and the team were in two minds about using the ‘M’ word at all. “We were discussing whether to be a ‘museum’ of youth culture or something else,” she says. “Young people don’t go to museums. They’re the least likely group of society to [do so] because museums don’t do a very good job of catering to young people – they’re very good at catering to children and families.”

With a laugh, she admits: “We’ve done ourselves a disservice by calling ourselves a museum when it comes to bringing young people through the door – but we needed to do that for the gravitas. It says, ‘This is such an important story.’”

Located on St Pancras Way, a short walk from the punks and goths who still congregate on Camden High Street, the new venue heralds itself with a multicoloured mural that boasts “100 YEARS OF YOUTH CULTURE UNDER ONE ROOF”. Inside the industrial-looking building, you’ll find the aforementioned café and possibly the world’s coolest museum gift shop, courtesy of Rough Trade. You’ll also find an exhibition space that’s currently displaying ‘Dancing Down The High Street: Club Culture in Camden 1988–2000’, a collection of photos and rave flyers that evoke the last pre-digital party days that shook the streets right outside the door.

In addition to this, there’s a small library of books that reflect the museum’s mission statement, including Emma Warren’s Up the Youth Club: Illuminating a Hidden History. As I’m chatting to der Weduwe, a group of teenagers wander over to the bean bags scattered about the library and each take a seat, chatting and mucking about, confidently making the space their own. According to joint research by the YMCA and the trade union Unison, more than 760 youth centres closed in England and Wales between 2010 and 2020. If you’re a young person in the UK, this kind of ‘third space’ – somewhere that isn’t your home, workplace or place of education – is in short supply.

“Post-austerity, with the closing of all the youth clubs and [the decline of] youth provisions,” says der Weduwe, speaking over Klaxons’ Day-Glo nu-rave cover of ‘Not Over Yet’ as it pulses from the museum’s speakers, “in the last couple of years, there’s been a lot of discussion of: ‘How can we better support young people?’ We want this to feel like a place where you can hang out. We encourage people to sit and have a read, and we have a foosball table.” Plans are afoot for the museum to host an actual youth club and various workshops, too.

Downstairs, the hangar-like main room is currently occupied by ‘Subculture Street Party’, a vast photography exhibition that depicts teenagers stepping out in parent-baiting outfits throughout the ages. From a cardboard cut-out of a 1920s flapper astride a motorbike to a young woman scoffing a burger and chips after a night out at Deptford Northern Soul Club, the whole story is right here. “We wanted it to be joyful,” explains der Weduwe. “We want to start with a really positive message about how young people come together, curate and shape things.”

A second downstairs space contains the venue’s most interactive and perhaps most fascinating exhibition, ‘Things I lied to my parents about’. This oral history was devised and produced by the museum’s youth collective of participants aged between 16 and 23, who’ve gathered visitors’ handwritten testimonies of fabulous – and sometimes poignant – fibs. One, signed by “Phil”, reads: “Bracknell, 1980: At 15, I told my parents I was dating a family friend’s cousin, Dawn. It was actually a family friend’s cousin, Steve.”

The exhibition is based around a recreation of a teenager’s bedroom, replete with a bed you can sit on as you take it all in; this isn’t the kind of museum to have a finger-wagging sign telling you to keep off. All in all, it sums up a mischievous enterprise with a healthy disregard for doing what you’re told.

Before I head back out to the streets of Camden, I get chatting to a group of teenagers gathered in the library on the ground floor. It turns out they’re students visiting the UK on a class trip. “We’re from East Germany,” explains 19-year-old Marlene, who notes that self-expression was “forbidden” in the repressive climate of the German Democratic Republic before the collapse of the Berlin Wall in 1989. “It’s important to know what other countries’ youth cultures could do,” she says.

Sitting beside her, 18-year-old Eleni adds: “Youth culture is changing all the time. It’s a fight against rules, politics and the government.”

The Museum of Youth Culture reflects the kineticism and vitality of Eleni’s observation. Contrary to what the name might suggest, it’s not an exercise in nostalgia. This is a place where everything is always happening all at once – where 100 years of history, rebellion and youthful innovation dances towards the future, right before your eyes.

JJerome87 is the nomme de groove of Joe Newman, frontman with alt-J. Having got together while they were students at Leeds University, the brainiac band (then a quartet, now a trio) won the 2012 Mercury Music Prize for their debut album An Awesome Wave. Over succeeding albums – This Is All Yours (2014), Relaxer (2017), The Dream (2022) – this big-thinking outfit both refined and loosened their music. Art-electro, math-folk, hymnal-rock, alt-pop, call it what you will – none of it’s wholly wrong, all of it’s someway right.

On 2014’s ‘Hunger of the Pine’ they sampled their own remix for Miley Cyrus. On Relaxer, they covered ‘House of the Rising Sun’, but in a wholly alt-J way, stripping the varnish from The Animals’ take and finding the woody grain in Woody Guthrie’s version of the lyrics. Then, the following year, they released Reduxer: every track on the album redone, with inspired wing-people ranging from Little Simz to Pusha T to Rejjie Snow.

Now, two decades since their formation, Newman is going (hopefully temporarily) solo. And, wonky artist name notwithstanding, The Canyon is a top-to-bottom masterpiece of songcraft, production and accompanying visuals. Lead single ‘Brush Me Like a Horse’ is a magisterial, country-choral, spaghetti-western epic, with a chorus as breathtaking as Monument Valley. The accompanying video is appropriately widescreen, cinematic and surreal, the bastard offspring of John Ford and David Lynch.

The sprinting indie-guitar pop of second single ‘Track and Field’ is a celebration of athletics, specifically female competitors, with the inspiring video a feast of decades-spinning archive footage of warm-ups, races and sporting contests. Melody-wise, it could be a PB for Newman, which is saying something.

The Canyon opens with ‘Mr. Alligator’, a sun-baked blues that showcases both his remarkable singing range and this album’s masterful deployment of multiple (female) vocals. In the lyrical picture painted, it’s up there with the ripe Southern Gothic swirl of Nick Cave’s wondrous debut novel And the Ass Saw the Angel: “I'm a creature / Nice to meet yuh / I cooked quiche yeah / For the congregation / But I'm not to be trusted”.

‘Green Velvet’ is a feat of psych-pop engineering, interlayering glockenspiel, swinging organ, twanging guitar and another star-scraping chorus. In a nod to the city where the record was recorded, ‘Quaaludes’ evokes a soulful, wee hours drive across Los Angeles, albeit not while under the influence of the titular disco biscuits.

Aware that all that, only three tracks in, could be A Bit Much (but gloriously so), Newman serves up a pretty, 37-second piano palate-cleanser titled, yes, ‘Interlude’. Then it’s on with the show. The sleazy, shoulder-rolling ‘Juicy’ feels like either a frazzled day on a Californian beach or a fried night at an East London afters. Opening with the snorts and pounding of horses, ‘Walkaway Music’ is galloping surf-rock.

Then, coming immediately after the mighty ‘Brush Me Like a Horse’ on this boldly, brilliantly sequenced album, is ‘Two Hearts’. It is, in a wholly lovely way, cardiac arresting. A sweeping, strings-lifted ballad, it begins with the sound of Newman’s pregnant partner receiving an ultrasound scan and the sonographer saying, with an audible smile: “The lovely heart beating in the chest there… We’re dancing…” That baby, born in 2021, appears on the cover art (painted by Sally Dunne, also responsible for the artist-at-work visualiser for ‘Mr. Alligator’), standing at her daddy’s shoulder. It’s an image as moving as this wonderful ode to motherhood and parenthood.

It ends with ‘Pennine’, a swirling, jazzy, kaleidoscopic, brass-and-strings-and-kitchen-sink road-trip through Newman’s memories: “Slow motion heartache / compliments that landscape / on the train north to Leeds / painted over black night / slow motion landslide / street lights in towns I'll never see in day”.

A bittersweet, psychogeographic symphony? It’s the only way to close a truly exceptional album that manages to go out there while simultaneously hitting you in here.

When, for one of his first interviews, I talked to Myles Smith in early 2024, he was “just” a singer-songwriter whose viral TikTok covers (Amber Run’s ‘I Found’, Sweater Weather by ‘The Neighbourhood’) had recently landed him a major label record deal. The release of ‘Stargazing’, the global smash that would earn him the BRIT Rising Star Award a year later, was still four months away. But he explained to me the musical roots that had grown a songwriting skillset that had encouraged Sony to beat off 20 competing labels.

“I grew up as a young black boy in Luton, so I guess I wasn't an out and proud Coldplay fan!” he admitted with a laugh. “I definitely wasn't embarrassed about it. I just think that it wouldn't be the thing I'd mention first. But it would be the thing that I probably play first on my iPhone.”

Acknowledging the deep influence, too, of both Ed Sheeran and Labrinth, he added that he “was a fan of songs that connect to me. I was a huge Green Day fan growing up. That's a punk band from West Coast America and I'm in Luton screaming out 'American Idiot!' It was all about the music that moved me and spoke to me the most. And it wasn't always lyrical content. Sometimes it was just how it made me feel. Was it the guitars or the tones?"

Now, finally, after that huge success of ‘Stargazing’ and, also in '24, 'Nice to Meet You’ – both included here – comes his debut album. Kudos to Smith for taking his time. It’s certainly full of guitars and tones that will move his already staunch fanbase. And that, in his upfront discussions of his mental health challenges (see: 'Sertraline (Where Am I Now)’), will speak to them, too.

The rub with that is that the sad-boy-with-guitar confessional already feels overwhelmed – by the female power-pop of Rodrigo, Carpenter, Roan et al – and overdone. Overdone but not over, clearly: Lewis Capaldi is still packing them in, and Noah Kahan’s The Great Divide had blockbuster sales upon its release in April. But for all the undoubted accomplishment of Smith’s songwriting in My Mess, My Heart, My Life., it's hard to escape the feeling that this is a dated sound. Yes, already.

Again, to be clear, the songcraft is on point. The confessional ‘My Mess’ is a huge, emphatic opener, based around notes from his therapy sessions, that will surely raise the curtains on the 28-year-old’s increasingly large concerts. You can’t argue with ‘Stargazing’, nor the billion streams it achieved within 18 months. ‘Hold Me in the Dark’, Smith’s rich and resonant vocals buoyed by fleets of backing vocalists, has a chorus to balance your pints on. ‘Stay (If You Wanna Dance)’ hits the sweet spot between Coldplay and Kahan – and that is, for sure, commercially speaking, still hugely sweet. ‘Grandma’s Place’ is a lovely, hymnal blues that honours his childhood, familial safe place.

But elsewhere, overfamiliarity breeds meh. The boyband dance-lite of ‘Mary’s Song’ is less blues than Blue. ‘Drive Safe’, which features Niall Horan, and ‘Nice to Meet You’ are firmly in the tradition of the 2010s’ “Stomp Clap Hey” era, as Vice recently witheringly described it, those neo-folk singalongs embodied by Mumford & Sons, Of Monsters and Men etc. Altogether now: “woooaahhhh…”

The banjo-and-syncopated beats of the closing ‘Gold’ can’t escape that dread hand either. Worst of all, ‘Dublin Lights’ out-Sheerans Sheeran in its craven-ness, and is what happens when you instruct ChatGPT, “fiddly-diddly Guinness drinking song, but make it even more cringe”.

Say it again: great songwriting and great vocals make for a decent candidate for album of the year. But that year is 2024. Which, in these fleet-footed musical times, is an aeon ago.

According to my niece – staying for the weekend and alarmed by my constant playing of this ultra-emoshe album – I seem pretty much like a heartbroken teen/twentysomething girl. From global chart-topping smash ‘drop dead’ (“one night I was bored in bed / and stalked you on the internet”) to ‘what’s wrong with me’ (“say I’m in love, so it’s hard to admit / I can’t eat, I can’t sleep / I think you’re what’s wrong with me”) via ‘honeybee’ (“baby boy, honeybee / God, I love the way you look at me”), this album is lower-case lyricism with higher-stakes, dizzying highs and end-of-the-world lows. I’m not crying, you’re crying!

If there’s an equation that sums up the third album by this graduate of the school of High School Musical, it’s: relationship arc + Gen Z indie nostalgia + big pop songwriting = Taylor Swift for (mildly) alternative kids. Or, more concisely, it’s the fifth track, which is titled ‘u + me = <3’. This is all the feels, and then some more of the feels – quite possibly built from the wreckage of her last relationship, with British actor Louis Partridge – and brilliant for it.

Over 13 songs and 51 minutes, Rodrigo doubles down on the musical passions that made 2021 single ‘Good For U’ such a modern rock anthem – but also made it so indebted to Paramore’s ‘Misery Business’ that she had to belatedly add that band’s singer Hayley Williams and ex-guitarist Josh Farro to the writing credits.

The love of this 23-year-old Californian who grew up in the Disney dream factory for wintry British post-punk and indie is apparent not just in The Cure references (“you know all the words to 'Just Like Heaven' / and I know why he wrote them”) in ‘drop dead’ – a glorious opener and the lead single which, incidentally, has had almost a quarter-of-a-billion plays on Spotify in only two months. It’s there in the Joy Division bassline of ‘maggots for brains’.

It’s there, too, obviously, on the ‘the cure’, a near-five-minute epic that starts as strummy goth-pop and builds to a strings-drenched tornado of defiance and going-solo empowerment. And even more obviously on ‘what’s wrong with me’, a winsome duet with Robert Smith that’s giving tear-smeared make-up and dog-eared copies of NME from 1983.

It’s not just four-decades-old Anglophilia. ‘u + me = <3’ represents Eighties and Nineties indie’s American wing, evoking the 4AD-friendly sound of Throwing Muses and Belly. A slightly earlier era is channelled in the New Wave synth-rock of ‘my way’ is a hammering yowl of frustration and wholly thrilling – unless, ofc, you’re the dufus ex- who “never get[s] the message”.

Rodrigo’s Disney-princess vocals are also given their space to shine. They’re front and centre on ‘begged’, a pretty, finger-picked, folky lament. They’re jazz standard-worthy on piano ballad ‘less’, another blast of nostalgia, this time all the way back to the Fifties.

By the time we’ve been through all the stages of this life-changing/heart-bruising relationship and get to the closing ‘cigarette smoke’, Rodrigo is leaning into the existential woe of a clothes-rending romantic poet, singing of how “it’s bone dry / bitter and hollow / you will never know my sorrow”. Over more building guitars and more swirling strings and more howling vocals, here are five minutes and 40 seconds that – after all the love-and-loss-and-loathing rollercoastering that has gone before – could be, well, a bit much.

But such is the strength of the songwriting, the conviction of Rodrigo’s delivery and the relatability of the romantic drama – even for those of us who seem pretty unlike a heartbroken teen/twentysomething girl – that you’re fully invested, fully moved and fully smitten.

To re-cap: in November 2024 Jaguar was facing an uncertain future. Production on its existing fleet – great cars such as the F-Type, F-Pace and i-Pace – was coming to an end but without a clear path forward for this iconic British brand. Unable to compete in a marketplace increasingly dominated by German brands with much greater economies of scale, Jaguar had become an unprofitable part of JLR and this was not sustainable. The uncomfortable choice was to close down or to re-invent the brand. A transformation into an electric-only brand was needed, and the following month, at an event held during Miami Design Week a prototype EV model was duly unveiled to the world… occasioning a great deal of coughing and spluttering.

The concept launch generated headlines around the world and a staggering amount of publicity for the brand, but not necessarily of the right kind. There was uncertainty about whether this project would ever actually happen. Since then, there has been upheaval at JLR – not least the departure of Gerry McGovern, the design supremo and Chief Creative Officer who led JLR to extraordinary success over 20 years – while a great deal has also changed in both the industry and the world.

So where is Jaguar now? There is an actual car – the Type 01. Over the last few weeks, production prototypes have been shown to select journalists, culminating in a ‘launch’ in Monaco with almost-complete camouflaged cars driving on public roads in and around the principality. More importantly, the new Jaguar brand is itself coming into sharper focus. Back in Miami the message was all forward-looking with no references to the past. But that has been revisited and for the Monaco event, Jaguar’s best-of-the-best – an XK120 from the 1950s, an E-Type from the 60s and an XJS from the 70s - were celebrated as inspiration. That is quite a philosophical reversal and once again founder Sir William Lyons’ ‘Grace, space and pace’ is back on the agenda, or as MD Rawdon Glover put it, “First and foremost a Jaguar should be really desirable, really distinctive and provoke an emotional response both in how it looks and how it feels.”

So how did it look? Rather extraordinary. Jaguar has said the Type 01 is the first of three models, and as a four-door coupé, it is not small. Although the original concept was a two-door version, the camouflage could not hide the fact that much of the muscular original proportions are still there. Seeing a prototype on the street, as opposed to the studio, really brings a car to life, and The Type 01 is much more subtle than the original concept images suggested. Furthermore, the cars were in constant use over a couple of days, much of it at (very) high speed around the closed Monaco Grand Prix circuit (the event coincided with the Formula E series in which Jaguar is a leading competitor) and they just looked… cool.

Run-of-the-mill electric cars are a depressingly soulless bunch - apart from looking faceless, they often deliver power in the on/off manner and handling tends to be non-existent. That is absolutely not the case with the Type 01. Evidently, a huge amount of effort has gone into capturing the essence of Jaguar in a vehicle that is – as they say – ‘drivetrain agnostic’. The V12 XJ, XJC and XJS are all cited as inspiration and with the Type 01 you could imagine you had a super-silent V12 under the long bonnet in front of you. Which begs the question: does it in fact matter whether it is powered by a V12 or a brilliant electric powerpack if the effect is the same? The car is astonishingly quiet to the point of it being described by some testers as second only to a Rolls-Royce Ghost. Praise indeed.

Speaking of other brands… a couple of very significant things have happened in the last few weeks that are highly relevant to the Jaguar story. Firstly, Mercedes-AMG unveiled its GT 4-door EV coupé. This is not an attractive vehicle, exaggerating design themes from the already aesthetically-challenged EQS range. But worse, it creates artificial petrol-engine noise and a simulated gear-change feel. This lack of authenticity has been met with widespread derision. But second and even more curious, is the new all-electric Ferrari Luce, designed by Jony Ive and Marc Newson, which has had the Ferraristi united in uproar. It is a 5-seat SUV that looks – ironically – rather like an enlarged Jaguar i-Pace. Inside, you are deep in Apple world – indeed possibly the Apple car that never was? As you’d expect, the interior is beautifully functional, but it is the exterior that is so challenging. The Ferrari brand has always been about Italian style, beauty and desire, but those qualities are extremely hard to find here. This car could just as easily have a mass-market badge on it. Oh, and did I mention it costs over half a million Euros?

Both approaches underline just what an existential crisis premium automotive brands are facing in the world and times we are in. Drastic times call for drastic measures and Mercedes, Ferrari and Jaguar have each chosen a different route. Cards on the table – I want Jaguar to succeed. Very much. It has an extraordinary heritage and is one of Britain’s great automotive stories. A few weeks ago, before seeing Type 01, I was hopeful but – I have to admit - concerned. Having now experienced it and, perhaps more importantly, having seen how not to do it, I am convinced Jaguar is roaring back.

Twenty years after the launch of its celebrated City Guides, Wallpaper* returns with a new series uniquely positioned to introduce design lovers to vibrant cities, cool escapes and emerging, design-focused destinations. Fully revised with one-of-a-kind intel for today’s global explorer, the series launches with guides to four of the world’s most stylish, culturally active and exciting hubs: Milan, Paris, New York City, London.

Each of these beautifully produced pocket-sized books has been curated by a Wallpaper* writer intimately familiar with their destination’s most exciting neighbourhoods, hotels, cafes, restaurants, bars, retail and wellness experiences – as well as ideas for culture-rich weekend excursions. And we are just getting started. Future Travel Guides will not only visit landmark cities, but also cultural capitals, island idylls and creative hotspots across the globe.

Available to buy on Amazon and online at wallpaper.com/wallpaper-travel-guides

“I hope it makes you happy, to hurt somebody else / and when you lose it all, I hope you find yourself… / And that you get what you deserve… / so here’s a toast to the ones that hurt me most…”

On ‘Toast’, the opening song on her fifth album, Lizzo comes out fighting, albeit in a Great American Song-style piano ballad. It’s a magnificent flex, one that demonstrates her way with a jazz-angel vocal, her mastery of genres and that revenge is a dish best-served ice-cool and classy. The haters might come for her, but that’s no sweat – for Lizzo, this is “just a day in the life of an aspirational bad bitch…”.

The reclaiming of “bitch”, from the album title onwards and across the lyrics of these 12 tracks, definitely gets a little wearing. But Lizzo, certainly, has some anger to burn.

Late last year the quadruple-Grammy-winner prevailed in a court case against three of her former dancers. In a 2023 lawsuit they had accused her of fat-shaming. But as Lizzo clapped back in a victory video on social media: "There was no evidence that I fired them because they gained weight. They were fired for taking a private recording of me without my consent and sending it off to ex-employees." Still outstanding and ongoing, though, are claims from the dancers that they were subject to sexual harassment, claims that Lizzo denies and has vowed to keep fighting.

And fight she does on this album. As this musical powerhouse – who, in her long slog to success, endured a period where her home was a mobile one – sings on the minimal funk of the title track, which samples ‘Bitch’, the 1997 hit by Meredith Brooks: “‘She’s a bitch’… uh, you mean boss / you been through what I been through, you know the cost / if lost some followers it ain’t a loss / ’cause I ain’t lost sleep since I slept in my car”.

Whether it’s the litigants who are wholly the subject of her ire at “the ones that hurt me most” isn’t clear. Certainly they’re not always – the beginning of ‘Like a Crime’ paints the memorable picture of “me and my period fighting to the death, she just might win if I don’t take another breath”.

But indubitably and unavoidably on Bitch, Lizzo is fired up and darkly funny. Her impulse for finding the humour in her clapbacks is evident up front and centre, in an album sleeve in which the middle finger she joyfully serves is in the form of her own body, rising womanfully from her own, giant manicured hand. The doo wop-style ‘Whose Hair Is This’ is another retro sashay, a full-blooded, take-no-prisoners accusation against a partner after she finds an incriminating hair in their bed. Lizzo goes for the jugular before abruptly remembering, “Oh shit, I did have red hair last week”.

Revenge is also a dish best served as a banger. ‘That Grrrl’ (“say you don’t like a big bitch… I know you want my body”) is a techno-disco empowerment anthem that, with a strategic remix, could become an Ibizan summer staple. ‘Don’t Make Me Love U’ twins flashes of body positivity (“I’m a big fine woman, don’t lose your place in line”) to a ‘Billie Jean’ beat and a gloriously soaring, ’80s synth-pop keyboard line evocative of 'The Best' by Tina Turner.

She switches lanes again on the brassy, sassy wee-hours jazz of ‘Too Nice’, before ending, somewhat anticlimactically, with the blandly bopping ‘Good Morning’. It’s all a bit scattershot. But whether she’s processing her recent public spats or other, private, personal challenges, kudos to Lizzo for doing so less with bitchy bitterness than with winking pizzazz.

Long before The White Lotus transformed Taormina into television's most coveted address, the town attracted a different kind of pilgrim. Artists, aristocrats and writers made their way to this sun-drenched corner of Sicily in search of beauty, inspiration and, occasionally, escape. Among them was Oscar Wilde, who arrived in 1898 after leaving England and found solace beneath the Sicilian sun. More than a century later, the allure remains much the same.

Dramatically positioned on a rocky terrace between the Ionian Sea and the slopes of Mount Etna, Taormina is a place of extraordinary contrasts. Ancient Greek ruins overlook designer boutiques. Baroque churches sit moments from glamorous beach clubs. Narrow medieval lanes spill into piazzas framed by bougainvillaea, and the sea views are so arresting they appear almost theatrical.

Yet Taormina's enduring appeal lies in more than its undeniable beauty. There is an effortless sophistication to the town. Mornings begin with granita and espresso on sunlit terraces; afternoons drift between hidden coves, historic palaces and elegant hotels; evenings are devoted to long dinners, local wines and golden-hour views across the bay.

Whether you're visiting for a romantic weekend, a grand Sicilian tour or because you watched that show, Taormina offers a compelling blend of history, culture, gastronomy and glamour. This is your guide to where to stay, eat, drink and explore in Sicily's most captivating coastal town.

Where to stay

By the sea: Belmond Villa Saint Andrea

Villa Saint Andrea has lived many lives. First built as a private home for an English family in 1919, it then opened as a glamorous boutique hotel in the 50s. In 2010, it was acquired by Belmond and transformed into a luxury hotel right on Taormina’s shoreline. The design is midcentury modern – a nod to its past – in pastel blues, pinks and olive greens. Pack a good book to enjoy in the bar’s cosy reading nooks or poolside, with expansive views. The rooms boast balconies overlooking the Ionian and in the summer months, you can dine right on the water’s edge – just one of three restaurants on site, serving Sicilian fare, fresh seafood and Etna wines. Be sure to pop by the bar for a paloma made with smoky, pineapple-infused Mezcal. Shuttles run into town on the hour or take the cable car.

In the town: San Domenico Palace, Taormina, A Four Seasons Hotel

Perched on a rocky promontory, San Domenico Palace, Taormina, A Four Seasons Hotel is arguably Sicily's most renowned address. Originally a 14th-century Dominican monastery, the property seamlessly blends centuries of history with contemporary luxury, its cloisters, terraced gardens and elegant suites all oriented towards breathtaking views of Mount Etna and the coastline below. While its starring role in The White Lotus introduced it to a new generation of travellers, the hotel's appeal runs far deeper than television fame. Impeccable service, exceptional dining and an unrivalled setting just moments from Taormina's historic centre make it the ultimate base from which to experience the town's timeless glamour.

Where to shop

Feliciotto

Taormina has no shortage of luxury stores along Corso Umberto but Feliciotto is a unique offering. The concept store is split across two sites for men and women, on opposite sides of the street, and boasts a great selection of sneakers, vinyl, fragrance and clothing. Issey Miyake’s Pleats Please collection sits alongside Margiela tabis, Bottega Veneta shades and Carhartt jackets. The store even produces its own zine.

Where to eat

Granduca

Hidden behind an unassuming entrance in the centre of town, Granduca occupies a beautifully restored 15th-century villa that opens onto one of the most spectacular dining terraces in Taormina. Set across a series of gardens and sea-facing terraces, the restaurant commands sweeping views over the Ionian coastline, the Bay of Naxos and the ancient Greek Theatre. The menu celebrates classic Sicilian cooking, with fresh seafood, local pasta dishes and wood-fired pizzas sitting alongside regional specialities, but the setting is undoubtedly the main attraction. Arrive before sunset and linger over dinner as the sky turns pink above Mount Etna – few restaurants in Taormina capture the town's blend of history, romance and old-world grandeur quite so effortlessly.

The film to see…

The close friendship between Lucian Freud and Kate Moss is fascinating. Moss & Freud, it’s story on film, is written and directed by James Lucas and executive produced by Moss herself, after the director approached her in the script’s early days. Her commitment is testament to how much the relationship between the two of them meant, even if neither she nor Freud much cared for the resulting painting. Freud is played by Sir Derek Jacobi and

Ellie Bamber gets Moss’s mannerisms perfectly after spending time with her. As the nineties endures as a moment for vintage inspiration, it’s startling too to see early noughties Notting Hill (where Freud lived and worked) put on screen as a moment in very recent history. In cinemas from 29 May.

The exhibition to see

At Tate Modern Frida: The Making of an Icon runs from 25 June to 3 January. As well as gathering a huge once-in-a-lifetime collection of her own work, the show will include many works by artists she inspired. If you have the stamina it will also make for a fascinating double viewing with Dame Tracey Emin’s A Second Life which you can see concurrently until 31 August. And if it’s your own walls you’re thinking about, it’s time for the Royal Academy’s Summer Exhibition (16 June to 23 August). Members' preview days in early June give you the best chance to add a red dot and take something home. This year’s theme is Interconnectedness.

The theatre to see… 

Carrie Cracknell’s Old Vic production of Tom Stoppard’s masterpiece Arcadia moves to the West End with the Duke of York’s theatre being newly renovated into the round for this production, which runs for 12 weeks from 20 June. It’s a great way to toast a beloved intellectual giant of our time.

Meanwhile in Waterloo, The Old Vic’s winning streak continues with Glengarry Glen Ross reimagining David Mamet’s fast-paced real estate masterpiece for a snappy all-female cast, including Indira Varma. Directed by Patrick Marber, from 4 June to 18 July.

The collaboration to look out for…

After the thrill of sculpting a Kardashian, bringing a moment of true pop art mastery to the Met circus, closer to home see more work from the legendary British artist Allen Jones at Camden Arts Projects this summer (5 June to 30 August). Curated by his artist admirer Philip Colbert, this celebration of new and recent work is staged in collaboration with Almine Rech.

The event to attend…

Dalkey Literary Festival (18-21 June) overlooking Dublin Bay has speakers including local heroes Roddy Doyle, John Banville and Anne Enright alongside Sir Salman Rushdie and Charlie Mackesy. To do it in luxurious style, book into The Westbury, or at the very least head to the award-winning The Sidecar cocktail bar.

The album to buy …

What happens when you set out to write an album about being in love and then break up halfway through? Well, if you're Olivia Rodrigo you turn it into a concept album, starting with a first date and ending somewhere quite different. For third LP, You Seem Pretty Sad For A Girl So In Love, last year's Glastonbury headliner explores the complex spectrum of emotions that comes with being in and out of a relationship. Much of this album was written here and she promises a big dose of her own “London vibes".

The TV to watch...

Cape Fear takes inspiration from a classic 1991 Scorsese/De Niro collaboration (1991) and is retold for long-form TV, starring Javier Bardem in the De Niro role over ten episodes. The remake comes with Scorsese’s blessing – along with Steven Spielberg, he is an executive producer on the series. The stellar cast also includes Amy Adams and Patrick Wilson. Get yourself hooked, as a compulsive psychological thriller is a great heat wave aid for any British summer nights too hot to sleep. On Apple TV from June 5.

The book to read…

As the centenary of Marilyn Monroe is celebrated this month all over the world, with highlights including the exhibition at the National Portrait Gallery ​(4 June to 6 September) and the BFI’s season, settle in with Andrew Wilson’s biography which is finally a life to do her justice at a 100. After decades of sensational – or at best variable – lives, I Wanna Be Loved By You: Marilyn Monroe A Life In 100 takes (Simon & Schuster) is a superb cinematic guide, told through a series of cumulatively revealing snapshots. A great companion to this is Marilyn and Her Books: The Literary Life of Marilyn Monroe by Gail Crowther (Corsair) which goes to Marilyn’s rich inner life through close attention to her library... Happy birthday Marilyn and here’s to these new, far more subtle appreciations of her unique place in the canon of 20th-century artists.

Beatles archaeology, hagiography and lore: we, obviously, can’t get enough of it. From Sam Mendes’ in-production quadrilogy of interconnected Fab Four biopics, to the BBC’s also-in-production series Hamburg Days, about the band’s foundational, speed-fuelled, 10,000 hours in the rackety German port, via endless repackages and re-releases of their music, John, Paul, George and Ringo’s past is forever present. From next year, it will even be with us in bricks and mortar: their former Apple HQ at 3 Savile Row will become seven floors of “ticketed experience”.

No one knows that better than Paul McCartney. In 2013, I accompanied him to Japan, a leg of a huge and ongoing, arena-scale world tour that evidenced a fandom as staunch as ever. When I asked him to explain that ceaseless drive to perform, and perform heavily, still, he replied: “It’s something to do with the sort-of-legend being a kind of avalanche coming behind me. I’m running down the hill from this avalanche of fame.”

Well, now, for his 18^th solo album, Paul McCartney has decided to turn and face the strange; to let the avalanche wash over him and dig into the formative, rubble-strewn landscape it had covered and concealed.

So, on The Boys of Dungeon Lane he takes us back to Liverpool L24, to the post-war cityscape that formed him and his bandmates, to the terraced houses and birdwatching spots, to the memories of his three closest pals, to the “smoky bars and cheap guitars”.

He sings of the latter on ‘Days We Left Behind’, a simple, beautifully sketched elegy with a glorious melody that, boldly and brilliantly, lets us hear the years – and strains – in McCartney’s voice. There’s similar honest nakedness – of wear’n’tear, and of emotion – in ‘We Two’, a tale of partnership/kinship recorded on a four-track Studer tape machine McCartney rescued from Abbey Road. It revels in the memories, and in the creaky majesty of the basic tech – this is the gear with which they somehow made Sgt. Pepper’s – that The Beatles used to conjure magic: it ends with the squiggly sound of tape being rewound.

Magnificently, McCartney’s facility for the three-minute pop song is undimmed. These 14 songs – produced with hotshot 35-year-old American musician/writer/producer Andrew Watt (Miley Cyrus, Ozzy Osbourne, Lady Gaga) – run to 47 minutes, meaning few of them crest that totemic mark. And when they do, as on the near-five-minute “epic” opener ‘As You Lie There’, he stretches out into a rock’n’roll symphony that plays to the strengths of his own multi-instrumentalist musicianship – he’s listed as playing 22 instruments, although that does include "hand claps".

Yet even those short songs are crammed with detail (of course they are). The skiffley ‘Down South’ is a travelogue recalling he and George Harrison’s fondness for hitchhiking (“it was a good way to get to know you, a fine way to work it out… before we learned to twist and shout”). The stomping ‘Home to Us’, a collaboration with Ringo Starr (with backing vocals by Chrissie Hynde and Sharleen Spiteri), recalls a city scarred by war and poverty: “the world around us wasn’t safe, the place was falling down”. The mournful mariachi of ‘Salesman Saint’ is a tender tribute to hard-grafting parents in the Liverpool suburbs who, with their wartime baby, “couldn’t take any more, but they had to carry on”.

Here, for once, nostalgia isn’t what it used to be. The Boys of Dungeon Lane is a candid, emotional, forensically detailed reflection on McCartney's – and The Beatles’ – roots that makes for a vital record for here and now.

Will we still need him, will we still heed him, when he’s 84, the age he turns this month? Yes, indubitably, remarkably, gratefully, we will.

Amid the homogeneity of the modern airport, there is always one thing that cuts through – that person with the aluminium case. One can’t help but notice it – those bevelled edges, the riveted silveriness of it, those eerily quiet wheels. In a universe of tired plastic luggage, the aluminium case is a beautiful alien, one that is as coveted by short-haul business warriors as much as dedicated fashionistas, and that’s because neatly packed into its chiselled contours is status – and everybody wants it.

In 1938, oil man and serial entrepreneur Erle P. Halliburton had grown so fed up with his leather and canvas bags disintegrating in the Texas oilfields that he commissioned aircraft engineers to fashion cases from lightweight, corrosion-resistant aluminium – necessity, as always, the mother of ingenuity. Little did he know the result would become a style statement.

Almost 90 years later, Zero Halliburton is still going strong. Besides looking good, aluminium’s advantages are self-evident: feather-light (sub 5kg for most carry-ons) yet tough as they come, while hermetically sealing your belongings. In short, not just a pretty face. On these pages, the finest iterations that money can buy.

Leading into the release of his second solo album, Radiohead guitarist Ed O’Brien has been upfront about the darkness that prefigured the light.

After Radiohead’s last world tour (that is, not counting last autumn’s 20 shows in five European cities), in 2016/18, he felt done – burned out and bummed out with the life of the rock star member of a big band. As part-corrective he released, under the name EOB, solo debut Earth – a record inspired by him and his family’s time living in Brazil – in early 2020, right as the Covid pandemic hit. Then, during the lockdowns, at his home in Wales, he started falling. Emotionally, mentally, helplessly.

But in the Welsh countryside he eventually found healing, in nature and in music. It was a time of rebirth and ritual, a process documented in a lovely short film, Blue Morpho: The Three Act Play, directed by Kit Monteith.

“The midlife crisis, or whatever you wanna call it…” O’Brien, 58, began, searching for the words, as he launched the film at North London’s Screen on the Green cinema in March. “We as a society call it mental health… But mental health doesn’t feel like an adequate description. It’s something way fucking deeper than that. It really is. It’s a crisis in your soul.”

But he was one of the lucky ones.

“I’m very blessed, [with] my day-job. [In] the mothership, Radiohead, I don’t have a boss. I don’t have to go to work. So I don’t have to medicate to get through it. So I was able to really be in it. Then it’s like alchemy – as musicians or creators, we take this stuff, this darkness. And there’s a beauty in darkness.”

That beauty is now here in the seven songs that make up Blue Morpho. Named, as all we lepidopterists know, after the magnificent butterfly found in Central and South America, it’s 38 minutes of incantatory, rhythmic soul-seeking. A truth-chasing odyssey around the sun of O’Brien’s psyche, weaving a beguiling path between psych rock and prog rock, with the route plotted by producer Paul Epworth (Adele, Florence and the Machine) – the perfect space cowboy companion for O’Brien given the sky-high/soul-deep explorations of his own 2020 solo album Voyager.

It starts, appropriately enough, with ‘Incantations’, a seven-minute-plus indie-shamanic groove. The title track opens with birdsong, and with glorious strings and a winding, entwining melody that would hold their own on Nick Drake’s Five Leaves Left. On ‘Sweet Spot’ O’Brien’s voice, reliably in-the-pocket supplying harmonies stage-right with Thom Yorke, is a breathed, murmured, considered delight.

Then, with the hypnotic funk of ‘Teachers’, O’Brien circles back to how we, eventually, got here. “Midway through life I just lost my way, lost my way,” he intones, before the band – featuring fabulously limber guitarist Dave Okumu (Jessie Ware, Anna Calvi) – let rip with a cosmic, shape-throwing breakdown (the good kind). O’Brien may have lost himself but here, at least, he finds himself on the dancefloor.

O’Brien pushes out even further on the final ‘Obrigado’, a near-10-minute stretch of healing that suggests tropicália remixed by DJ Shadow. In an album that artfully mixes exquisite vibes, songwriting production and “feels”, this final epic is primus inter pares: a Floydian broadcast from the dark side of the moon that heralds a man coming back down to earth – back to himself – with a life-giving bump.

A beach club is the place to lose hours in the most gloriously barefoot manner possible. Call it a more alluring version of the quicksand effect; whether it’s down to Sancerre or Sangria, or just plenty of sea time, before you know it, sunset hits in the blink of an eye. From Amalfi to Antiparos, these fabled places offer plenty of restorative and indulgent fun, with generously spread-out sunbeds, not to mention platters of crudo and grilled seafood, best enjoyed after that first swim of the season.

After 60 years, Da Adolfo on the Amalfi Coast remains one of the most intensely rapturous (and languorous) daytime beach restaurants in the world. On the storybook, shingled Laurito Beach, a few coves around the coast from Positano, Sergio Bella and his wife Miriam maintain the properly egalitarian magic his parents created in the summer of 1966, and it remains as much a place for fishermen as it is for film stars and finance bros. It is like one long letter to a rarefied world of carefree joy, with the sonic haze of cicadas and a ’70s Rino Gaetano song playing in the background. Getting here is half the adventure, whether by water taxi or the restaurant’s cute wooden boat (crowned with Da Adolfo’s charming red fish logo) that chugs backwards and forwards to Positano every hour. The holiday merch is also divine, and you will want to take home the T-shirts emblazoned with that famous fish design, which also appears on the cutlery packets that adorn the ramshackle trestle tables.

And then there is the food and drink that is excellent and plentiful; order jugs of chilled Marisa Cuomo wine with white peaches, mozzarella grilled in lemon leaves, followed by the best zuppa di cozze (mussel soup). Yes, six decades on, the restaurant still serves food that tastes properly of summer – and the sea.

Just wait until you try the vongole at the new Le Sirenuse Mare beach club that recently opened further down the coast in Nerano. It’s the new hotspot from the bewitching hotelier family, the Sersales, who execute the perfect iteration of a modern-day dolce vita homage, with 1950s aquamarine-striped parasols and sunbeds, multi-layered terraces with chestnut wood pergolas jutting overhead and a statement Giuseppe Ducrot fountain that sits at the heart of the main restaurant, framed by fragrant Aleppo pines. Then there is the Dolce Far Niente Bar, which excels in imaginative spritzes, not to mention Rose’s Bar, named in honour of the British artist Rose Wylie. It’s as chic as it is romantic, cocooning you in a style that Ripley’s Dickie Greenleaf and Marge Sherwood would have appreciated.

For something that miraculously manages to be both bling and bohemian, Maçakizi in Bodrum is on another level. Sitting on a secluded bay, with a ley line of happiness seemingly running through this beach-club-with-rooms, you will relish eating bowlfuls of cherries on ice or stuffed vine leaves and lahmacun, the most addictive Turkish pizza. Our advice is to get the front-row beds on the far left to maximise tanning time. New this season is Maçakizi’s private yacht, Sentimental, designed by the hotel’s owner (and cigar connoisseur) Sahir Erozan, a man who certainly knows how to throw a good party.

For something a little more sedate, the beach restaurant La Table de la Plage at Domaine de Murtoli in Corsica is the holy grail. As well as being aesthetically pleasing, with its immaculate, purple linen-dressed tables overlooking a vast swathe of golden sand, the food is unparalleled. It’s a menu you could truly eat on repeat: lobster pasta, salt-baked sea bass and delicious yogurt and blueberry ice cream.

And if Odysseus was looking to return to the best beach club in Greece, he would forgo Ithaca in favour of Antiparos, seeking out The Beach House, a dream Greek island idyll of whitewashed walls and powder-blue shutters. Here, hotelier Athanasia Comninos has cranked up its mythical beauty that is both refined and imaginative. It’s also a summer-taste odyssey, the food whipped up by an outpost of the Athenian restaurant Cookoovaya, renowned for its grilled octopus – the best to be had in all of the Cyclades. Better still, dinner here is served early – the kitchens close at 10pm sharp – so you have the whole beach to yourself to watch the moon rise before slipping into bed. ■

One of the surrealist art movement’s most compelling figures, British-born Mexican artist Leonora Carrington is best known for her painterly dreamscapes, featuring fantastical quasi-human forms, both cosmic and horrific. Her latest exhibition, Leonora Carrington: The Symptomatic Surreal, at the Freud Museum marks the first time her paintings have been displayed in London for 35 years.

Told through Carrington’s sketchbook drawings and letters from 1938 to 1941, the exhibition traces her escape from Nazi-occupied France, following the arrest of her lover, the German surrealist Max Ernst, to her hospitalisation in Peña Castillo sanatorium in Santander, Spain. During this time, she suffered a mental breakdown that sent her spiralling into severe psychosis, prompting doctors to subject Carrington – then 23 years old – to brutal Cardiazol shock therapy, while encouraging her to draw her experiences obsessively. Several of her works, most notably the seminal painting Down Below (1940), reflect on her psychic disintegration, also chronicled in her memoir of the same name: ‘I didn’t know where I was going. This seems to be a recurring thing in my life. I think it’s death practice.’

Giving form to her experience through alchemical and underworldly symbolism, the works see Carrington imagine herself as a cadaver, transforming the hospital into the world of the dead, with a lavish and masked cast of non-human characters drawn from myth, folklore, religious rituals and the occult. The exhibition is accompanied by extracts from Carl Jung’s Psychology and Alchemy, which greatly influenced Carrington’s work. Juxtaposed alongside the works are antiquities from Freud’s personal collection, such as an ancient Egyptian statue of Anubis – the half-human, half-dog deity of the afterlife – and several horse statuettes, an acknowledgement of Carrington’s horse alter ego and both individuals’ shared interest in the transformative properties of death and the unconscious realms of experience.

A deeply personal portrait of transformation, Carrington’s Santander sketchbooks depict her profound journey through the subterranean world of her psyche, culminating in her reincarnation as a hybrid and quixotic being: ‘an androgyne, the Moon, the Holy Ghost, a gypsy, an acrobat, Leonora Carrington, and a woman,’ as she writes in Down Below. Through this interconnected lens, themes of death and rebirth are reimagined as sites of potential, where the metaphysical dimensions of experience present an intimate understanding of otherness in all its shapeshifting forms. B

Leonora Carrington: The Symptomatic Surreal is showing until 28 June 2026 at the Freud Museum London

Maisie Peters was on BBC One’s The One Show when the boss called in to tell the nation what was good about her and why he’d signed her to his record label.

“[I] started off as a fan and then I met her and she’s a very, very fun girl. Very personable. But her songwriting ability was the first thing that was really striking to me, and how she portrays her emotions. She kind of reminds me a lot of myself at that age in what she writes about. I’m thrilled to be working with her.”

When the boss is Ed Sheeran, those words matter. As the singer-songwriter from smalltown Sussex, 21 at the time of the call, pithily pointed out, Sheeran – as well as running his own label, Gingerbread Man Records – is “obviously king of the radio and of England”.

Five years on from that chatshow moment, Peters recently announced her third record with another hefty co-sign: the Amelia Dimoldenberg-directed “album trailer” for Florescence. It features the musician scurrying around dressed as a daisy, tangling with a hen party and with a woman dressed as an olive. Naturally.

Florescence, as all we horticulturalists know, is “the process of flowering; the process of developing richly and fully”. Which is what Peters, now 25, has been doing for the past year. It’s a (re)growth that began after a whirlwind few years’ performing and touring – and supporting Taylor Swift, Coldplay and Noah Kahan – that washed her up, at the end of 2024, physically and mentally frazzled.

Cue reset, and cue trip to Nashville to work again with longtime collaborator and co-producer Ian Fitchuk (Kacey Musgraves, Chris Stapleton). Cue, too, luckily, the blossoming of a new relationship with her high school sweetheart. As she sings on the impossibly pretty, Paul Simon-esque ‘Audrey Hepburn’, “my heart was a hellhound, now my heart sits on your lap”.

Peters’ love dividend is all over this articulate, honest-sounding, refreshingly downhome album. For all her heavy-hitter backers, in an era of “pop girlies” going hell-for-leather-hotpants (no judgement), Peters is going full Sussex. Not so much try-hard as try-easy, Florescence is 15 tracks of sweetly sung, deftly played, country-tinged, lightly beats-flecked acoustica.

With that confidence and contentment comes a disarming candour. As she sings on the whispered, simple, stark opener ‘Mary Janes’: “My body’s not a temple, more a bachelorette pad… my teeth aren’t straight, my jeans are as cool as my music taste… I’m not the coolest or the greatest in the club, it doesn’t matter… who gives a fuck, when I’m in love…” Which is the kind of confessional that is, of course, cool AF.

‘Kingmaker’, a collaboration with American songwriter and singer Julia Michaels (co-writer no less of Justin Bieber’s unapologetically brilliant ‘Sorry’), floats on gentle upward draughts of synths and is a low-key banger. ‘Vampire Time’ is an earworm pop-folk anthem, complete with fiddles and flurries of harmonies, that will undoubtedly incite Peters’ rabidly engaged fanbase, as will ‘My Regards’, a Swiftian (Taylor, not Jonathan) masterclass in electronica-lite exuberance.

As for the Nashville influence: that’s most directly evidenced in the wondrous, woodsy ‘If You Let Me’, a collaboration with, er, Wimbledon-raised Marcus Mumford, where the blend of his grainy tones and her bell-clear country vibes is truly transporting.

By the time we get, eventually, to the final, 15^th song, the enraptured, Chris Martin-swaying-at-the-piano ballad ‘Nothing Like Being in Love’, we’ve fully felt Maisie Peters’ reinvigoration. Slightly overlong growing season aside, Florescence is bloomin’ marvellous.

Later this month, the New Zealander born in 1990 as Hannah Topp heads out on tour.

The singer-songwriter – who was long based in Cardiff but is now back home – starts in Brighton, does three nights at the Barbican in London, wiggles round England, Scotland and Ireland till June, then continues round Europe throughout the summer. She winds up on the eastern side of the Atlantic at Wales’s Green Man Festival in late August, hits America and Canada for a month, before finally pitching up in Australia and New Zealand in mid-November, as spring shades into the southern hemisphere summer.

It's a lot of touring for anyone, far less for an “indie-rock enigma” (© what’s left of the music press) who’s become progressively more reluctant, in the dozen years she’s been releasing albums, to engage with the media. She hasn’t even approved a record company biography – standard promotional practice round an album’s release – in a decade.

Talking to The Guardian in 2019, Harding admitted that she’d decline to respond to questions “if I don’t feel like the answer’s going to come out in a natural, musical way”. Talking to Pitchfork in 2022, she framed her unwillingness, or inability, to describe her music thus: “It’s like somebody who doesn’t like to dance because they don’t like their body. Suddenly I’m in the middle of the floor, and I’ve got my hips working, and I just feel awful. You know?” We know.

And it’s a lot of touring for an album as wondrous, beauteous, shimmering and borderline fragile as Train on the Island. It’s her fifth album overall, her fourth in a row recorded at the legendary Rockfield Studios, Monmouthshire’s psychogeographical hotspot where rock’n’roll meets farming, and her fourth with co-producer/musician John Parish (PJ Harvey, Dry Cleaning).

That said: this is “fragility” built on stout and robust songwriting, and on production that is vividly curlicued in its detail. Once a Harding melody worms in, it stays there, curving and curling, entwined and nagging. When a Harding song unfurls, its sonic details unveil like patterns on a butterfly wing. These 10 tracks are spellbinding perfection.

The title track is a five-a-minute, lazy-jazz epic recalling Laura Nyro. The opening ‘I Ate the Most’ is beguiling folktronica, Harding’s close-mic’d voice and self-harmonies right up in your ear. ‘One Stop’ is an irresistible marvel of piano-ballad chamber-pop, conjuring both striking imagery (“I met the real John Cale, he had no words, but I don't mind, I packed the stage while he ate rice”) and, should the mood take you, as evidenced by Harding’s gyrations in the video, some sweet moves.

There are, too, gyrations of the clock-stopping, jaw-dropping vocal and instrumental kind. ‘San Francisco’ has a quiet sprawl, shifting from a loose, country-bluesy swagger, to spartan jazz torch-song, to pure singer-songwriter acoustica the next. ‘What Am I Gonna Do?’ evokes the PJ Harvey of Let England Shake era, with its tumbling rumble of drums, organ and harp, and its different manifestations of the multiple-personality Harding voice: low murmur, high keen, Laurel Canyon folk sweetness.

‘If Lady Does It’ is another perfectly executed mix of the baroque and the skeletal – one minute, just drums organ breaths and whispered vocals; the next, a rising and falling and finally fading tide of piano, acoustic guitar and that shimmering voice.

This is Train on an Island all over: a rewarding headphones record, and a record to be joyously shared. At those live shows, the sound of pins dropping will be cacophonous.

Swimming pools are a recurring theme in the work of Paris-based digital artist Vincent Smadja, who uses AI to conjure fantasy images from familiar landmarks. Two of his most striking creations reimagine the Eiffel Tower and Arc de Triomphe as a sprawling waterparks, wrapped in a tangle of bouncy slides spiralling around the monuments.

London, in its own way, already hosts something that feels almost AI-invented: the Sky Pool at Embassy Gardens in Nine Elms. Suspended between two buildings, the transparent pool looks like an architectural fantasy brought to life.

More broadly speaking, there’s been a resurgence of statement swimming pools, particularly in high-end hotels across the capital. As wellness culture expands, pools are no longer mere amenities, they’re centrepieces. Designers are leaning into glamour: infinity edges, unusual materials, rooftop settings and immersive environments that blur the line between relaxation and impactful design.

At Claridge’s Spa, designed by Andre Fu Studio, the pool isn’t trying to impress through scale but through atmosphere. Drawing on references from Kyoto’s temples and zen gardens, the space is intentionally restrained. At just 9 metres, it quietly rejects the idea of swimming as exercise and reframes it as a kind of meditative drifting as you listen to the sound of flowing water, what’s more the water itself is salt-treated reducing chlorine and bringing softness to the skin.

More under the radar is The Other House, known for its exuberant Baroque interiors. It features a 10m pool, steam room and sauna, open to both guests and members, with monthly access starting from £165. The focus is firmly on wellbeing, with an extensive treatment menu ranging from holistic massage, reiki and craniosacral therapy to hypnotherapy—and even sound healing sessions held in the pool. Membership also extends to its soon-to-open sister location in Covent Garden, which will feature a rooftop terrace and a restorative, luxury stone-hewn vitality pool.

One standout is the spa and wellness centre at The Peninsula London, designed by Peter Marino —the man with the golden touch, whose clients include Chanel, LVMH and Tiffany &Co. — Marino has long defined modern luxury as spaces that feel expansive and light-filled, yet quietly intimate. Here, a 1,300 sqm subterranean oasis somehow evokes a penthouse setting, thanks to a generous double-height volume crowned with overhead panels that shift in tone throughout the day, simulating natural daylight. This is a pool designed for serious lap swimming: wide and, at 25 metres, among the longest private pools in London. With restricted access times for families, it remains notably peaceful and quiet. Yet it also channels a resort-like ease, with a generous lounge area encircling the water, complete with chaises and cabanas. Service is discreet but meticulous: mid-morning, staff circulate with sugar-free fruit popsicles. Beneath the surface, underwater speakers pipe in gentle music, heightening the sense of escape.

Silver membership (for spa and gym) starts from £9,000 per year and includes a range of perks, such as a massage and a personal training session. Alternatively, booking a 90-minute treatment — such as the Ricari Body Signature Massage — grants access to the spa and wellness areas.

By contrast, the 25m subterranean pool at Bvlgari Hotel London leans into the aura of Romanesque spa culture with a touch of luxury cruise liner elegance. It feels distinctly neoclassical, with thick-set fluted columns framing a pool lined in shimmering blue mosaic tiles. The focus here is on regeneration rather than pace, making it better suited to unhurried breaststroke. Therapies include hyperbaric oxygen sessions, ‘Zerobody’ dry float therapy, ice bathing and chakra realignment massages. A 90- minute treatment includes one hour of spa access before and after.

The Asaya Spa at Rosewood London Chancery delivers unmistakable wow factor—unsurprising given the building’s extraordinary past. Formerly the U.S. Embassy, designed by Eero Saarinen, it has been meticulously reimagined under the direction of Sir David Chipperfield.

Opened in 2025, the hotel has already become a magnet for tastemakers, including Manolo Blahnik who cites it as one of his favourite London boltholds.

The property is dripping in museum-worthy modern and contemporary art as well as design rarities, while its restaurants are led by Michelin-starred chefs, plus there’s also the thrill of sipping cocktails beneath a giant eagle on the top floor.

The wellness experience begins with a plush ground-floor boutique before descending into a warm, golden sanctuary below. Here, the latest Artis Line equipment by Technogym sits in soft cream tones that echo the serene interiors. The 25-metre, wide pool (enough for three lanes) suits confident lap swimmers, while partitioned lounge areas with thermal heated marble beds offer a more private retreat. A jacuzzi, vitality pool and sauna complete the offering, alongside a treatment clinic helmed by esteemed cosmetic expert Dr Wassim Taktouk.

Day passes are priced at £250 Monday to Thursday and £300 from Friday to Sunday, granting full access to the gym and spa.

The sprawling, four-level wellness space at the London OWO Raffles Hotel building was designed by architectural practice Goddard Littlefair, the same studio behind the plush residential spa at Chelsea Barracks. In keeping with the building’s Edwardian and Neo-Baroque architecture, the double-height pool area is framed by a refined material palette of marble and tone-on-tone timber. Textural circles on walls and a spiral staircase add a decorative Art Deco touch, while elegant arches separate a warm thermal pool from the main swimming pool, while pillars and curved alcoves create intimate spaces for private lounging.

At 20 metres, the pool is designed for gentle laps rather than intensive training. Access is more flexible than you would imagine, with a four-hour pass priced at £180 from Monday to Friday, which also includes use of the state-of-the-art gym. Additional indulgences, while not included, are well worth considering.

These include the luxurious Guerlain Atelier beauty space and the Pillar Kitchen, which specialises in fresh, healthy dishes.

For those unconcerned with cost, memberships are available in Classic, Silver, and Platinum tiers. The top-tier Platinum membership, priced at £25,000 per year, includes unlimited personal training, two complimentary nights’ stay annually, and a range of spa discounts and exclusive services.

The Maybourne Group has invested heavily in its Surrenne spa at The Emory, as well as its sister destination, Surrenne Riviera, at the Maybourne Riviera hotel —and the investment has paid off. The London spa secured the top spot at the World Spa Awards in both 2024 and 2025.

Masterfully designed by Rémi Tessier, whose studio is also renowned for crafting the interiors of private jets and luxury yachts, the space reflects an expertly curated sense of proportion and sculptural sensitivity. At its heart is a 22-metre pool, wide enough to accommodate two to three lap swimmers side by side.

As with Claridge’s, the pool uses a salt hydrolysis and UV system, producing chlorine naturally while keeping levels low for a gentler, more refined swimming experience.

Annual individual membership is £10,000 plus a £5,000 joining fee which includes a full fitness assessment with three follow-up sessions, plus two hyperbaric sessions, four advanced body treatments or facials, and twelve Tracy Anderson classes. It also offers twelve guest passes, complimentary laundry service, and preferential rates on suites, rooms, spa treatments, valet parking, and dining at The Emory, The Berkeley, and Surrenne. Day passes are not available.

You may be disappointed to learn that the UK’s first Six Senses hotel and spa, within the £1bn Whiteley redevelopment, will not open its wellness facilities to non- members or non-residents — at least for now. Access remains firmly exclusive. Still, there is a credible alternative within the wider luxury complex: the new Third Space club, where an 18-metre pool, hydrotherapy circuit and ice bath offer a more democratic—if no less design-conscious—option. Memberships start from £273 per month, for those seeking a similarly elevated, all-access experience.

On the first single from her new album, Kacey Musgraves tells it how it is. Or, how she is.

“I'm so lonely, lonely with a capital ‘H’, if you know what I mean,” she sings sweetly but leadingly on the boot-scootin’ country-pop of ‘Dry Spell’. “I've been sitting on the washing machine, ain't nobody's tool up in my shed, ain't nobody's boots under my bed… And I'm tired of keepin' my hands to myself, 911 it's officially a cry for help…”

Toto, we’re not in Nashville. Musgraves may have the prairie-clear voice and Country FM-friendly melodicism – not to mention, in all her new promotional pictures, the cowboy boots and hat – of a stoutly establishment star of America’s biggest musical genre. But on her sixth album, the eight-time Grammy-winner is once more ploughing her own furrow – lyrically at least. The artist who released 2013 LGBT anthem ‘Follow Your Arrow’ (“kiss lots of boys, or kiss lots of girls, if that's something you're into, when the straight and narrow gets a little too straight, roll up a joint, or don't…”) is, true to form, bringing a little personal spice to this most traditionalist of genres.

This, to be fair, has long been the 37-year-old’s saddlebag. During the making of her country-busting third album, Golden Hour, the girl from the no-stop town of Golden, Texas publicly admitted enjoyed “micro-dosing on LSD”.

“That embarrassed the hell out of my mom and grandma,” she told me, cheerfully, in 2018. “But I said, sorry, I have to tell the truth. Psychedelics have been something that I’ve mildly dabbled with… If you’re responsible about it, it can be a positive thing. It’s really opened my heart and mind in a lot of ways.”

She had also recently married musician Rustin Kelly, which made for a certain lovestruck vibe to Golden Hour. But, again, Musgraves wasn’t one for playing it straight. “I don’t want people to be like, ‘we get it, you’re married, you’re in love, boring, snoozeville, song number 13…’”

A lot personally has happened since then. She and Kelly divorced in 2020. Then, until 2023 she was in a relationship with poet Cole Schafer. Hence Middle of Nowhere, a new album “written during a period of reflection and post-breakup clarity”. At its most playful, that’s the horny AF ‘Dry Spell’, and the woozy, boozy, late-night, zydeco-flavoured singalong ‘Horses & Divorces’, a duet with scene queen Miranda Lambert. Most evocatively, it’s the winsome, heart-tugging title track.

But at its most on-the-nose, that means the toe-tapping pedal-steel lament ‘Loneliest Girl’, and ‘Uncertain TX’, a by-the-numbers, clip-clopping, Texas tea-channelling collab that’s elevated, just, by the vocal contributions of the mighty Willie Nelson.

‘Coyote’ – a duet with Colorado-via-South Africa folkie Gregor Alan Isakov ­– is more intriguing, a spaced-out epic with a windblown torch and twang. But then there’s ‘Rhinestoned’, with its unashamedly easy-listening ‘Everybody’s Talkin’’ vibes. It’s a song which typifies the place where this era’s artist has found her happy(ish) place: less middle of nowhere than middle of the road. Here’s hoping that, next time round, the boldly out-there writer whose Insta handle is @spaceykacey either finds love or, as post-Harvest Neil Young famously did, finds that ditch.

The film to see...

All eyes on the Croisette to show us next year’s Oscar contenders from Cannes but right now, pass the popcorn please. The Devil Wears Prada 2 moves its fashion month focus to Milan. With its stellar cast, clothes and wit, Meryl, Stanley and all of the Emilies definitely merit a cinema outing (dress code, cerulean).

You can also catch homegrown talent Leo Woodall (One Day, Mad About the Boy) take the lead with support from a rare performance from Dustin Hoffman in Tuner. This unusual thriller, directed and co-written by Daniel Roher, lands in UK cinemas this month via strong reviews at Telluride and Toronto film festivals. Roher won the Academy Award for Best Documentary Feature Film for his must-watch 2022 documentary Navalny, about the late Russian activist. Here the tension is ramped up for a fictional piano tuner who learns to crack safes.

The exhibition to visit...

Photo London returns for its eleventh edition from 14 to 17 May 2026, with a VIP Preview on 13 May and a new home in Olympia. Annual catnip for collectors and window-shopping fans alike, the must-see is the Stephen Meisel presentation. This year’s Master of Photography, the fair will showcase a rare and apt chance to see Meisel’s London portraits which were made in the 90s for British Vogue. His punk spirit muses included Stella Tennant and Bella Freud.

Also this month, from 13 May, London duo Rob and Nick Carter show Transforming, bringing movement to art-history masterpieces. Working at the cutting edge of human-guided AI, these startling works are in museums around the world, but this is a chance to see them in West London

The theatre to book…

It’s almost twenty years since their legendary Chekhov production of The Seagull, which won Kristin Scott Thomas an Olivier, transferred to Broadway from the Royal Court and helped to catapult a teenage Carey Mulligan to stardom. Now Scott Thomas reunites with director Ian Rickson for their interpretation of The Cherry Orchard. In a new version by Conor MacPherson, it will run from 3 October to 9 January. Serious fans will want to book the hottest autumn ticket now, and you can still get them for £20

Meanwhile, “a summer reggae party driven by Jimmy Cliff’s music’ in the words of director Matthew Xia is back. The Harder They Come returns to Stratford East 16 May to 4 July led by Natey Jones who won rave reviews for his portrayal of Ivan in the show’s first short run. This is a great high-octane way to end the day if you’re close by at V & A East, seeing the brilliant inaugural show The Music is Black.

The collaboration to look out for…

Rurbanite bliss, as country life comes back to Mayfair thanks to The Newt in Somerset. From 18 to 31 May, A Farm in Mayfair pops up at Claridge's, the ultimate place to stay if you’re heading to Chelsea Flower Show (19-23) and a whimsical reminder that Shepherd Market was once the setting for a real rowdy Mayfair. Soak up all of this green inspiration via the bar (anyone for a Newt Cyder?) and a wander through the temporarily bucolic lobby. Many other Newt Estate ingredients will also be on the menu, along with the chicest tote of the month for all of your shopping.

The event to attend…

If you aren’t lucky enough to be bobbing around the Grand Canal for Venice Art Biennale, closer to home, Charleston Festival (13-25 May) has one of the most seductive festival settings. Get lost with a glass of wine or two as you soak up the work of Duncan Grant and Vanessa Bell and their Bloomsbury time capsule gardens. From our own life and times, this year’s programme includes Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe, painter Rose Wylie, Sir David Hare, Hugh Bonneville, Margaret Drabble and many more. Brighton’s City Books festival pop-up is also worth a trip in itself.

The album to buy…

New work from Paul McCartney is always an event. This is his first LP for six years and so far, there is one beautifully elegiac single, Days We Left Behind'. The full album The Boys of Dungeon Lane is coming on 29 May and promises a detailed look back at his childhood, his family and his first days with his future bandmates. As he’s said, ‘I do often wonder if I’m just writing about the past but then I think how can you write about anything else?’ Plus, if you’re humming 'The Van' from Jack Antonoff, you’ll also be getting Bleachers' new album – Everyone For Ten Minutes – on 22 May.

The TV to watch

Made with the help and blessing of the late national treasure Dame Jilly Cooper, hit show Rivals takes us back to the 80s again with season two, helmed by rising star British directors including Dee Koppang O’Leary. The first six episodes of twelve land on May 15. Steady on…

The book to read

Paul Auster fans won’t be able to miss Siri Hustvedt’s tribute, Ghost Stories. (Hodder & Stoughton) The book includes letters from the New York trilogy novelist to his baby grandson, and a raw account of the last months of their four-decade-long literary love story.

Also this month, Oscar Wilde expert Matthew Sturgis studies three personalities with larger-than-life siblings in Relative Failures (Bloomsbury) Let him introduce Willie Wilde, Mabel Beardsley and Howard, brother of novelist Julian Sturgis (both his great great uncles). It’s a brilliantly off-kilter concept for a group biography, and a passport to the 1890s in the hands of a vivid raconteur.

Marrakech is a place of colour. Of terracotta tagines, of dusty tracks and the vibrant blue of the Jardin Majorelle. It’s a place brimming with energy but also – if you choose wisely – a place of calm, where the sun nearly always shines and luxury comes at a reasonable price.

Since Yves Saint Laurent laid down roots in the 60s, it has attracted a class of creatives concerned with great design. Whether enjoying the mayhem of the medina or Guéliz’s emerging bar and restaurant scene, here is The Blend’s guide to Marrakech.

Stay

In Palmeraie, a tranquil palm-lined neighbourhood to the north of the Medina, you’ll find J’nane Rumi. Opened in 2025, the artists’ retreat is a former private residence designed by Tunisian architect Charles Boccara, transformed into a live-in gallery. The eleven-room hotel is the perfect spot to inspire creative thought and unclutter the mind. Relax by the pool, lounge in a hammock in the immaculate gardens or eat a selection of small bites at the restaurant, headed up by Dutch chef Karin Gaasterland (formerly of El Fenn). Inside, the hotel’s design-forward credentials are on full display. Works by Moroccan artists such as Mous Lamrabat and Margaux Derhy adorn the perfectly curated and colourful walls. For an extra special stay, book the annexe.

Book at jnanerumi.com

Visit

When fashion designer Yves Saint Laurent first visited Marrakech in the 60s, he instantly fell in love. Over 60 years later, it feels fitting that the city has a museum dedicated to his life and work. Architectural buffs will marvel at the Studio KO-designed building and its impressive entranceway. Inside, the museum comprises a 400 sq m permanent exhibition space designed by Christophe Martin, a temporary exhibition space, a research library with over 6,000 volumes, a 150-seat auditorium, and a bookstore and terrace café. Located next door is the vibrant Jardin Majorelle, which Saint Laurent saved from closure in the '60s. Go early to avoid the crowds.

Book tickets

Eat

Sahbi Sahbi, Gueliz

The women-led Sahbi Sahbi is one of Guéliz’s buzziest addresses – and its most aesthetically pleasing. The restaurant is another project by Parisian architects, Studio KO, and its ethos is to spotlight the female cooks behind much of Morocco’s traditional food. At the heart of Sahbi Sahbi is an open kitchen, where chefs prepare charmoula prawns in sizzling tagines and a selection of tasting salads made from purslane, tomato and pumpkin. Go for modern Moroccan food done well.

Book in at sahbisahbi.com

Drink

Pétanque social club

Behind an unmarked door in Guéliz, you’ll find another of the city’s hottest hangouts. The latest venture from pioneering restaurateur Kamal Laftimi, creator of beloved Marrakech venues Le Jardin, Café des Epices and Nomad, PSC is a revival of a 1930s pétanque club. Inside its walled garden, sip cocktails (and throw boules) in a bustling courtyard and outdoor bar. Inside, vintage furniture – including revamped 1970s chairs from famed hotel La Mamounia – are paired with objets from local artisans.

pscmarrakech.com

Revive

1112 Marrakech Tea House

A haven in the midst of the medina, 1112 is a former riad lovingly turned into a teahouse, restaurant and museum. Serving twelve types of tea in a heavenly orange-blossom-scented courtyard, it offers a moment of respite during a day of shopping in the souks. Be sure to visit the roof.

1112marrakech.com

After a long, long winter, you know it's that time of the season, when the possibility of enjoying lunch outside at The River Cafe is on the table. That frisson of excitement as the winter menu changes to spring; bitter curls of Puntarelle alla Romana give way to the joy of eating English asparagus dunked in anchovy butter; and a chilled glass of something divine and rosy from Abruzzo replaces a warming bottle of a Barolo. Of course, the River Cafe is a perennial favourite and obvious choice, but when a flash of sunshine descends in London, there is nothing like finding a perfect table outside, away from the crowds, and relishing the return of summer.

Particularly the mythical tables that exist at Chelsea's ...At Sloane. Here, there's an ease, grace and sophistication to the whole place, largely down to its fabulous manager, Tariq, who you will want to have on speed dial to help you get one of these tables. It's an intimate affair with six tables immaculately laid out set on a small balcony, overlooking the storybook red-brick mansions of Sloane Gardens below. It's the definition of 'if you know, you know'. The menu is an homage to the original Parisian bordello-chic bolthole Hotel Costes (which also has one of the best courtyard gardens to enjoy a perfect plate of Pâtes pomodoro), and the menu here is an edited list of decadent hits, such as a superlative steak frites and that renowned signature tomato pasta.

Of course, Italy has an abundance of terraces and gardens made for long, languid lunches. Particularly under the most romantic loggia in the fabled Locanda Cipriani on the Venetian island of Torcello, which is said to reopen later this spring. As does Airelles Palladio, Venice – a majestic sprawling restored convent with one of the largest secret gardens in Giudecca, where you can savour some Jean-Georges Vongerichten classics next to vine-draped walls. And further down south at La Posta Vecchia, there are few culinary experiences that can rival dining under the umbrellas of this sun-baked Roman villa, a dolce vita vortex (and former home of John Paul Getty), with a terrace made for sipping negroni sbagliatos. New this year is a divine beach club, so there is no real reason to leave, as you bumble from your room to the pool or beach, via the terrace for a cocktail, ice cream or, indeed, the best bruschetta, overlooking the sea beyond.

Meanwhile, over in LA, which is a city that excels in high-octane al fresco terrace moments (hello, Polo Lounge and Chateau Marmont terrace), but there is something refreshingly low-key and down-to-earth at The Maybourne Beverly Hills, which has two distinctly different outdoor experiences, much like a Californian remix of dolce far niente. There is The Terrace restaurant, with colonnades strung with fairy lights, overlooking a fountain, which is the quintessence of quiet, refined glamour. Here, you can enjoy Tahitian vanilla French toast to a soundtrack of birdsong in the morning and in the evening, savour the signature corn agnolotti. Dusk is when the rooftop bar, Dante, comes alive on the hotel's ninth floor, serving delectable cocktails and icy Martinis as you gaze out to the most distinctive view of LA; the Hollywood sign glaring at you as you sip away on the signature Garibaldi (the fluffiest orange juice and Campari creation).

But no one can conjure up a series of eating 'en plein air' moments quite like hotelier Paddy McKillen at his wine estate- cultural space, Château La Coste, in the Luberon region of Provence. At this enlightening epicurean place, every night feels as if Nancy Sinatra and Lee Hazlewood's wistful song Summer Wine has come to life (where McKillen's Château La Coste 2024 Rosé d'une Nuit really does taste like 'strawberries, cherries and an angel's kiss in spring').

The hotel, Villa La Coste, is an unquestionably aesthetic experience, where you're struck by the most romantic scent-scape, supplied by the rows of lavender and streams of jasmine arching down its walls. Then there is the dizzying repertoire of restaurants in the hotel and cultural estate's grounds, from the Terrasse bar and hang-out that centres around a gurgling fountain – perhaps the best spot to sip a chilled glass of the estate's rosé – to the flame-grilling of renowned Argentine chef Francis Mallmann, where you can enjoy generous cuts of rib-eye and sirloin steaks under big, starry skies. For al fresco eating as high theatre, make for the new star restaurant, Louison, headed up by chef Florent Pietravalle, who does tasting menus that subtly exaggerate the most distinctive flavours of Provence. And nothing compares to his version of the pissaladière tart, which tastes just like the end of a golden summer...

“I’ve got a big sign in the other room,” says Chad Kassem, “where we took an article, blew it up and put it in a frame. The headline says, ‘Why Salina?’ – because I get asked that question about a hundred times a year.”

Kassem, the founder of ultra-high-end vinyl record manufacturer Acoustic Sounds, is speaking to The Blend from the company’s headquarters in the aforementioned city in Kansas. He grew up in Louisiana’s action-packed Lafayette but chose to start a new life in this obscure former cow town (population circa 46,000), at random, in his early twenties. A troubled kid with a drug problem that helped to earn him 16 criminal charges, he could have moved anywhere in the world to try and get clean.

So… why Salina?

The 63-year-old cracks a wide grin. “Why not?”

It’s certainly an unlikely place to start a business that had garnered annual sales of more than $1m within a few years and has gone on to become a major player in the global vinyl revival. 2026 marks the 40^th anniversary of Acoustic Sounds, which Kassem first launched as a mail-order vinyl retailer. By 1991, he’d founded Analogue Productions, the reissue label that specialises in audiophile pressings of classic albums by the likes of Etta James and Muddy Waters.

In terms of sound quality, Kassem’s records – which he presses at his own plant, Quality Record Pressings, in the Salina headquarters – are as good as it gets. Compared to streaming, he says, they are “cleaner, clearer, smoother, more realistic”. With near-religious fervour, he typically remasters albums from the original master tapes, which often have to be tracked down, and only world-class studios and engineers will do. This can come with a hefty price tag: some limited-edition releases reach up to $150 (£110) a piece.

Even as vinyl becomes ever-more expensive thanks to that much-trumpeted revival, this is pretty unheard-of for brand-new reissues. “We try our best to make the best,” Kassem says in his slow, Cajun drawl. “We’re not too cheap to pay attention. Everybody’s trying to cut corners in life. That’s not what my customer wants. They want me to be the one not to cut corners.”

And who is that customer? “Someone that cares an awful lot about hearing their favourite artist sound as good as possible and is willing to pay extra to be able to hear and feel that.”

The company is currently toasting its fourth decade with The Acoustic Sounds 40th Anniversary Series, having raided the archives of Warner Music Group’s catalogue label Rhino Records to release two timeless albums every month throughout 2026. Already they’ve put out reissues of Van Morrison’s Astral Weeks and Moondance, with the likes of The Ramones and Gram Parsons yet to come.

In October, Kassem will also host a jazz and blues festival at Quality Record Pressings, flying the likes of acclaimed saxophonist and trumpeter Chico Freeman over to Salina to celebrate the company’s success. It’s quite the vindication of his decision to start a vinyl label, which seemed highly questionable in 1991.

“When I first got to Salina,” he notes, pointedly, “it was 1984, the same year that CDs came out.”

Kassem was originally shipped to the city to stay in a ‘halfway house’, a transitional living facility for those on parole or recently released from prison, following yet another scrape with the law. A judge gave him a choice: it was that or jail. He’d previously lived in a halfway house in Iowa, but this one’s quietude appealed after the temptations of his hometown: “A lot of bars in Louisiana are 24 hours. When you’re 12 years old, you can buy beer. It’s just the way we grew up, but some of us can’t handle it – and I was one of ‘em. I got arrested a lot. I would get drunk, start shit, get in trouble. I dealt a little bit of drugs.”

Kassem understandably doesn’t seem keen to dwell on the past and skilfully turns the subject back to his passion: “[Selling drugs] isn’t much different to selling records. I sold records so I had more – buy three, sell two. Buy, sell, trade, keep your profits.”

Indeed, he was back in Louisiana when an old partying buddy introduced him to audiophile vinyl, imploring him to listen out for small differences in sound, explaining, “Subtle is big.” For Kassem, this changed everything. “I owe the guy,” he admits, before adding, quietly, “although he’s passed away from drugs.”

Upon his return to Salina, Kassem set about rebuilding his vinyl collection; in fact, it turned out, he was rebuilding his life: “A lot of my records, I had partied with, so they were rough. I had used them to roll joints on and partied all night with them.” Around this time, he worked as a cook and in a lightbulb factory owned by Philips, the company that helped to invent CDs, the technology that was supposed to put vinyl out to pasture for good.

That didn’t pan out, clearly, given that sales of the format surpassed $1bn (£790m) in annual revenue in the US last year, a figure not seen since 1983. In 2023, it was reported that UK vinyl sales had reached 5.9m units, their highest level since 1990. On both sides of the Atlantic, vinyl now easily outstrips CDs in terms of annual revenue as the unlikely comeback of black wax continues to gather apace.

“Here’s some quotable shit,” announces Kassem, a true raconteur. “I didn’t know this day was coming, but I spent every moment of my life, and every dollar that I had, as though I did.”

He believes people are simply realising that vinyl sounds better than other formats. Kassem is particularly scathing about streaming platforms, which he says engineers are catering to with a homogenised, “compressed” sound: “It kills the music.”

Either way, Kassem was well ahead of the curve, as he began buying and selling vinyl for fun before officially setting up his business in 1986. He now employs more than a hundred people, pressing around a million records a year and, he’s said, rejecting about 150,000 in his relentless mission for quality. His office, which is lined with shelves of vinyl, contains two turntables so that he can test pressings against one another, while he also scrutinises his records with a sound meter. “Nobody really does what I do,” he says.

Not many people, after all, would spend “25, 30 grand” on flying a small team, including himself, out to London’s Abbey Road Studios to remaster five Bob Marley albums, as Kassem did last year.

It’s a far cry from the ease of streaming, which, he argues, devalues the listening experience: “People consume way too much music. They listen all day long in the background. I believe the less you listen, the more you appreciate it when you do. If you’re gonna listen, fuckin’ listen. People say, ‘With an LP, you’ve gotta get up and flip it [halfway through].’ No, 20 minutes is the perfect amount for your brain to invest.”

To that end, 42 years since he came here to successfully get sober, Kassem is installing a record store at the Acoustic Sounds headquarters in Salina. Even back then, he says, “I knew vinyl would never die.”

The importance of being earnest: it’s bread-and-butter for the songwriting, and songcraft, of Noah Kahan. And it’s the reason why the American folk-rocker’s impassioned, sing-every-word, feel-all-the-feels fanbase grew exponentially with the third album that, finally, broke him. Broke him in, to some extent, both senses.

The formerly struggling singer-songwriter, who grew up on a tree farm in Vermont, cut through, and then some, with 2022’s Stick Season. It was a Covid-born album of connection and community that hymned the beauty of going home, staying there and leaning into the stark, autumnal/wintry majesty of the titular time of year.

Before he knew it, Kahan had racked up 15 billion streams; was a superstar in old England as well as New England; had sold out a pair of nights at storied Boston baseball stadium Fenway Park; and, three albums in, was nominated for Best New Artist at the Grammys.

All of which, unsurprisingly, caused a little local difficulty for an unassuming home-buddy who had long been open about the mental health challenges that had propelled him to set up his own foundation, The Busyhead Project (they’ve so far raised $6.6m to help those with similar challenges). Not for nothing is a new feature-length Netflix documentary called Noah Kahan: Out of Body. As he tells the cameras: “[I] always have felt physically ugly and facially ugly, mentally ugly… I don’t know what I look like. No clue.” One can scarcely imagine the dysmorphic disconnect when you know that, on your next, instantly sold-out tour, over one million people will be staring at that ugly mug.

Now, on The Great Divide, Kahan digs into all that: earnestly, lengthily, over 17 songs. At its most powerful, he’s bare-faced and open-hearted. On ‘Porch Light’, with its banjo-driven gallop, he addresses the turmoil he caused his divorced parents by talking about them onstage and in interviews. “Whatever made you famous, made you sick,” he sings in the voice of his mother, “but you can only do what pain allows… There ain’t no shame in calling this thing quits”.

On the surging, rousing 'Doors', he talks again of childhood and isolation and dynasty and feelings handed down: “I grew up pretending sticks were little guns, I would point ’em at my dad and he’d get mad, ’cause God forbid I hurt someone, I’d hurt anyone I could, anyone who got too close and anyone who wouldn’t look, I was born into a 100-year-storm…”

Certainly Kahan can write a tune. The Great Divide’s title track is a foot-stomping anthem occupying the middle ground in a Venn diagram overlap of Arcade Fire and Mumford & Sons. ‘American Cars’ is a mandolin-powered rerub of Born in the USA-era Bruce Springsteen.

More interesting, though, more sticky, is ‘Downfall’. It's a more delicate, finely wrought, baroque-folk song that betrays the clear influence of one of its co-writers, The National’s Aaron Dessner. The musician, who’s worked similar woodsy wonders with Taylor Swift and Bon Iver, hosted Kahan at his Long Pond Studio in upstate New York (there were also sessions in Nasvhille), and he’s well-represented here. He's co-producer of ‘Willing and Able’ and ‘Spoiled’. And, as well as ‘Porch Light’, he’s co-writer/producer of ‘End of August’, the wondrous, spacey, alive-to-the-seasons-again piano ballad that opens the album (“the minute that September hits, I’m going off my medicine”). He performs the same role on the closing ‘Dan’, another long, lyrical, song, this one about friendship, loss, the good old days and the bad old days, a Stephen King short story cast in elegiac, country-music tones.

More of that, please, and less of The Great Divide’s overly long, default setting. Too often, that’s a polished, route-one/Route 66 take on adult-oriented rock – a genre very well-represented on these near-dozen-and-a-half tracks. Too many of those songs seem purpose-built for the venues that this beardy long-hair and campfire-friendly folky now, unfathomably, finds himself playing. But maybe when you’ve done 17 billion album streams – and spent too long stuck in stick season – you can’t help but be a bit less cabin in the woods and a good bit more stadium in the ’burbs.

To update the well-worn adage: if you can remember the ’90s, you weren’t really there.

Well, actually, if you can, you still might have been, even if you did at the time go full Fool/Cool Britannia and fried your braincells. You can even remember them if you were born this side of Y2K. Because a quarter-century on from the decade emphatically ending, we’re positively stewing in nostalgia for The Last Great Cultural Epoch (© every newspaper/magazine/platform).

For much of last year, London’s National Portrait Gallery hosted a certifiably blockbuster exhibition about The Face. The 1980-born style magazine reached its zenith, commercially at least, around the time of its 1995 Robbie Williams’ cover, those defining images of the incipient imperial phase of the erstwhile “fat dancer” shot by Norman Watson.

More recently: Love Story only launched in February, but Ryan Murphy’s telenovela about the Peak ’90s New York romance between JFK Jr and his fashionista belle Carolyn Bessette Kennedy – which couldn’t be glossier if it was sponsored by Timotei – is already the most streamed drama in the platform’s six-and-a-half-year history.

Meanwhile you may have noticed that, a few heady months ago, that ur-’90s band, Oasis, got back together for a tour. The world collectively lost its mind and Gen Z turned itself inside out to rock a bucket hat.

Now, because nostalgia is very much what it used to be, comes The 90s: Art and Fashion. Tate Britain’s upcoming exhibition is, according to Alex Farquharson, the London institution’s Director, an exploration of a “dynamic… exciting time [of] social mobility and something so many of us crave: life lived in person without digital distraction.

“I think back to a decade bursting with energy and possibilities,” he continued this morning (Monday 27^th April) as he unveiled the exhibition – running from October 2026 to February 2027 – over caramelised banana pancakes in Soho. “When a new generation of young creatives dismantled old hierarchies without waiting to be invited.”

The exhibition will feature, according to Dominique Heyse-Moore, the Tate’s Senior Curator, Contemporary British Art, more than 70 works. Those include photography by Corinne Day: England’s Dreaming, her (cough) “heroin chic” image of Rosemary Ferguson in Day’s grimy Soho flat, which appeared in the August 1993 edition of The Face. And by Juergen Teller: his 1998 “Young Pink Kate” image of Kate Moss, used as the exhibition’s flagship image. The vitality of the era’s club culture is captured in forever-evocative images and films from assiduous youth culture chroniclers Ewen Spencer, Dave Swindells and, primus inter pares, Mark Leckey with his 1999 film Fiorucci Made Me Hardcore.

Then, leaning more directly into that “Art and Fashion” suffix, the exhibition is an Avengers Assemble of ’90s trailblazers and firestarters: Vivienne Westwood, Alexander McQueen, Chris Ofili, Steve McQueen, Damien Hirst and more. There are paintings, photography and films by Jenny Saville, Gillian Wearing and Sarah Lucas. Tracey Emin, currently rightly valorised by Tate Modern in her own 1990s-channelling exhibition A Second Life, of course features, via her 1998 neon piece: “Is legal sex anal? Is anal sex legal?” To which the answer is: only if we turn the other cheek.

Leading from the front in the exhibition is its curator Edward Enninful, who approached Tate Britain with the idea. As the decade dawned, he was an 18-year-old Ghanaian from Ladbroke Grove, the youngest ever fashion editor of an international publication, at i-D. As it faded, he had become one of the biggest voices in fashion and media in the world, on the way to becoming an OBE and the first Black person to serve as Editor-in-Chief of Vogue.

As Farquharson put it, Enninful was “at the centre of shaping the most influential and enduring visuals of the ’90s”.

All of which was launched, naturellement, at the decade’s ground zero playground: The Groucho Club on Soho’s Dean Street. “Welcome to my favourite haunt of the ’90s!” said Enninful in his opening remarks. “Have to be honest, I've never seen Groucho's in the daytime! It's a first.”

In his memory, the beginning of the decade “was a moment of transition. Not just personally, but culturally. London at the time wasn't the polished global capital it is today. It was raw, unstable and full of possibility. There was a sense that something was shifting, even if we didn't yet have the language for it.

“What defined that period, for me was not a single movement but an energy,” he continued. “A refusal of hierarchy and a belief that new voices could and should be heard across art, fashion, music and image-making. People were working in close proximity, moving between the same spaces, the same conversations, the same ideas.”

That, of course, wasn’t just a day-job for desk-jockeys. For Enninful and his coworkers at i-D, or for the team at Jefferson Hack and Rankin’s Dazed & Confused, the upstart style mag that launched in the white-heat of that time, this was a 24/7 commitment. Or, even, a 25/8 one. As Enniful said: “A morning shoot with Nick Knight and Kate Moss might dissolve into a night in Soho. Clubs were not just places to go out, but spaces where ideas were formed, images were tested and identities were performed. The boundaries between disciplines, and between private and public, were collapsing in real time.”

Full disclosure: I’m writing this in full ’90s-meets-’20s uniform, a new, limited-edition T-shirt designed by Junya Watanabe that bears a photograph of Blur, shot by Andrea Giacobbe for the September 1995 edition of The Face. I couldn’t be more nostalgic for other times/worlds if I was Doctor Who.

Fuller disclosure: as an editor at The Face in the ’90s I was one of that new generation of young creatives dismantling old hierarchies without waiting to be invited. Not that it felt anything remotely like that at the time. As one of my old mag colleagues, also in attendance this morning, put it (and I’m paraphrasing): “We were just goons having a laugh, going out a lot, making a magazine. We didn’t feel like any kind of cool set.”

Nonetheless, when The ’90s: Art and Fashion opens this autumn it will, undoubtedly, be grandstanding room-only for old ’90s lags like me, wanging on about the good old days. But Enniful promises something more, too.

“This exhibition is not about nostalgia,” he insisted. “It's about understanding a moment that continues to shape how we think, how we create, how we see. The 1990s established conditions that are still with us: the merging of high and low culture, the politicisation of fashion and image, and the emergence of diversity as a creative force.

“And perhaps most importantly,” Enninful – who now runs EE72, a “global media and entertainment company” – continued, “it reminds us the questions we were asking then remain urgent now. Questions of visibility, access and who gets to be seen. So, this exhibition is an invitation not to look back, but to look again. To reconsider that decade, not as a closed chapter, but as something still unfolding.”

Nostalgia, though, may have its limits. Having closed in 2004, The Face relaunched in 2019, and I went back as a consultant editor. It closed again last month, its collab between ’90s-minted swagger with right-now vibrancy no match for a collapsed commercial/advertising market. We had a good run, though. Although not as good a run as the ’90s, the decade that still isn’t dead.

The 90s: Art and Fashion, 8 October 2026 – 14 February 2027. Tate Britain, Millbank, London SW1P 4RG

Open daily 10.00–18.00. Tickets available at tate.org.uk and +44(0)20 7887 8888

Psychogeography tells us that places can exert an influence over our mood or being: we yearn to feel the meaning of somewhere as much as we need to experience its physical presence. Mount Med, a new wellness resort housed within a 12th-century barn that started life as a roadside rest and recovery site for Bavarian monks collecting tithes in the Austrian Alps, is therefore off to a resounding start. In the intervening centuries, the ‘Probstenhof’, as it was known, served as a post office and a courthouse before returning to its original calling as a guest house. Now the building sits at the heart of a refuge of a different, if no less rehabilitating, kind – one with a keen interest in preserving and rewarding health.

You’ll find Mount Med 90 or so minutes’ drive from Munich in one of Tyrol’s more glorious valleys. Here, Oberau-Wildschönau, with its beautiful baroque church, is a blissful setting in which to house a clinical redoubt from the pressures of life; the perfect spot to unwind, recharge and attend to some of those needing physio- and psychological issues that can plague our day-to-day lives. Comprising 10 buildings (including 46 rooms and 14 chalet suites) to form a self-contained retreat, Mount Med hosts a groundbreaking approach to healing developed by aesthetic and reconstructive surgeon Dr Alexander Papp and his Mylife Changer co-founder Horst Untemoser.

Together with Alexander’s brother, Stephan, a trauma surgeon specialising in sports injuries, the medical team at Mount Med embraces the holistic approach, advocating a low-calorie, protein-rich diet alongside a programme of vitamin infusions to aid detoxification, removing the need for fasting, while still achieving a state of ketosis (the process by which the body switches from using glucose to burning fat to create energy). The result: rather than enervating, the resort and its stylish yet comforting surroundings is remarkably energising, aided and abetted by Dr Stephan’s careful adjudication of skeleto-muscular fitness and the ample opportunity for both exercise and relaxation. As you would expect, Mount Med offers a plethora of programmes, from advanced diagnostics (Dr Stephan is the director of a local hospital offering next-day blood analysis as well as various scanners) to dermatology.

But staying the cruel hand of time seems uppermost in people’s minds here: hence the focus on cellular anti-ageing as the core of Mylife Changer’s manifesto. Regimens start with 23 key biomarkers being taken, after which personalised treatments reflect the goals of the guest: nothing particularly arduous is involved, simply the requirement to submit to evidenced-based protocols using intravenously administered supplements. Skilfully designed with plenty of soft furnishings, a bar (serving mocktails as well as alcohol on demand), the atmosphere here is more après-ski than sanatorium, with excellent food served in surroundings that in some cases (the fine-dining restaurant Aurea for instance) seem barely to have changed in almost a millennium.

Mother Mary, who she? And a Greatest Hits already, really?

Certainly, the American pop phenom has big hitters in her corner. Charli xcx, fresh from her work on the soundtrack of Emerald Fennell’s Wuthering Heights, has written some of these songs. So has fellow English star FKA Twigs, hot from packing them in at the Mojave stage at Coachella. Also on board is Jack Antonoff, taking time off from his dayjob band Bleachers, winning 13 Grammys, and from being studio wingman to Taylor Swift, Lorde, Lana Del Rey, St. Vincent and Sabrina Carpenter. And this fortysomething music biz survivor around whom these red-hot creatives have coalesced is now signed to the record label offshoot of A24, the powerhouse cinematic provocateurs.

That star-chamber of collaborators neatly triangulates everything we need to know about Mother Mary without seeing the movie that bears her name. She’s a fictitious superstar, played by Anne Hathaway, in A24’s psychological thriller written and directed by David Lowery (A Ghost Story, The Green Knight). As the Mother Mary trailer teases, she’s Lady Gothic Gaga, an arthouse glamour-queen with a parasocial relationship with an adoring fanbase. And now she’s plotting a comeback tour, with killer costuming to match, which necessitates a reunion with her estranged former stylist/designer (Michaela Coel).

“You are standing under the lights,” intones Coel’s Sam in voiceover. “Here you come. Marching down that aisle. You’re doing what you’re born to do. You open your mouth. You sing your song. Mother Mary. We’re reinventing you.” Cue… a flash of body-horror, the phrase “psychosexual affair”, a script Coel describes as “witchery”, and a two-year-plus filmmaking process Lowery has likened to Apocalypse Now.

Mother Mary, then. Spice World: The Movie it ain’t.

This default lead song on this seven-track soundtrack album – there’s also an 11-track Original Score album, by violinist and composer Daniel Hart, a frequent Lowery collaborator – is ‘My Mouth Is Lonely for You’, which we see Hathaway perform in the trailer. A breathy, burbling disco confection, it’s the poppiest, least, well, witchy song here, which is remarkable given that it’s the contribution of Twigs, the artist whose current album Eusexua could have served as a thematic template for the torrid, feverish passion at the heart of Mother Mary.

More on-message is ‘Blue Flame’, glitchy, spooky and spectral, and the result of the collective songwriting efforts of Antonoff, Sounwave (Kendrick Lamar), Charli and George Daniel (of The 1975, and of Charli’s wedding vows). ‘Burial’ is equally illustrative of the pop star Mother Mary is likely meant to be: Catholic-curious, mainstream-adjacent and a bit try-hard transgressive. Written by the same grouping, minus Sounwave and with the addition of Hathaway, it’s throbbing, moody electro with the feel of late-period Madonna reaching for some edge. If Madge took a vaycay in Brat Summer, ‘Burial’ would be the theme song.

Then, from a whisper to a scream, comes ‘Cut Ties’: a plinky, pretty-in-pink ballad which blooms into intense, multi-voiced, strings-and-things melodrama. ‘Holy Spirit’ is a death-disco anthem which is unashamedly what I’m calling “dark ABBA”. It’s mirrored by ‘Holy Spirit 2’, which is the mic-drop track that the holy trinity of Benny/Björn/Gaga would surely conjure. In reality, it’s the compositional work of Hathaway, Lowery, Claire Givens of a band called People Museum and composer Aaron Boudreaux. So, mega kudos to those guys.

Leading from the front on all of these is, appropriately, Hathaway – on the strength of her contributions here, a Hollywood A-lister who could more than hold her own alongside diva-whisperer Antonoff’s other studio clients.

“Everybody has a true angel,” she sings, gloriously, in the Tori Amos-channelling ‘Dark Cradle’, “everybody has an obsession, everybody has a dark idol… everybody has a secret…” In times of trouble Mother Mary comes to us, speaking words of, if not wisdom, then meme-worthy caution. Overall, Hathaway – the Hollywood A-lister who channelled Oscar-winning tears as tragic Fantine in Les Misérables – again proves she has serious vocal abilities. She dreamed a dream… and so what if, for the character of Mother Mary, it turned out to be a bit of a nightmare? With this bespoke, bejewelled, bijou soundtrack, it was worth it.

Mother Mary is in cinemas on 24^th April. The album is out now

Forget diamonds, it’s all about divination decks. Over the past few years, tarot cards have quietly become the most romantic heirloom jewel to collect. Just imagine owning the rare deck that Sotheby’s had on auction: Sylvia Plath’s Tarot de Marseille deck, that was gifted to her by Ted Hughes in 1956...

In terms of captivating an aesthete’s imagination, nothing compares to the occultish beauty of tarot. Since its creation during the 15th century in Milan, the decorative appeal of the card’s artwork has continued over the centuries, from the curlicued beauty of the Visconti-Sforza Tarot set to the more graphic and bold Hermès Cheval Natte deck. Whether you believe in divination per se, in contemplating and being able to ascertain exactly what is happening in one’s inner and outer world, the visual storytelling of tarot is undeniably enchanting, thanks in part to its rich symbolism and that frisson of excitement it conjures up with its esoteric undertones.

Take Niki de Saint Phalle’s fantastical Il Giardino dei Tarocchi, dreamt up in the 1970s in coastal Tuscany, where she created 22 monumental sculptures that represent the 22 cards of the major arcana in tarot – special mention goes to the Empress, which rises 50 feet above the olive groves where Saint Phalle based herself while creating the tarot garden, her bedroom in one vividly decorated breast, her kitchen in the other.

The otherworldly and philosophical appeal of tarot amongst artists finds its best expression among the surrealists. During the 1940s, when Europe was in upheaval, André Breton became fascinated by tarot, and redesigned the Marseille tarot deck, replacing traditional figures with cultural icons such as Baudelaire and the Marquis de Sade, while Salvador Dalí’s 1980s deck remains an archive treasure. For sourcing rare tarot decks – and the classics – Wilde Ones in Chelsea, London, remains a trove of rare finds, from the Dalí set to a rare Augustus Knapp/Manly P Hall tarot deck, circa 1981, not to mention the classic Rider Waite set, which remains one of the most important decks for reading tarot.

As the illustrious tarot reader Annabelle Mitzman explains, ‘I still have my original Rider Waite deck from Hatchards in 1974 when I was at art school in London, although it’s now quite beaten up; it remains a favourite as all the cards were hand cut. The only other deck they had was an Aleister Crowley one, which was slightly more sex, drugs and rock and roll...’ Mitzman adds that, for teaching and reading, ‘I don’t know how you better the perfection of the Pamela Colman Smith drawings, every subtlety and philosophical meaning is there. It’s the most academic base for tarot.’

It’s all so enlightening, no wonder Mitzman has such a devout following for her readings on past, present and future; for tarot die-hards, no one else comes close. As for the resurgence and interest in tarot, ‘It always happens in times of trouble when people are looking for something else, another type of knowledge,’ she says. ‘It happened during the 1940s with the surrealists and it’s similar to now; tarot helps people make sense of chaos.’

South Londoners are notoriously protective of their local haunts, so when Grove Lane Deli announced its closure last summer, the neighbourhood was left briefly unmoored. It was a rare case of a restaurant becoming simply too popular; the queues for its roast chicken sandwiches had become victim to their own momentum, and for founder Danielle Moylan, its scale had become a gargantuan task.

A former UN spokesperson, Moylan saw the deli as a move toward something local and repeatable, a sort of counterweight to the abstraction of international work. “I thought I might have more impact working at a local level”, she said. Naturally, as it expanded, that proximity began to erode.

In its place, reopening in the same thirty-square-meter corner plot, Lala Books has established itself with unusual speed. Within a year, it hosted International Booker authors, introduced a ‘pay it forward’ scheme, and reinstated Grove Lane as a consistent Saturday point of congregation.

That unusual pipeline from deli to bookshop, a lateral shift into the literary, mirrored a broader cultural return to smaller, more considered spaces that operate as informal civic anchors. Moylan traded the frantic pace of the kitchen for a living room-esque aesthetic, its charming interiors rejecting the rigid, back-to-spine sterility of Waterstones.

Books are instead found in baskets or stacked in low-slung piles that prescribe slower, physical engagement, shaped by proximity rather than efficiency. You have to crouch, and flick through, and shuffle. It is a layout that privileges attention over throughout.

Coffee remains part of the offer, but the absence of indoor seating ushers activity onto the pavement. The threshold dissolves, and the shop expands into its immediate surroundings without altering its footprint. What emerges is a loosely held public realm, par structured by habit, par by design. This model addresses a specific modern malaise.

Gen Z, frequently dubbed as the ‘loneliest generation’, are finding an anti-phone sanctuary in Lala. You cannot scroll on your phone while reading a physical book; it demands a singular focus. “You cannot do that with a book. It is impossible. It demands your whole attention.” And while they say Netflix’s biggest competitor is sleep, the bookshop is perhaps the phone’s. And a more chic rival at that, non?

The curation is equally deliberate. Moylan describes the selection as a ‘spatial archive’ of her own reading life, shaped by time spent in Lebanon and Afghanistan. The shelves foreground translated fiction and voices from the Global South, bringing together International Booker winners such as Banu Mushtaq alongside titles from Africa, the Middle East and South America.

What Lala Books demonstrates, in times of isolation and overconsumption, is a reassertion of community. “It’s often not the people closest to us, but small interactions with strangers that shape our day-to-day happiness”, Moyan tells me.

The independent bookshop, long positioned at the margins, is returning as a viable form of cultural infrastructure, and one that accommodates both commerce and collective use without fully resolving either.

On Grove Lane, the pace has altered, the duration of stay extended, the space itself reoccupied: “I knew expanding would take me further away from the customers, and the whole thing becomes less personal”. And Lala Books holds its very shape by staying small.

The film to watch: The Drama

Zendaya’s faultless red carpet press tour with the help of Louis Vuitton, vintage Vivienne Westwood and Armani Privee has been entertaining enough, but there is also a new film in which she stars opposite Robert Pattinson. The Drama is in cinemas now but be warned it’s a lot darker than a standard rom-com with a tone that’s thrown some audiences. Between the Academy Awards and Cannes it’s full on popcorn season, so you might also want the Imax for wry science fiction with Ryan Gosling in Project Hail Mary.

The exhibition to see: Fashion Becomes Art, Victoria & Albert Museum London

It’s surrealism for spring from the 1920s to the work of creative director Daniel Roseberry. Fashion Becomes Art at the V&A is (somehow…) the first UK exhibition on Elsa Schiaparelli and runs till 8 November. To get you in the mood, listen to the designer’s granddaughter, 70s Queen of the Scene Marissa Berenson, share her memories and personal insights on the podcast A Life Curated.

The tickets to book: Les Liaisons Dangereuses, National Theatre London and High Society, Barbican London

A stellar cast including Lesley Manville, Aidan Turner and Monica Barbaro revive Christopher Hampton’s Les Liaisons Dangereuses at the National Theatre. Manville appeared in the original 1985 production playing Cecile, one of aristocratic sexual adventurer Valmont’s victims. This time she schemes as his former lover, the Marquise de Merteuil. As dark as theatre can get, try to get a ticket till June 6 or see it through NT Live from June 25.

For something frothier, High Society starring Felicity Kendal and Helen George is at the Barbican from 19 May to Saturday 11 July. It’s a summer must if you love the classic film, its inspiration The Philadelphia Story or both. And while your humming True Love, look ahead too… For even a chance of tickets for their 2027 Sunday in the Park with George, you need to sign up for advance info. Ticket sales for the Sondheim show inspired by Georges Seurat starring Jonathan Bailey and Ariana Grande will start in May.

The event to attend: A new wine club at The Park, London

Hold the merlot, The Park is launching the Miles Raymond Society. Their first wine club event (inspired by Paul Giamatti in Alexander Payne’s Sideways, of course) is a masterclass in rose for spring, which hopefully will have come to London by Thursday 23 April. Book your spot and find out more at reservations@theparkrestaurant.com A few glasses, some sunshine and Hyde Park will definitely start to feel like Santa Barbara…

The collaboration to look out for: Musee Gainsbourgh, Paris

One of the most moving museums in Paris, preserved just as it was when it was his home for 22 years unitl his death in 1991, Musee Gainsbourg, on rue de Verneuil in the 7 th , is now subtly opening the doors to new ways to soak up the history in a manner in which you hope Serge would have approved. As well as visiting the evocative piano bar, Gainsbarre, just across the street, you can now plan a small party or dinner here surrounded by the history and time capsule atmosphere. Put us on the list s’il vous plait…

The TV to watch: Babies, BBC

Rising star Paapa Essiedu has recently won rave reviews on stage opposite Bryan Cranston in All My Sons. Through NT Live from 16 April you can catch that performance in cinemas if you missed the live run, and at home, on the small screen Babies is new from Mum writer/director Stefan Golaszewski. Here, Essiedu stars with Siobhan Cullen as a couple navigating babyloss. While it’s undoubtedly hard material, it’s one of the best reviewed BBC dramas in years. Six parts available to watch now.

The album to listen to: Your Favourite Toy, Foo Fighters

The new album from the Foo Fighters Your Favourite Toy is out at the end of the month. Four years since the untimely loss of the band’s drama Taylor Hawkins in 2022, Dave Grohl has described the start of this album as their therapy for the tragedy that ‘that threw our world upside down.’

The books to read: Fame Sick, Lena Dunham and See You on the Other Side, Jay McInerney

When Jay McInerney eulogised 80s downtown in his fiction Lena Dunham could have been a kid with the crayons at the Odeon. Grown up, Dunham’s precocious first work Girls drew many comparisons with Bright Lights, Big City. This month her second memoir, Fame Sick is a coruscating must read, with the same intensity of the TV show and her first coming of (under) age book Not that Kind of Girl.

Meanwhile, McInerney, is, he says, concluding his portrait of a marriage with See you on the Other Side. Fictional literary It couple Russell and Corrine Calloway, whom he first introduced to readers in Brightness Falls (1992) have grown-up twins, including a girl of their own trying to open a restaurant in Brooklyn. They’re still frequenting the Odeon as the pandemic takes hold of life as they (and we) knew it. McInerney’s emotional realism, unerring social observation of several generations and subtle hints of autobiography in his fiction make for a great New York pairing with Dunham’s mordant millennial memoir.

The mid-Nineties were a strange time for the artists formerly known as Peak Eighties, yacht-going dandies in Antony Price suits.

A decade after crashing straight onto Top of the Pops with New Romantic-defining first single ‘Planet Earth’ and their debut self-titled album (1981), Duran Duran entered the new era a depleted force. In the wake of Andy Taylor (guitar) and Roger Taylor (drums) quitting in the months after the band’s appearance at the Philadelphia leg of 1985’s Live Aid concert, there were only three original members still standing: singer Simon Le Bon, keyboard player Nick Rhodes and bassist John Taylor. Sixth album Liberty (1990) came and went with nothing-to-see-here alacrity. The musicians’ private lives were in some turmoil.

But then, with American guitarist Warren Cuccurullo, a member of the line-up since 1989, taking a more active role, the band slowly got on the front foot once more. The result: this pair of albums, fascinating in different ways, re-released this week in sparkling new editions. In a nod to the band’s career-long interest in art and design, Duran Duran (1993) – the second self-titled record that’s better known as The Wedding Album (due to the sleeve featuring marriage photographs of the members’ parents) – and Thank You (1995) are available in deluxe new vinyl and CD packaging, with the music itself benefiting from audio remastering.

The Wedding Album might also be better known as The One with ‘Ordinary World’. The dreamy but soaring synthpop ballad, blessed with one of Le Bon’s best ever vocals, was a chart hit all over the world, and won the band an Ivor Novello Award for Most Performed Work. With over half a billion streams on Spotify alone, it’s their most-streamed song, narrowly besting talismanic early banger ‘Hungry Like the Wolf’.

‘Ordinary World' still sounds terrific now, as does the album’s other big song, ‘Come Undone’, the production and beats leaning into the then-voguish trip-hop vibe. Some album-only cuts retain age-defying freshness, too, notably ‘Too Much Information’, which opens the 13-song set with punchy, crunchy INXS-esque rock’n’roll, and the house-y ‘Drowning Man’. It all speaks of a rebooted band brimming with renewed confidence and swagger…

…which might go some way to explaining Thank You. Released two years later, it is, as the title would have it, the band’s offering of gratitude to those artists who’d inspired them. And while it’s hard to divine Year Zero hip-hop’s influence on the Brit electronic pioneers, Duran Duran’s cover of Grandmaster Flash and Melle Mel’s ‘White Lines (Don’t Do It)’ is riotously good fun, that feeling definitely helped by contributions from the track’s originators. But as for the other hip-hop cover, of Public Enemy’s ‘911 Is a Joke’, reinvented as a Beck-style blues jam with Le Bon rapping over the top: no thank you.

Their furiously funky take on Sly Stone’s ‘I Wanna Take You Higher’ is more successful, as is their moody, art-electronica recasting of Lou Reed’s ‘Perfect Day’. But Elvis Costello’s ‘Watching the Detectives’ done reggae-style; Bob Dylan’s ‘Lay Lady Lay’ done DD synthpop style; and Led Zeppelin’s ‘Thank You’ done like unleaded Zeppelin all collapse uncomfortably somewhere between heartfelt homage and wince-inducing cringe.

Three decades on, though, Thank You stands up better than we might expect for the album voted in 2006 the worst of all time by music magazine Q. With the benefit of snark-free hindsight it sounds less like Duran Duran’s bonkers shark-jumping moment than an out-there curio from a crucial, lane-shifting phase in their career.

Certainly it didn’t hurt them in the long run. Later this month Duran Duran release a scorchingly funky new single, ‘Free to Love’, recorded with old mate Nile Rodgers, and this summer they’re headlining a night at BST Hyde Park in London. These still-got-it veterans’ lounge-act cover of The Doors’ ‘Crystal Ship’ likely won’t appear in the set list, but ‘Ordinary World’ will be right up there.

Album #3 time for the west Londoner whose poetry-channelling, Mercury-winning debut Collapsed in Sunbeams came out five hectic years ago, and it’s all back to Arlo’s. “We’re doing dishes, the party’s starting to thin,” she sings in a dazed coo on the opening track, “Aleda’s cousin’s out the back being sick / The walls are scratched up / It smells of chips and gin / Crash and Ames are back at it / She kissed his cheek before she split”.

Not so much the party, then, but the afters. Hence the title – ‘Blue Disco’ – of a curtain-raising song which is bruised, gauzy dreampop ripped straight from the soundtrack of a Sofia Coppola elegy to late nights and lost boys/girls. Because Ambiguous Desire is the record on which the Covid-era, bedroom-pop #sadgirl gets her groove on… ish.

As much was telegraphed by first single ‘Get Go’: skippy, pleasingly decaffeinated drum’n’bass that spans the night, from wide-eyes on a strobing dancefloor to wee-hour cab rides across London/New York/LA, Local FM on low. The come-up and the comedown in one blissed-out banger.

Follow-up ‘Heaven’ went in similarly hard-and-soft, the beats nagging, the sentiments wistful (“I wish I had the language, to tell you the way this feels,” Parks sings in her cochlear-close voice, “let’s get involved, until the dawn breaks”). Likewise ‘2SIDED’, the pain and longing of unrequited love layered over Eighties synthpop jolted by junglist rhythms.

Template firmly established by those three tasters, last week the 25-year-old released ‘Beams’. It’s what’s known in the music business as the “focus track”: the song put out right before the album and/or the song that everyone involved thinks is the strongest and best exemplar of the record as a whole. And, mostly, it is. Over trip-hop beats and Chris Martin-style, lighters-aloft piano, ‘Beams’ paints another picture of a sleazy-cool motive (“We were sobering up / On a stranger’s stairs / Looking over shots / Of Harley Weir”), but with a shadow of emotional rejection and suicidal thoughts that’s more than just a bad trip.

It’s all exquisitely happysad, the phrasing as gracefully well-turned as we’d expect from a published poet, an album with one foot in the club and the other back in the bedroom, its protagonists repeatedly circling each other in the haze of either dancefloor smoke or of that ambiguous desire. Eventually, though, the listener’s head and hips yearn for a thrust of the “queer hedonism” in which Parks seemingly immersed herself at New York’s Paradise Garage. By the time we reach the penultimate ‘What If I Say It?’, we’re back in the enervating realms of the dreaded “dinner party soul” that came to characterise the fag-end of trip-hop.

On the final ‘Floette’, at least, the washes of atmospheric synths build to a frenzy of percussion and free-jazz drums. As Arlo Parks says in the album’s closing words, in the end, at last, at least, “we’re blossoming”.

Furrowed-brow talk about a comeback artist’s “journey” are de rigueur and, usually, de boring. Their back catalogue is a bit spotty. Their fortunes dipped. This time round they junked a few early song ideas. The record label got on their pip. They fell out with the bass player, and with the delivery guy who supplied muse-boosting 3am matcha lattes to the studio.

But Robyn: she’s been on a passage through the music industry and through life that’s so odyssean – not to mention, at times, Sisyphean – it’s a surprise Christopher Nolan hasn’t directed her new pop videos.

Signed in her early teens in her native Sweden on the strength of music the adolescent had written about her parents’ divorce. A second album the world outside her homeland refused to release because of the lyrics about abortion. A rebuttal of a US label’s overtures, which led them to seek out an “American Robyn”, using her producer Max Martin, the result of which was Britney Spears and ‘…Baby One More Time’. Ending up on that label anyway when her label bought that label. A stunning trilogy of mini-albums in one year (2010’s Body Talk). A stone-cold classic in the shape of that era’s ‘Dancing on My Own’, the sad banger that someone, somewhere, is smile-sobbing to right now.

Then, in the eight years since her last album, Honey, Robyn decided to undergo IVF as a single parent while also getting fruity on the apps. And now, here she is at 46, back back back with ninth album Sexistential, on a new hip new label (Young, home of the xx, FKA twigs and Kamasi Washington), reunited with Martin and with longtime collaborator Klas Åhlund, being shot for edgy magazine covers by provocateur-in-chief Juergen Teller, and making (oh yes) some of the best music of her 30-year career.

These nine perfectly judged tracks are Robyn having fun, cutting loose, leaning into everything she’s learned in those three decades. ‘Dopamine’ was the appropriately mood-boosting first single, an icy-cool electro party anthem from a heat-seeking fortysomething. ‘Sucker For Love’ is a minimal synth art-bop that sounds more like early Eighties Sheffield than 21^st century Stockholm. ‘Talk To Me’ is the shape-throwing, dancefloor-sparking result of her reunion as co-writer with Martin, one of the pre-eminent ultra-pop hitmakers, well, ever.

And then there’s title track, a roof-raising and indeed eyebrow-raising masterpiece of detail, confession and celebration. ‘Sexistential’ is a libidinous, suitably throbbing, mommie-horniest melodrama in which Robyn raps about the hormonal hurricane of a middle-aged mother-to-be with “ovaries on hyperdrive”. The rest of the lyrics? Glad you asked. “F*ck a app, I need me some IRL / I'm on the clock, just give me your ASL / F*ck a Plan B, baby, it's no big deal / I'm already 10 weeks in maternity / F*ck a single mom, I'm not judgemental / In my sweatpants, and some juicy hentai / F*ck a therapist, it's not mental / I need philosophy, this shit is existential.”

While I’m googling “hentai”, the picaresque continues, to a meeting with her doctor, discussion of her dream donor and how “Adam Driver always did kind of give me a boner”. I’ll just leave that there, save to say that, this summer, Robyn is on tour, at arena-scale. The sound of 10,000-plus fans bellowing that line nightly already feels like the unlikeliest concert singalong moment of the year, alongside “who the f*ck is Madeline?”.

Upwards, onwards, outwards, very forwards: now that’s a journey.

Sexistential is out now via Young

“He stalks the New York City subways, waiting for his chance to strike. When the opportunity comes, he moves fast. He has to.”

Thus began an October 1982 CBS news report that introduced the world to Keith Haring, who was at this point already an artist of note, though not yet the superstar he would become. Back then, adverts would be pasted onto black, vertical rectangles that lined New York subway stations. If one happened to be vacant, Haring would descend, with a piece of chalk in one hand, and hastily graffiti it with his simple cartoon figures – an iconic design that now adorns everything from phone cases to T-shirts from H&M.

For all that he’s now widely revered, though, the Pennsylvania-born artist was very much operating outside of the system with the subway works, which were created between 1980 and 1985. “Technically,” CBS noted, “what he’s doing is illegal”, before broadcasting one of his numerous arrests for vandalism.

That report plays on a TV screen in Voice of the Street, the immersive new exhibition at central London’s Moco Museum, the independent contemporary art gallery that also has outposts in Barcelona and Amsterdam. More than 30 of Haring’s early ‘80s guerrilla subway drawings are currently on display at Moco, with alien spaceships, the aforementioned figures and his immortal ‘radiant baby’ – a crouched infant exuding straight lines that denote innocence and light – jostling for space.

The relevant section of the gallery, meanwhile, has been remodelled in the style of an ‘80s subway carriage: a tiled wall bearing an old-fashioned telephone and a sign declaring “UPTOWN TRAINS” contribute to its rich depiction of Haring’s world. Moco was mindful, explains its Chief Exhibition, Collection & Operational Officer Birthe Faessen, that the experiential elements didn’t overwhelm the understated power of Haring’s art.

“Because we’re telling the story of Keith Haring, set in the background of 1980s New York,” she says, “it becomes important to [set the scene] because it was such a dynamic society back then. All artists create from specific circumstances, but when you recreate something like this, you want to make sure that it is true to the feeling. You don’t want to under-do it; you don’t want to overdo it.”

Work began at the start of the year. As with any creative process, the curation of the exhibition was a matter of trial and error. At one point, the space was accessible via an historically faithful subway entrance and featured a vintage Louis Vuitton suitcase, as though a passenger had plonked their possessions down to admire the art. “You don’t want to make it gimmicky,” notes Faessen. “So then the process begins: ‘Let’s eliminate some of these items so that the art can speak and visitors still feel that they’re in the 1980s.’”

After Faessen and the team stripped back certain elements (visitors will need to head down the road to Oxford Street if they really want to see a Louis Vuitton suitcase), the early renders looked too sparse. Thankfully, a fabulous neon sign that reads “OPEN 24 HOURS” is one of the props that returned to the fold, resulting in an exhibition that is both playful and accessible.

For Lionel Logchies-Prins, who co-founded the gallery with his wife Kim in 2016, that last word is crucial. “Haring,” he says, “believed that art should be accessible to everyone, which is also central to Moco. His subway drawings are the clearest expression of that idea, created in public, for the public.

“His work invites people into a shared experience, and that sense of openness and connection is something we continue to value. It shows how art can speak to everyone, without losing depth.”

Indeed, the exhibition fully explores the fact that Haring was making unapologetic, subversive art at a time when, as an openly gay man, his very existence was stigmatised amid the AIDS crisis. Some of the subway drawings depict bodies entwined in a celebration of intimacy, signalling Haring’s message of defiance in the face of a hostile media.

Haring was so inspired that he reportedly created up to 50 subway artworks per day and around 5000 in total. Countless drawings disappeared forever, while some were ripped down from the walls by enamoured travellers (many on display at Moco have suitably ragged edges). A number of these fell into the hands of collectors, with a collection of 31 subway drawings sold for $9.2m (£7.4m) at Sotheby’s in 2024 – not bad considering they could originally have been acquired for the price of a one-way ticket.

Of course, what’s really important is Haring’s worldview, which Voice of the Street has brought vividly to life some 36 years after his death from AIDS-related complications. “His message of love, acceptance, joy, resistance and vulnerability,” says Birthe Faessen, “is so relevant when there’s so much going on at a social and societal level today.”

It’s here that the exhibition’s immersive elements come into their own. “I'm hoping that if anybody walks away from this exhibition having a conversation,” says Faessen, “it’s about what is happening now or what happened back then.”

Voice of the Street is open at Moco Museum London for a limited three-month run

After a successful run of nomadic exhibitions held in clothing shops and galleries across the city, London gallerist Freddie Foulkes celebrated the opening of his permanent space in the arches of the historic Shepherd’s Bush Market last week. Bringing together four artists – Alexander Carey-Morgan, Charlie Gosling, Emily Wilcock and Hunter Amos – the inaugural exhibition saw eager crowds of art-goers spill out the arches and into the surrounding market, a testament to Foulkes’ active commitment to the local scene.

Featuring a rich selection of portrait, figurative and landscape paintings, sculptures and, soon to come, live performances, the show – titled A Brutal Kind of Bloom – makes a strong case for sensation-based art that favours ritual and affect over contemporary minimalism and conceptualist ideas. As the exhibition text puts it: “In a world of quantification and statistics in which we are told the things that matter can be measured and described, there are new artists who suggest otherwise.” From Australian-born Hunter Amos’ dreamstate oil paintings of perceptual otherworlds to Alexander Carey-Morgan’s earthy interpretations poppy and papaver fields – made by staining and canvas with watercolour and coffee – the centrality of human mark-making feels particularly resistant to algorithmic instrumentality, grounding viewers in abstract and ancient forms, which recall pre-modern modes of visual language.

Elsewhere, British artist Charlie Gosling’s figurative paintings of friends and acquaintances glimpsed the inner world of his subjects through expressive and painterly textures. British-Australian artist Emily Wilcock’s brightly coloured and restless portraits featured fast brush strokes and fearless incisions that Foulkes describes as pure “mind-to-hand art-making”. What united the works on show was a deep engagement with the affective dimensions of experience, stretching beyond representational forms into the sublime. To quote Philip Guston in A Life Lived: “What the hell would I want to do with information when sensation is on offer.”

Whether freshly released or cherished classics, the titles in our reading list look both back and forwards. Some explore long-gone eras, through the fashions of the 19th century or major changes in furniture design over the decades, as simple items such as chairs find ever-evolving form. Others look at the connection between artists and where inspiration is found, while elsewhere the patterns of the past are broken, and a decolonial, limitless world of design for the future is imagined.

Krautrock. Rage-rap. Footwork. Skeletal techno. You can’t say Kim Gordon hasn’t been living her best musical life in her solo career. In the 15 years since the messy dissolution of Sonic Youth, rent asunder by musical and personal partner Thurston Moore’s infidelity, she’s roamed far and free from the alt.rock/proto-grunge terroir of that ground-zero New York guitar band.

You can’t say she isn’t having pointed fun either. The already-iconic lead song on 2024’s The Collective was ‘Bye Bye’. Over a trap beats-meets-noise-rock bed, she intoned her packing list for travelling. Altogevva now: “Milk thistle. Advil. Black jeans. Blue jeans. Cardigan. Pyjamas, silk. Eye mask. Ear plugs. Sleeping pills. Black dress. White tee. iBook. Power cord. Medications. Bella Freud. YSL. Eckhaus Latta. Eyelash curler. Vibrator. Teaser.” The result: the TSA airport patdown anthem we didn’t know we needed.

Now, on her superb third solo album Play Me, the 72-year-old continues that playfulness, with added razor-sharp observational edge. She opens with the grimy, inner-city jazz of the title track, and this time the listicle lyrics are taken from Spotify playlists: “Makeout jams… Neon cowgirl… Easy rider... ‘’70s hippie... Spring pop…… Rich popular girl… Villain mode… On wheels… Chill vibes…”

As for Gordon’s music: you can, the DSP (Digital Service Provider) (you knew that) tells me, find it on their Oblique playlist, where that means “angular, asymmetrical”. Which, while not unreasonable, does barely sufficient justice to the engaging, transfixing brilliance of Play Me. She and repeat collaborator Justin Raisen (also producer for Charli XCX and Yves Tumor) wanted these songs to be short. Fast. Focused. Tight. That they've done, with the album’s 12 songs clocking in at a (surely deliberate) one second shy of 30 minutes.

‘Girl With a Look’ is a New Wave bop throwing, yes, angular shapes over gauzy synth. ‘Busy Bee’ is a turbulent post-rock jam that mixes late-period Radiohead with Aphex Twin-style skree and echoey drums from Dave Grohl. Lyrically it includes a tweaked sample of Gordon and her old bandmate in Free Kitten, Julia Cafritz, talking in the 1990s. Funnily enough, their three-decades-old quotes from the depths of the era’s rock patriarchy feel relevant: “Those boys are lucky that we broke up before they made it big… Or they’d have a lawsuit on their hands… Man, I think you should still sue their ass… Maybe we will!”

Because these punchy songs have punchy messages, too, about personal politics and actual politics, about tech dystopia and the flailing mayhem of Gordon’s homeland. The itchy, glitchy ‘No Hands’ laments an America where there’s “no hands on the wheel, it’s a steal”. On throbbing sub-bass lament ‘Subcon’, in pitch-shifted vocals and haiku-tight lyrics, she takes aim at the vainglory of the broligarchy (“You wanna go to Mars, and then what?”). In the pitch-black satire of ‘Post Empire’, she breaks from the sprechgesang to sing, dreamily, “Love what you’ve done with the empire”, before adding, just to check: “We’re post, right?” We’re crying with laughter. Or laughing through tears. One of the two.

Play Me ends with ‘Byebye25!’, a sequel, listicle and protest song all in one: it runs down ideas or phrases from Trump’s “banned words” list. You know, things he doesn’t believe in, and certainly won’t be funding, or even allowing to exist, in his big beautiful US.

From the top: “Mental health… Gulf of Mexico… Gay… Bird flu… Immigrants… Intersex… Diversity… Climate change… They/them… Tile drainage… Measles… Abortion… Women…”

This is Play Me, already the most vital album of 2026. Make America Gordon Again.

Play Me is out now via Matador Records.

‘An airline ticket to romantic places... Gardenia perfume lingering on a pillow.’ So said Eric Maschwitz in his wistful lyrics of the song These Foolish Things, which aptly distil what, for me, is the nostalgic allure of travel. And it’s evident in my Smythson Cosmic diary, where there may well be pressed gardenias and various BA boarding passes folded into its pages over its year-long travels.

A big part of my love of collecting various souvenirs and talismans from my trips is the transportive quality of taking you back to another time, another place. Or as Joan Didion succinctly declared in her essay On Keeping a Notebook, for the life-affirming gift it gives you of jolting you back to life ‘when the world seems drained of wonder’.

I confess to being a fairly analogue traveller – looking for romance in the real, not the digital, world – where I always take a disposable Kodak camera with me, in the hope that it will add a slightly sepia-tinted – and very much wishful thinking, here – Harley Weir-esque magic to my holiday snaps.

Hotel tote bags are another big love of mine, collected over trips which are like time capsules into where and what exactly I was doing that month; a particular favourite is one from the beach restaurant in Positano – Da Adolfo – which is still filled with sand, seashells, a pair of Manolo mules and a collection of some of my most-loved items of hotel paraphernalia. To clarify, I do not steal hotel pieces, but there is nothing like an Italian hotel beach towel or ashtray – special mention to Le Sirenuse, Villa d’Este and Il Pellicano for both – not to mention their hotel matches. (Equally old-school and fabulous are the more graphic deco box of matches from Claridge’s, which instantly conjure up the languid reverie of Martini time in its Fumoir.)

Apart from happy times in hotel bars, I seem to spend a lot of my time following ley lines and seeking out shrines and ruins, from temples in Egypt to pagodas in Vietnam, where I always like to make an offering of some kind. So I often travel with a box of Astier de Villatte incense, beautifully packaged in a slim Tiffany-blue box filled with delicately scented sticks sourced from the Japanese island of Awaji, where, for more than a thousand years, it has been made by the koh-shis, or masters of aroma. A forever favourite is the Palais d’Hiver variety, which is meant to evoke the scent of the tsarinas: an exuberance of musky patchouli mixed with the delicious perfume of white, waxy flowers. And seeing as it’s unlikely I will get to Russia any time soon, it extols a pure fantasy version of my imagined dreamscape of St Petersburg and the Romanovs. The perfume makers have all kinds of incense inspired by places from Kingston, Jamaica, to Buenos Aires, and a new one based on the island of Sao Tome and Principe, in which the heady aromas revolve around cocoa.

Aside from the hugely evocative power of scent, there’s a special sort of magic that ‘taste’ conjures up in vividly bringing a place back to life. Food is never just food; it’s a memory – a moment recaptured in a mouthful. Eating a madeleine will forever be like plunging into a forgotten Marcel Proust reverie. But, for my preferred temps perdus, the most evocative cake is a Tropézienne tart from Birley Bakery, which tastes like it’s been spritzed with Santa Maria Novella’s orange blossom water and exudes enough Françoise-Sagan-Bonjour-Tristesse 50s glamour to instantly take me on a faded-gingham romp through Pampelonne Beach.

“When you’re putting everything into it yourself, it’s a pressure cooker. So it does drive you insane. And eventually you will hate some songs and feel like you’ve failed on a few. But as long as there’s an emotion there, whether it’s anger or ecstasy, or feeling something, that’s intensity enough to carry it.”

James Blake told me that in 2013, a few weeks after the one-man-production-hub won the Mercury Music Prize for his second album, Overgrown. The then-25-year-old blessed with an oratory’s worth of vocal range was still – quietly, modestly, wryly – on a high. “My album sales went up 2500 per cent in the week after the awards. But I’d only sold about four records,” he added with a smile. At the ceremony at The Roundhouse in North London, such was the unknowability of the six-foot-six songwriter from Enfield that host Lauren Laverne introduced him as James Blunt. He joked that he should have performed ‘Your Beautiful’ as his winner’s song. “I was kicking myself afterwards – there was the perfect to opportunity to sing a song that had actually sold some records.”

Almost 13 years on, as he releases his wonder-inducing seventh album Trying Times, much has changed for Blake, and much hasn’t. He’s spent the biggest part of his subsequent recording career living in Los Angeles but has now, after a decade, returned to the UK. He’s worked with some of the biggest names in music, including Beyoncé, Frank Ocean, SZA, Rosalía, and Kendrick Lamar, his studio skills highly covetable in R&B and hip-hop, but is still probably – visually, certainly, lanky stature notwithstanding – unknown to most.

For most of that time he’s been in a relationship with actor/activist/writer Jameela Jamil, whom he credits with inspo for her “constant and unwavering dedication to quality”, and who contributes here as a co-writer. And he’s still cheerfully creating music in a pressure cooker of his own construction – he spent two-and-half years making Trying Times, during which period he extricated himself from the major label system and set up his own indie, CMYK Records, to self-release his music.

That go-his-own way freedom finds vivid form across these 13 tracks. Whereas previously his writing and production have on occasion been a marvel of precision minimalism, of ascetic electronica – something to admire rather than love – the songcraft and soundscapes on this album are astonishing. Human, soulful, inclusive, wholly embracing.

He enters the ring with the opening ‘Walk Out Music’, a pulsing synthwave anthem of encouragement and resilience: “You’re no good to anyone,” he and his pitchy backing vocals sing, “dead.”

Lead single ‘Death of Love’ contains a “master sample” of Leonard Cohen’s ‘You Want It Darker’, and has Blake singing close-mic, voice swooping the octaves. ‘Make Something Up’ is a beautiful, drifting earworm, an acoustic guitar strum swelling alongside a hymnal wash of vocals and a low-rise wall-of-sound production. The exquisite ‘Didn’t Come to Argue’ sounds like a comedown take on a Great American Songbook torch song – then, when Monica Martin joins on vocals, pivots to a Sufjan Stevens psych-pop symphony. After Blake contributed to last year’s The Boy Who Played the Harp, Dave returns the favour with punchy bars on the head-nodding glitch-pop of ‘Doesn’t Just Happen’.

Blake largely recorded much of this album at Peter Gabriel’s Real World near Bath, bucolic studios where, rather than create in the windowless rooms of before, he could let the light in. That feeling of play is there in ‘Rest of Your Life’, a vocal-lite, sun-up rave-up that’s both beseeching and chilled: “What are you doing the rest of your life? Spend it all with me… no pressure, I’m breezy”. And it’s there in the closing ‘Just A Little Higher’, a piano ballad that blooms to the orchestral grandeur of violin, viola, cello and double bass, the wearied ache of his voice right (t)here for us. “Adjust your sights just a little higher,” he sings, another note of encouragement and resilience and caution to bookend the album, “’’cause they’re playing us from a great height.”

Trying times? For James Blake these are, in no small way, achieving times. Bravo, maestro.

Guesthouses suffer from an image problem. The term still conjures a certain look: heavy mahogany furniture, crocheted doilies, laminated house rules, breakfast served too early in a stuffy dining room that no one really wants you to sit in. Something polite, a bit tired, left behind by the rise of the boutique hotel and the bargain of the short-term rental.

But a different kind of guesthouse has been taking shape for some time now. The places that get this right tend not to start with hospitality at all; the accommodation is instead an extension of a creative sensibility. They’re conceived by people already immersed in other forms of work, be it fashion, art, design or retail, who bring the judgement they have developed elsewhere indoors. Not just in how a space looks, but how it’s actually lived in.

You notice it in small ways: books that have been thumbed through; furniture chosen for curling up in; bathrooms stocked with full-size bottles of brands you’d buy yourself. Nothing is too precious to be used, but nothing is generic either; there’s a distinct point of view. Guesthouses like this work particularly well when you’re travelling alone, in a pair, or simply want a room to yourself without disappearing entirely.

The guesthouses below are different in mood and location, but they share that warm logic. Each one operates as a cultural address first, accommodation second. Your stay becomes even more pleasurable if you pay attention to how a place has been put together, then let that guide how you move through, and beyond it.

La Traverse, Marseille

La Traverse sits above Malmousque, in Marseilles, under the direction of Catherine Bastide. It’s a house that behaves like two things at once: guest accommodation at the top, and a gallery and event space at street level. The guest studio, La Petite Terrasse, is under the roof with views out towards Château d’If and the Frioul islands. It’s set up as a lived room rather than a hotel room, with a double bed and an extra bed sharing the space with a desk, a small library and a kitchenette.

The furniture is entirely made by Ateliers Laissez Passer using re-used materials from the Grand Port Maritime de Marseille; the entrance door glass has been hand-engraved by Ludivine Venet. The bed and other pieces sit on casters, making the studio easy to rearrange and play with.

Downstairs, La Traverse functions as a large, bright gallery space with a white mosaic floor and a concrete kitchen designed by Régis Jocteur Monrozier. It opens onto a veranda and a courtyard shaded by a faux poivrier. You stay upstairs knowing the ground floor might be in use for a launch or an exhibition, with no need to plan ahead when you can wander down and see what’s happening.

Pagostas, Patmos

Pagostas is set within the fortified lanes of Chora on Patmos, in a house held by the Monastery of Saint John and restored to host a small number of guests. The project is led by Maria Lemos and her husband, Gregoris Kambouroglou, also behind Mouki Mou and the agency Rainbow Wave. The building carries the same editorial instinct, translated into stone and lime.

Artwork by Katerina Mourati sit on open shelves, while a scent developed with Lyn Harris lingers lightly through the rooms. Windows look directly onto the monastery walls, and from the upper level the whitewashed roofs of Chora step down towards the sea.

Kambouroglou, a former orthopaedic surgeon, spent months on site during the restoration, working alongside local builders and craftsmen. “Pagostas, as is Mouki Mou, is Maria’s brainchild,” he says. “The project depended on the harmony between Maria’s vision, Leda’s concept and the contribution of master craftsmen.” Interior designer Leda Athanasopoulou developed the rooms with Greek makers throughout, building beds into plastered alcoves and placing solid low tables against thick walls. Mattresses, pillows and bed linen are Greek-made.

The project draws on the Greek idea of philoxenia, the practice of welcoming strangers into one’s home. Communal spaces include a dining room, library, courtyard, garden and roof terrace. In the early evening, records play in the dining room to signal apéro, and guests gather with the hosts on the roof terrace, the monastery walls rising at eye level beyond the parapet.

Casa Julfa, Montmorillon

Casa Julfa is housed in a 17th-century townhouse in the historic centre of Montmorillon, south-east of Poitiers. The town has long been associated with books, inks and calligraphy, and the house reflects that history. Founded by the artist Corinne Aivazian, it operates as both guest accommodation and artist residency.

Four apartments are arranged across three floors of the townhouse, while an adjoining forge has been converted into an atelier. The studio retains its industrial proportions, with a tall opening that brings daylight across worktables and pottery wheels during the Makers & Thinkers residencies.

Inside the house, rooms carry traces of successive decades of use. Original 1950s and 60s wallpaper sits beside a large tapestry and stone fireplace, while fabrics sourced from local brocantes appear in curtains and upholstery. A short walk from the door, the Gartempe river runs through the medieval quarter, where bookshops, printers and paper dealers still shape the town’s life with the written page.

Valletta Vintage, Valletta

Valletta Vintage is spread across a cluster of restored townhouses in the historic centre of Malta’s capital, set among narrow streets and honey-coloured limestone façades that define the city. The project was founded by architect Chris Briffa, whose work begins with the restoration of Valletta’s limestone houses and continues with apartments furnished for short stays. Each address retains the proportions, stone surfaces and deep-set windows of the city’s domestic architecture.

Furniture and objects have been introduced gradually, mostly by Chris’ wife Hanna Briffa, who knows many of her returning visitors personally. Mid-century seating, studio ceramics and vintage lighting sit comfortably within rooms where the thickness of the masonry walls and the height of the ceilings allow everything to breathe. Balconies and shutters open onto the street, keeping the apartments in close contact with everyday life in Valletta.

Guests can stay in DOMA, a townhouse currently available for short lets, while the neighbouring SCALA building continues to evolve. Two additional spaces are underway there: a lounge with a small cinema for guests below ground, and a street-level shop that will offer natural wines, vintage pieces and other carefully chosen objects when it opens this autumn. Together, they extend Briffa’s inviting original premise, with shared rooms for guests below and a small shop opening onto the street.

Jonojé, Bruges

Jonojé is in a listed building in Bruges, among narrow medieval streets running towards the canals. The property has been reworked by the design studio Studio LOHO, founded in 2017 by Karel Loontiens and Jo Hoeven. The project combines the studio’s working environment with accommodation, allowing guests to stay within the same spaces where the designers develop their objects and interiors.

Six suites, each around 75 square metres, occupy the upper floors. The rooms function as demonstration interiors, furnished with pieces designed and produced by the studio in its Bruges workshops. Materials remain close to their natural state, with clay, wood and stone forming much of the palette. A ceramic bathtub shaped from a single block of clay anchors the room, reflecting the studio’s emphasis on material process.

As Hoeven explains, the approach comes from the designers’ close involvement in every detail of the space. “What makes Jonojé different is that we are not only hosts, but also the creators of everything the guest experiences,” he says. “We define luxury as attention: to materials, to detail, to tranquillity.”

Elsewhere in the building are the studio’s showroom and gallery spaces, alongside working areas where new pieces are developed. A garden of more than 1,200 square metres sits just outside the city centre, extending the project beyond the house.

Because the objects and interiors are designed and made by the studio, the spaces remain closely tied to their practice. As Hoeven puts it: “We have designed and crafted every object ourselves, so we know every line and nuance of the space. For us, hospitality is a personal invitation into a world we have created ourselves.”

10AM Lofts, Athens

1OAM Lofts is in the Kerameikos–Psyrri quarter of Athens, a neighbourhood where workshops and small galleries mix with late-night cafés and music venues. The guesthouse forms part of the wider world of 1OAM Apotheke, the project founded by Eva Papadaki that explores Greek ingredients and everyday rituals.

1OAM Lofts is in the Kerameikos–Psyrri quarter of Athens, a neighbourhood where workshops and small galleries mix with late-night cafés and music venues. The guesthouse forms part of the wider world of 1OAM Apotheke, the project founded by Eva Papadaki that explores Greek ingredients and everyday rituals. The 10AM Lofts project was developed with Studio Andrew Trotter, Gavalas Ioannidou Architecture and Papadaki, who reworked a former 1970s industrial building into a series of creative spaces. The penthouse on the upper floors was designed by Studio Andrew Trotter with the local practice, bringing lime plaster, raw concrete and generous light into the building’s later residential life. 

The loft apartments were conceived as places to live for a short time within the city. As Papadaki explains: “1OAM Lofts is a guesthouse set in one of Athens’ creative districts. Surrounded by art spaces and clubs, the idea was never to create hotel rooms, but homes where guests feel part of the neighbourhood and move through the city as residents do.”

During the week, visitors can book an appointment to explore the ingredients at the heart of the apotheke, including wild Cretan herbs and essential oils, along with soaps and incense prepared in small batches by the studio. Many of these references trace back to Papadaki’s childhood in Crete, where her grandmother made soap with herbs from the garden and kept olive oil and thyme honey close at hand in the kitchen. At weekends, the doors open more freely, with pastries from the bakery, coffee, organic Greek tea and wine served to guests and neighbours.

In the week that David Byrne brings to the UK the cavalcade of communal joy that is his Who is the Sky? tour, here’s the cavalry. As something like spring breaks across the country, Harry Styles releases an album hymning, if not the importance of good punctuation, then the power of connection, of dance, of disco, of, yes, kissing. As lead single 'Aperture' had it, we belong together. Which might be a bit tilting-at-windmills in the current (geopolitical, economic, existential) climate, but I’ll take it.

On Kiss All the Time. Disco, Occasionally, partly recorded in the techno central that is Berlin, Styles leans into abandon that’s both wilful and artful. As he explained to Haruki Murakami in their recent conversation piece for Runners World, “I wanted to recreate [what] I had on the dancefloor, being lost in instrumentation and the musicality. It was so immersive, like, this is how I want to feel when I’m on stage, too. I don’t want it to feel like a sermon I’m delivering. I wanted it to feel like, oh, we’re in this music together. Like I’m in it with you.”

Hence the titling and routing of this year’s world tour: Together, Together runs to 67 dates but comprises multi-night “global residencies” in seven cities. For this sub-three-hour pavement-pounder, music and the sharing thereof is a marathon and a sprint.

On 'Aperture', this fourth album’s opener as well as its lead single, Styles and longstanding co-writer and wingman Kid Harpoon set the pace, the song’s lyrically vague, blissed-out message of rave inclusivity lashed to a fizzy, dizzying mash of Balearic and electro. 'Ready, Steady, Go!' has a delicious, day-glo Hot Chip shimmer. 'Are You Listening Yet?' is a carnival-ready call-to-arms (or, at least, -to-the-dancefloor) complete with Styles rap, gnarly guitar solo and Basement Jaxx-style exuberance.

There’s more primo electronic-culture cherry-picking on 'Season 2 Weight Loss': a track with a winking title and an exquisitely produced percussive scaffolding that are both worthy of LCD Soundsystem, although the gospel – strong backing vocals from Wolf Alice’s Ellie Rowsell and House Gospel Choir – elevate it from sticky dancefloor to heavenly plane.

Like any good runner, Styles knows it’s also about pacing. 'Coming Up Roses', one of only two songs that bust the four-minute mark, is a lovely, pizzicato-coloured ballad that blooms into a gorgeous wash of strings courtesy of maestro arranger Jules Buckley. Then, straight after, the nominative determinism of 'Pop', a libidinous, burbling synth-pop singalong whose lyrics give us the tour title, not to mention a special image of Harry, viz. “it’s just me on my knees”. I’m not sure it’s thanks he’s giving.

We break the tape on an arms-aloft high with the final 'Carla’s Song', the album’s longest track and a heart-pounding, Eighties-synth aerobic workout. Altogether now: “I know what you like, I know what you really like, you can hear it any time.” Like the rest of the album, the message is persuasive but hardly profound. But if it isn’t the suitably euphoric, appropriately escapist, wholly on-brand main set closer on the Together, Together tour, I’ll eat my legwarmers.

The film to watch

It’s a quirk of awards season that while Oscar voters love to make a new female film star through the acting categories (think Jennifer Lawrence at 22, Mikey Madison at 25 last year and many, many more) it’s almost impossible to win as a young man. Adrien Brody is the only Best Actor to have ever won in his 20s. Previously nominated as Bob Dylan in A Complete Unknown and for Call Me By Your Name, third time lucky, can Timothee Chalamet, 30, win with Marty Supreme? And what’s more, would it be deserved? Ironically Marty Supreme examines ambition as a subject matter in itself… Make up your own mind before the Academy Awards on 15 March. Watch on ITV.

The tickets to buy

David Hare’s new play, inspired by the world of Victorian theatre Grace Pervades, opens at the Theatre Royal Haymarket on 24 April until 11 July. Book now to see Ralph Fiennes (still due a best actor Oscar) on stage as Henry Irving.

Or go for the spring run of Dracula with all 23 characters inhabited by a shape-shifting (and singing) Cynthia Erivo directed by Kip Williams. The Aussie director is best known for his hit re-imagining of The Picture of Dorian Gray with Sarah Snook

The exhibition to see

You need to book your tickets for an electrifying encounter with Dame Tracey Emin at Tate Modern running till 31 August. Her first solo show at White Cube in 1994 was pessimistically entitled My Major Retrospective. The work she has made since then – and continues to make today – is a moving testament to her singular second life as an artist. There’s nothing like seeing so many of her confessional works across multiple genres in conversation with each other, even if you’ve been seeking them out since ‘My Bed’ was the star of the Turner Prize in 1999.

Get tickets

The event to attend…

Celebrating its 40^th year on the London landscape, BFI Flare, the LGBTQIA+ film Festival, runs from 18-29 March. There are tickets from £10 along with many special events and talks, from a free celebration of Midnight Cowboy auteur John Schlesinger in his centenary, to Russell T Davies in a Screen Talk conversation.

The collaboration to look out for…

We do like to be beside the sea even in March especially if you’re wrapped up in Barbour. The new collaboration with Paul Smith is inspired by the British seaside and to celebrate, a custom Paul Smith fish-and-chip van has even been on a national tour. Chips with a side of cobalt Southwold stripes please… and look out for the fisherman bags too, great for the beach or the city.

The TV to watch

The performances and script divide opinion but you can’t fault the wardrobe. Thank Love Story on Disney+ (which includes Naomi Watts as Jacqueline Kennedy) for educating the next gen on JFK Jr and Carolyn Bessette Kennedy whose style is now being copied by 20-somethings. Maybe the CBK trend will get the youth vote out for Jack Schlossberg, JFK’s grandson, currently running for Congress in New York. And if it’s still sub-zero, have you tried Heated Rivalry on Sky Atlantic which is creating a surge of interest in getting off the sofa and taking up ice hockey... amongst other extra-curricular activities.

The album to listen to…

Kiss All the Time. Disco, Occasionally, Harry Styles fourth solo album, is currently being teased by 'Aperture': his promising electronica single and its work-of-art music video. A further glimpse into the universe of the new record (out March 6) was seen this weekend, with a spectacularly synchronised dance routine at Manchester's Brit Awards.

The book to read

After coming out of acting retirement for a cameo in Marty Supreme, Gwyneth Paltrow is said to want to play Belle Burden, granddaughter of Babe Paley, and author of the bestselling memoir Strangers: A Memoir of a Marriage (Penguin). Get to know the startling book in its beautifully written original, before it heads to the screen in any form. It’s a haunting must-read and the centre of a bidding war for the film rights.

For something new, add the latest from Atlanta novelist Tayari Jones to your stack. Author of An American Marriage (winner of the 2019 Women’s Prize for Fiction) her new book is Kin (Oneworld) out this month.

Tracey Emin and Frida Kahlo have both created profoundly personal work that challenges the way we view art and talk about our inner lives. This year, both artists are having major solo shows at Tate Modern, opening this month and June respectively. These exhibitions highlight their bravery and raw innovation. While they never met – Emin grew up in Margate a decade after the Mexican painter’s death – their practices continue to resonate with one another across a century.

Also featuring the Cuban-American artist Ana Mendieta, who shows at Tate Modern over the summer, the gallery has focused this year’s programming around ‘prominent and powerful female artists who have shaped art history’, says Catherine Wood, director of the gallery’s curatorial department, and its head curator. ‘Especially artists who have worked with their own personal life stories which were deeply affected by trauma.’

Kahlo’s paintings feature herself in settings that teeter between real life and surreal imagination, drawing upon her own experiences of heartbreak, sickness and miscarriage. In her famous work The Broken Column (1944), we see the artist topless except for a brace that wraps around her torso, showing a crumbling decorative architectural backbone through an exposed gap in her flesh. The piece was made following a devastating 1925 bus accident, which left Kahlo temporarily bed-bound before suffering lifelong pain. Her work was radical in its time, centring physical and psychological experiences that are universal yet frequently silenced. Through images rich with both beauty and tremendous suffering, she painted a complex and nuanced view of love and loss.

Emin’s early work can likewise be seen as ahead of its time in many ways. When she emerged onto the UK art scene in the 1990s as a YBA (Young British Artist), her brash yet sensitive works on sex and abortion drew outrage from certain sectors of the art world. Her appliquéd tent, Everyone I Have Ever Slept With 1963–1995 (1995), featured the names of 102 bedfellows both sexual and platonic and was derided by the tabloid press. Like Kahlo, themes of heartache, shame and, more recently, sickness, permeate her paintings and installations. She even paid homage to her predecessor in Mary McCartney’s famous photograph Dame Tracey Emin as Frida Kahlo (2000). In it, Emin adopts Kahlo’s unique style, with giant red flowers woven through her hair, expressive jewellery and an instantly recognisable thick brow drawn above the bridge of her nose.

‘I think we are familiar with the fierceness and independence of each artist, as they are and were equally brave, outspoken and determined,’ says Wood. ‘But the spiritual affinities and tenderness towards their families might surprise visitors.’ While both artists developed a fierce form of self-expression that is palpable in their work, it wouldn’t be possible without a vulnerable, emotional openness – and a willingness to share this with their audience.

Autobiographical art, especially that produced by female artists, has historically been treated as less serious than the conceptual pieces of their male counterparts. ‘It was always the feminist mantra that “the personal is political”,’ says Wood, ‘but it’s true that autobiographical work was seen as less serious, less “universal” than abstract work by male artists in modernist Western art history.’ Today, there is a much stronger focus on the life of the artist, accelerated by a contemporary landscape that invites us to share our feelings and personal experiences online.

There are many contemporary artists who have followed in Kahlo and Emin’s footsteps, delving into their own lives as a way of speaking about wider life experiences. The former’s exhibition, The Making of an Icon, reflects on this with the inclusion of over 80 of her contemporaries and subsequent artists who have been inspired by her. ‘Both artists changed art history by refusing to take the passive position that the female body had been ascribed by art history,’ says Wood. ‘They have jointly opened up the possibility to draw upon personal experience as valid subject matter for art, even when it is material that people would usually try to hide or be ashamed of.’

Tracey Emin, 27 February 2026 until 31 August 2026, and Frida: The Making of an Icon, 25 June 2026 until 3 January 2027, Tate Modern

It’s the day before Valentine’s Day in Los Angeles, and Giftphoria founders Anthony Abaci and Nic Clar are both in their cars making sure some last-minute gifts reach their destinations. “It’s the busy season, to say the least!” says Clar with a laugh. “We’ve been running around all over the place.”

About a year ago, Abaci dreamed up the idea for the pair’s popular new website when he found himself stuck for something to buy his girlfriend’s 22-year-old cousin. “I thought: ‘Why do I never know what gifts to give these people?’” he recalls. “I know these people so well, why am I always having this problem? I wanted to try and solve it.”

Abaci’s hunt for a solution evolved into Giftphoria, a site that connects online shoppers with local small businesses and their artfully curated wares in the LA neighbourhoods of Echo Park, Silver Lake, Atwater Village and Pasadena. Soon, they’re planning to launch an app too.

Giftphoria works because it offers something existing delivery sites don’t: the opportunity to find something genuinely special or unique. Their other key selling point is that their delivery times are just as speedy as those offered by major online retailers. “We all got duped into thinking that convenience has to mean corporate,” argues Abaci. “We’re trying to change that narrative. We’re giving people a way to support their local community, we’re treating people fairly, and we’re literally faster than Amazon.”

Abaci and Clar, who have known each other for a decade since meeting as students at Chapman University in Orange County, say they first bonded over wanting to build something “impactful.” Today, they’re helping people discover local community gems they may have entirely overlooked. “83% of our customers say they’ve bought from stores they’d never heard of before,” says Abaci. “People want to shop local, but it isn’t always convenient. We’re seeing people use our site to buy gifts, but we’re also showing up at people’s houses for delivery and seeing cardboard boxes everywhere because they just moved in and they’e looking for something for their living room. A lot of our customers are young moms that don’t want to shop from Amazon, but they literally cannot leave the house. We’re able to be the connector to their community.”

So far, the site’s top sellers have included all-natural skincare products from Highland Park-based Luca Essentials, as well as jewellery selected from around the world by the Burbank boutique Lusanet Collective. “Anything that has a unique quality about it, always sells,” says Abaci. “Initially we thought we’d know what people want, but people proved us wrong! There’s so many unique people, and when someone decides on a gift to give somebody they do so by matching their aesthetic. Can I see this in their apartment, or can I see them wearing this?”

What Giftphoria is doing so succesfully is making it easier than ever to find those perfect gifts, while also pointing out that they’re often closer than you might think. “Guys in particular often just default to shopping at Amazon or Walmart,” says Clar. “One of our customers said that last Valentine’s Day he just went to the candle section in Target. We’re able to put you in touch with stores that are close but that you may not have known about. We’re really excited to be able to provide that kind of visibility and that new distribution, and obviously that’s why we’re so busy right now!”

Alex Eagle, Creative Director

Where in the world inspires your work?

My role as creative director is informed by all my travels – the things and experiences I find around the world, from Murano glass in Venice, to antiques from Les Puces in Paris that I bring back for Alex Eagle Studio projects and the new London hotel opening we’re working on, 180 Quarter.

Most memorable hotel experience?

Hotel Il Pellicano has the stardust – the backdrop to birthdays, parties, cosy weekends with friends and significant moments in my life. Marie-Louise Sciò [creative director and CEO] is a genius at creating the most special places and happenings.

What are your favourite specialist shops around the world?

In Paris, Debeauve & Gallais for chocolate; Charvet for shirts and slippers. In Italy, my Mecca is Aloe & Wolf Vintage in Siena – Alessandra [Aloe, the founder] has the best shop and archive – I clear my diary for a full day or two. And then there is Desert Vintage in New York, which is near where I love to stay – the Nine Orchard hotel.

Dream last supper... What would you order?

A Bellini at Harry’s Bar in Venice, then omakase in Tokyo sitting at the bar in front of the chef, followed by a chocolate mousse at Le Voltaire in Paris. And then a nightcap cocktail at the Hemingway bar at the Ritz. I would be so full, but so happy.

Travel essentials?

A beaten-up Rimowa filled with my Alex Eagle collection shirts that work equally well with denim or pencil skirts, or over swimsuits. My Leica camera, plus some gold jewellery to add pizzazz.

Where is your still point in a turning world?

Lake Constance and the Black Forest in Germany. I stay at Buchinger Wilhelmi clinic to properly recalibrate, relax, read, rest and walk. Back in London, we’ve brought together the best practitioners at 180 Health Club – I love the more spiritual practices that you cannot always explain, but feel life-changing.

Martin Kuczmarski, restauranteur behind The Dover and Martino's London

Where in the world continues to influence and inspire your work at your restaurants in London?

Professionally, places that inspire my work are still Paris, New York and Milan. At the moment, I feel Paris manages to push the boundaries whilst also maintaining the heritage and culture of its local hospitality.

Where is your still point in a turning world?

I spend all my time around lots of people within our restaurants, so when I need time to recharge, I need somewhere that I can properly switch off. And it must be close to the beach: eternal favourites remain Como hotel Cocoa Island in the Maldives and Amanyara in Turks and Caicos.

Most memorable hotel experience?

My honeymoon in 2010 was spent in four different Aman hotels across Asia. I love the architecture and Aman’s way of capturing a sense of place. But one thing that really stayed with me is how you will never bump into staff attending to your room – I believe they call it ‘invisible housekeeping’. It is the most annoying thing when you come back to your hotel room and you find it being serviced.

What is the key to creating an atmospheric restaurant worth travelling for?

There are many great places around the world, but as long as you are in great company, with good – and, most importantly, not overcomplicated – food, elegant design, soft lighting and genuine hospitality, you’ve found a great spot.

Travel essentials?

I wouldn’t go away without a pair of sunglasses, two good books and plenty of navy outfits! And, of course, No.88 Czech & Speake Cologne.

Fernando Jorge, Jewellery Designer

How would you describe your taste in travel?

I’m adventurous and adaptable yet always try to find the most comfortable set-up within the possibilities of each destination. My work takes me to wonderful and exuberant places all year long, so when it’s time to switch off I usually choose nature and introspection in Brazil.

Where in the world continues to inspire your work?

The movement between Brazil and London has been the biggest source of inspiration for me. Moving between contrasting realities accentuates their characters.

What are your prerequisites for a memorable hotel experience?

A strong personality and a sense of history, with attentive service that makes you feel at home when away from home. I especially like hotels that are integral to the social life of a city: some examples are Fasano in São Paulo, Albergo in Beirut, Sunset Tower in Los Angeles.

Where are you yet to travel that captivates you?

I checked a big one off my list this past year by going to Japan. I am still to discover India. I would love to explore Jaipur and its jewellery history.

Travel essentials and packing list?

I am generous with my toiletries and supplements, which I pack in Métier travel organisers. I always carry a sketchbook and pencil case and an iPad in case I find time to sketch.

Where do you go when you need to recalibrate?

In an ever-changing travel schedule, going back to a familiar place is a great way to recharge. For the past 10 years I have taken a couple of weeks in August to escape to Greece. I’ve been to many different islands and keep coming back to Amorgos and Patmos to close the summer.

Best spa experience you have ever had?

A recent and very memorable experience was Forestis in the Dolomites. It combines amazing architecture, beautiful surroundings with activities for any season, as well as wonderful cuisine with local produce. It’s the kind of spa where you can also have a wine pairing with your seven-course meal.

Amanda Charchian, Photographer

Where in the world inspires your work?

Travel really ignites my desire to take pictures, as it’s a way to discover and really look at a place. Although my book, A Very Bad Man, was not really about travel but rather the contemporary experience of living in LA, the hotel Chateau Marmont being the epicentre of social activity. Increasingly, I crave unspoilt nature, a strong wellness programme or spiritual places. I have just come back from Chiang Mai in Thailand and Luang Prabang in Laos, which had a great mix of all of these – it was a perfect reset.

What is the stardust that sets your favourite hotels apart?

I love hotels that are part of the wild landscape they inhabit, such as Adrère Amellal in Siwa, Egypt, Cuixmala in Mexico and Las Balsas in Patagonia. That feeling of isolation and luxury is heaven for me. There is also something special about family-owned hotels, such as Le Sirenuse in Positano or the Locarno in Rome. But as far as chain hotels go, Vana retreat in India, which is now run by the Six Senses, is unparalleled for a mix of Ayurveda and Tibetan healing. Also the Amans in Bhutan are pure magic.

For a cultural pilgrimage, what is the museum that never fails to inspire you?

I love the Noguchi museum in NYC: the serenity of his work complements the zen feeling of the environment. You almost have to whisper there. I love how meditative it is.

OK, last supper – most atmospheric or memorable restaurant you love?

Fu He Hui is a two-star Michelin restaurant in Shanghai. Their menu is completely vegetarian. I have only been once but to eat such exotic vegetables amongst the museum-worthy display of furniture and art pieces from the Ming and Qing dynasties is just so special.

Travel essentials?

I have a Champagne-colored Rimowa metal trunk and large carry-on that I am shocked are still with me after almost a decade of traversing the globe. I always bring a beautiful silk pouch I got from Bhutan with all my night-time essentials.

The story of Orient Express has come a long way since American shipping container magnate James Sherwood first revived the trans-European train route that came to embody the belle époque years of continental travel in the bleak, downturn days of the 1970s. Growing to encompass hotels (including the Cipriani in Venice and the Splendido in Portofino) as well as river cruises, in the past few years the business has bifurcated, with LVMH taking the original Venice-Simplon-Orient Express business under its Belmond brand and hospitality group Accor rolling out Orient Express, a new entity responsible for the recently launched La Dolce Vita train in Italy and upcoming L'Orient Express in France and, since May last year, the first Orient Express hotel.

Orient Express La Minerva in Rome has a history no less storied than the brand itself: an imposing block-wide presence on Piazza della Minerva that overlooks the Pantheon. The 17th-century palazzo became one of Rome’s first grand hotels, opening in 1811 to accommodate the ‘influencers’ of their day – young aristocrats conducting a Grand Tour of Europe’s classical highlights – and later welcoming the likes of writers Stendhal, George Sand and Herman Melville. Today, Orient Express La Minerva gleams again following a full restoration under the guidance of Franco-Mexican designer Hugo Toro.

Taking as his cue the all-eras architectural pile-on that Rome represents to the awed visitor, a seasoned hand in creating historically resonant hospitality sites (including at the Park Hyatt Paris-Vendôme and London’s St Pancras) Toro has brought a mix of atmosphere, warmth and refinement to Orient Express La Minerva’s stately rooms: a blend of bespoke comfort and ageless elegance transmitted through a thoughtful use of colour and textures. Bathrooms boast pink marble and bedrooms are bedecked in the accoutrements required of stress-free travel – from voluminous wardrobes to the thoughtful placing of a writing desk beside the minibar. The public spaces are no less auspicious, the ground floor comprising, for the main part, a glass-ceilinged all-day dining and cocktail lounge, replete with harp accompaniment. The stellar backdrop of Rome’s inimitable skyline is best enjoyed from Gigi Rigalotto rooftop bar and restaurant, serving quintessential Italian cuisine in an environment that is both lively and laid-back. With 93 rooms and suites (including the frescoed Stendhal Suite) and a subterranean spa and hammam, La Minerva doesn’t lack for either scale or substance, but it’s perhaps the sublime setting that ensures its newly restored regal status in a city not short on lofty landmarks.

What is the first thing you see in the morning?

Bright light! I turn on my full-spectrum light panel, which I keep next to my bed. It’s not very romantic, but it sets me up for the day.

Describe the view from where you are right now.

From my Barbican office, I look out onto Aldersgate Street in the City of London.

Is there a view you can’t quite forget?

The moss garden at Kyoto’s Saihō-ji Temple^®. I can’t describe it as anything else but enchanted. Located in a grove, the garden centres around the so-called Golden Pond. It feels as though time stands still when you’re standing by it.

Is there a particular artwork you always return to?

Study for Homage to the Square^®, a series of oil paintings by Josef Albers from the 1950s until the mid-1970s. Every time I see one, I’m in awe of the straightforwardness and clarity, but also its depth.

What was the last movie you watched and loved?

One Battle After Another by Paul Thomas Anderson. It was a standout.

What sound do you wake up to?

Unfortunately my iPhone’s alarm clock.

What sound would you like to wake up to?

In a dream world, the sound of chirping birds.

What gets you dancing?

Seeing a 1993 recording of George Michael perform Killer/Papa Was a Rollin’ Stone live at Wembley.

Which singer or song do you never tire of hearing?

Laraaji, the 82-year-young American pioneer of ambient music. His album Vision Songs is on repeat at my place. Simply dreamy and inspired.

Which smell takes you back to childhood?

Homemade gnocchi. My mum used to excel at making them when I was a child.

What do you smell of today?

Of the Gods Polygonum eau de parfum by To My Ships^®. It’s distinctive and bold but not overbearing.

What smell makes you feel at home?

Freshly changed bed sheets – with a spritz of Dans Ton Lit, the linen spray created by Dominique Ropion for Frederic Malle.

What is your earliest scent memory?

Being with my grandmother and aunt making chocolate truffles. I must have been around four.

Describe a dish that’s stayed with you.

Scottish scallops at the River Café for a lazy lunch. A simple dish focused on the ingredients.

What is the taste of spring?

Flat peaches.

Olive or a twist?

Depends on the mood.

What is a dish you love to cook for yourself?

Roasted delicata pumpkin with lentils, parsley and shallots is my go-to at the moment.

What is your signature dinner party dish?

There are different dishes on rotation, quite often Mediterranean-inspired. However, I’ve recently invited friends for dinner after perfecting my spätzle skills. Originating in southern Germany, it’s a homemade pasta dish served with caramelised onions and a variety of sautéed mushrooms.

What three ingredients would we find in your fridge?

Parmesan, eggs and Greek yogurt.

Silk or cashmere?

It used to be silk, but I’m in my cashmere phase.

Marble or wood?

Wood.

What does spring feel like?

Renewal.

What is your favourite piece of furniture at home?

A set of three Arts and Crafts shelves. I love their proportions, and they’re the perfect display for a combination of ceramics, glassware and books. I can’t see myself parting with them ever.

Lucian Freud is one of the defining portraitists of his generation. The artist shared a nuanced understanding of life with his grandfather Sigmund Freud. His paintings embrace the mess of the human mind and body, depicting recurring, sometimes famous figures free of formalities. A new exhibition at the National Portrait Gallery is the first of its kind in the UK to focus primarily on works on paper. ‘Drawing Into Painting’ homes in on the artist’s pencil, ink and pen pieces from the 1930s to the early 20^th century, alongside a group of well-known paintings that demonstrate the links between both parts of his practice.

The artist’s expansive creative family features in the show. A 1995 black-and-white etching, one of eight new pieces of its kind acquired by the gallery in connection with the exhibition, captures a relaxed view of his daughter, the designer Bella Freud, lounging in a wicker chair with her head resting casually on one hand. Created using an unusual process for Freud, this work highlights his unique use of line and shadow to build up characterful faces with a powerful sense of movement, seeming to catch his sitters in the middle of an everyday moment.

“My father spent a long time working on ‘Bella in her Pluto T-shirt’, and he reworked my face several times before finalising the etching – it was really unusual for that to happen,” his daughter has said. “And it was quite interesting, in a way, to see that not everything came out right, and how to deal with something when it doesn’t. Sometimes he would ‘scrap’ something, as he called it, and then start again. And this time he just didn’t… Eventually, it was good. I think that’s been a very useful lesson in my work and my life. You don’t give up: you look for a way to see how things can work and then something will come if you’re in that mindset.”

While there is a tenderness to this etching, Freud was known to have a tempestuous relationship with some of his recurring sitters. His regular collaborator, club kid and Leigh Bowery confidante Sue Tilley, was fascinated by his mercurial character, which was as complex as the emotional range of his works. She has described him as “mean, extremely generous, grumpy, funny, loud, quiet”. Kate Moss, who was painted while pregnant by Freud in a moment of intimate vulnerability, has said, “I’ve met lots of interesting people, but Lucian Freud is the one who sticks out because I spent so much time with him. He taught me discipline, which I hadn’t been taught properly before. If I was, like, two seconds late, he would kick off. Once, I was three minutes late, and he went absolutely berserk.”

While Freud’s famous sitters built a powerful creative community in his works, he has also been inspired by numerous artists of the past, as explored in ‘Drawing into Painting’. His process is laid out in the exhibition through a series of childhood drawings, drafts of love letters, unfinished pieces and almost 50 sketchbooks. There are also works by other artists which highlight his key influences, including Jean-Antoine Watteau’s cabinet picture ‘Pierrot Content’ (c.1712) and John Constable’s ‘Study of the Trunk of an Elm Tree’ (c.1821), which offers a fascinating insight into his use of mark making away from the human figure. Freud once said that he hoped for his paint to work as flesh. In these lesser-known pieces, it is not paint but line, form and shadow that wrap around the body and bring his subjects evocatively to life.

Lucian Freud, Drawing Into Painting, National Portrait Gallery, 12 February - 4 May 2026. Get tickets.

The Dolomites are different to the Alps. The mountain range that extends from north-eastern Italy’s River Adige in the west to the Piave Valley in the east presents rock formations that are gothic, majestic and somehow more tangible to the skier.

Colour and profile provide spectacle and drama; depending on the time of day, the Marmolada can be rose pink one minute, purply gold the next. Piz Boè presents as a white-dusted, Fuji-esque pyramid across the Passo Pordoi valley.

The Dolomiti’s cathedralic, limestone forms inspire wonderment and rhapsody, with 20th-century architect Le Corbusier once saying, ‘There are mountains, and then there are the Dolomites... the most beautiful construction in the world.’ Ernest Hemingway was similarly smitten, calling the Dolomites ‘the loveliest country I’ve ever known’.

Roger Moore filmed scenes from his James Bond classic For Your Eyes Only at Cortina’s Olympic Ice Stadium, Ski Jump and Bobsleigh Run, and in Patricia Highsmith’s thriller The Talented Mr Ripley, handsome idler Dickie Greenleaf describes its ‘excellent skiing’.

A landscape of adventurers, writers, intellects, alpinistas, filmmakers, playboys, downhill racers, speed merchants and enthusiastic Aperol spritz imbibers are joined this winter season – as it was back in 1956 – by campioni Olimpici.

The XXV Olympic Winter Games, Milano Cortina is, nominally, based in two Italian towns, ‘just’ 260 miles apart. One is known for its mountains and valleys, the other for breaded chicken and elegant footwear. The former is a sprawling event space, with the multidisciplinary action actually taking place in a wide and dispersed alta via of towns, villages, hills and venues.

To business. Watching its downhill races and icy combats play out, in Anterselva, Verona, Livigno and Bormio, and to also have public access to the world-class slopes of Val Gardena, Alta Badia and Corvara on the enorme Dolomiti Superski domain – more than 400 lifts and 700 miles of runs, on one pass – requires a centrally located base camp.

Ortisei, a pastel-coloured gem of a town at 1,230m, is ideal – pretty much equidistant from the flurry of slaloming, curling, skating and super G-ing etc. at the 2026 games’ satellite schedule.

The Trentino-South Tyrol community (known as Urtijëi to Ladin-speaking locals), sits on the banks of the Derjon river and in the shadow of the Seceda peak. Boasting a long history of wood carving and mountaineering, it is also the birthplace of disco legend Giorgio Moroder, whose namesake, Ludwig Moroder, carved the St. Ulrich statue in the local church in 1932.

The town’s best hotel, the Gardena Grödnerhof is, like the Winter Olympics itself, over 100 years old. Once a humble guest house, now a modern, five-star hotel, world-class spa and Michelin-honoured dining destination, the Grödnerhof is a small village of Italian/Teutonic pleasures.

The Gardena spa is a thoughtfully designed delight; saunas and steam rooms, an icy plunge, a huge outdoor jacuzzi and an indoor pool with its own fireplace. After a day on the hill, the spa’s ZeroBody Cryo treatment provides cooling sensations of relaxation, muscle pain relief and speedily effective recovery.

Said to have the highest concentration of Michelin-starred chefs anywhere in Italy, the Dolomites achieves gastronomic misty flips at altitude. Break up your blue-sky ski day with a white-tablecloth frutti di mare lunch at the Rifugio Emilio Comici at the foot of the huge Langkofel rock, where the walls are festooned with photos of visiting Formula One drivers, rock stars, pro downhillers, Euro-royals and, of course, Giorgio Moroder.

Begin with a preprandial treat at the al fresco Champagne bar where, during peak season, you can relax with an iced Spritz

Veneziano in your hand and a Comici Apero appetiser on your table (complete with flaming hand heaters) watching the passing bellezze sciistiche instructors in their Armani uniforms.

Named after legendary climber and Casanova Emilio Comici, the restaurant has been a Val Gardena fixture since 1955 – with octopus, langoustine and scallops delivered daily, all the way from Venice. ‘Comici Hut’ is to the Dolomites what The Wolseley is to London and nothing beats its spaghetti alle vongole with a glass of Chardonnay Trentino or Prosecco.

Except, perhaps, the skiing. Which is more beautiful than anywhere in the world. In Val Gardena, inhale ambrosial velocity at the emboldening Gardenissima and the steep-fast Ciampinoi

No. 3. But there is more. If you have time (and a hire car) the Tre Cime di Lavaredo (three peaks of Lavaredo), the Sellaronda and the Great War Tour are a must. Nearer Cortina, try the five towers of the Mount Lagazuoi Cinque Torri route, the Marmolada mountain and the breathtaking heli-skiing at Kronplatz.

At night, after more spa-ing at the Gardena Grödnerhof and a spot of shopping (head to Caseificio Valin; a fantastic farm/ cheese shop in the valley), tog up and climb aboard a motorcade of snowcats for Rifugio Friedrich August.

The dark and snow-stormy journey into the unknown is worth every bump and arctic blast; the so-called ‘Yak Place’ is a cute and cosy auberge, with (daytime) views of the Catinaccio and the Sassolungo massif, organic Highland and yak cattle grazing in the neighbouring fields, its kitchen serving up prime cuts of mountain beef to hungry visitors. During the day, or even on a torch-lit night, the post-feed ski, possibly incorporating a whoosh down the Saslong World Cup downhill, is an Olympic-standard blast.

Grand, glamorous and undeniably bespoke, there is a certain appeal to couture – or, rather, tailor-made – travel. Just as designers coax style-savants away from the everyday to the wilder shores of their imagination, these specialists have been creating the most fantastical holidays for the great and good for years.

It’s not just their insider intel and theatrical flair, or the fact they have done hundreds of location recces across the globe; a large part of their skill lies in recognising a person’s style and instinctively knowing how to elevate their trip.

Take Emily FitzRoy of Bellini Travel, whose immaculate taste and attention to detail make her the unparalleled Italian expert to piece together a holiday that has all the exuberance and craftsmanship of a Dolce & Gabbana Alta Moda show.

For she thrives on elevating everyday experiences to stratospheric heights: be it the best guide to hike the volcanoes of Salina, the most verdant of the Aeolian Islands, or a private after-hours tour of La Foce in Val d’Orcia, whose gardens are an inspiring example of Renaissance-style planting created by Cecil Pinsent for the writer Iris Origo.

There are grand palazzos and sprawling vineyards at FitzRoy’s fingertips, white-truffle suppliers on speed dial, and restaurant tips galore – not to mention her miraculous ability to get a last-minute table through contacts at, say, Locanda Cipriani on Torcello, Venice, for the vongole of your dreams.

She just has that sixth sense of exactly where you want (and need) to be.

For Indiaphiles, no one compares to Bertie and Victoria Dyer of India Beat for helping you to tune in to the exceptional culture and rhythm of Rishikesh or Rajasthan – or, really, anywhere in this vast country.

Having lived in Jaipur for many years, they have a great book of contacts, whether you want to meet maharajas or mahouts.

When it comes to palaces and gem shops, and you don’t know where to start, they excel at guiding you to the best.

They also know the most original places to stay, including some heavenly havelis near the Pink City, with gauze-draped four-posters and jasmine-fringed gardens, and a remarkable eco-camp in the Aravalli Range, Dera Amer, which doubles as a sanctuary for two rescued elephants, Rangmala and Laxmi.

India Beat encourages you to stray from the well-trodden Rajasthani path, seeking out wildly beautiful abandoned temples and arranging blessings with priests or an appointment with an astrologist.

Stars aside, take the Dyers’ recommendation of lunch at organic retreat Anopura, where the thali is pleasure incarnate.

They also excel at safaris, where you might witness thrilling encounters with leopards or tigers – a hard feat to achieve, but then Bertie spent many years working for next-level photographers such as Mario Testino and Michael Roberts, so is very used to making the impossible happen.

Another dream-maker is Lord Edward Downpatrick, whose company, Aristeia Travel, offers unrivalled knowledge of Scotland – and entrée to some of its most spectacular castles.

Eddy Downpatrick’s bespoke trips are as extreme and wide-ranging as the Highland landscapes, where he can take you on a camping adventure in a converted Defender, off-piste skiing in the Cairngorms, or to seek out the country’s best beaches and island gems.

‘I’ve read pieces comparing the likes of Claigan Coral Beach on Skye and Luskentyre Beach on Harris to the best that the Caribbean has to offer and, rain or shine, I’d agree,’ he says, adding, ‘Perhaps none are as spectacular as the holy island of Iona, though.’

It was here that St Columba arrived on the white beaches with 12 followers and established a monastic community in AD 563.

With Downpatrick, you can even ride to the island (the horse goes on the ferry) – and, through his contacts, stay in its most charming house, where you can pull mussels off rocks or scuba dive for scallops for dinner.

If you’re seeking a more far-flung excursion, another of his specialities is helicopter tours of the Himalayas.

For even more Bondian glamour, when you want a seismic, life-changing trip, look no further than the founder of Cookson Adventures, a world-record-holding polar explorer and creator of some of the globe’s most imaginative and mind-expanding expeditions.

Something special happens when you travel with Henry Cookson.

Not only can he deal with the most excessive demands of rock stars and high-maintenance hedge-funders (it can take him months to draw up trips with the most military of planning), but the places he takes his clients render them speechless.

‘I tend not to reveal too much about the most remote places on this planet – there are still numerous secret spots I don’t even share with clients as, unfortunately, they become the victim of globalisation, thanks to people Instagramming them,’ he says, adding that a large part of the magic of his trips comes down to ‘authenticity, real culture and taking the time to fully immerse yourself – and let these places deeply affect you as they should’.

But then it is the way Cookson possesses the spirit of a place that makes being with him so special – whether in Socotra or Svalbard, he can amplify the energy of these incredibly otherworldly sanctuaries.

‘A place that always grabs me is the Great Bear Rainforest in British Columbia, which has an energy like nowhere else,’ he tells The Blend.

And what a series of natural highs he delivers. Indeed, there is something very 007 to Cookson’s approach – although he leaves guests far more stirred than shaken.

The film to watch…

Winner of the Palme D’Or at Cannes Joachim Trier’s Sentimental Value has a sweep of Oscar and BAFTA nominations. See why, and follow the lead of best supporting actor favourite Stellan Skarsgard, who plays an egotistical director, by seeing this in a cinema where it belongs. As his character says, “I can’t stand jazz hands in a film.” If you feel the same way about over the top acting, savour the restrained brilliance of Skarsgard, best actress nominee Renate Reinsve and supporting work from Inga Ibsdotter Lilleaas and Elle Fanning. Life in Trier’s Oslo is dark yet highly entertaining.

The tickets to buy…

Carl Foreman the screenwriter of High Noon was blacklisted in the 1950s. The timing of this look at Trumpian America through the lens of McCarthyism could not be better. The screenplay has been adapted by Eric Roth and for Grace Kelly and Gary Cooper director Thea Sharrock has the mighty stage presences of Denise Gough and Billy Crudup. Their Western in the West End (with an unexpected Bruce Springsteen soundtrack) is at the Harold Pinter Theatre till 6 March. Get tickets.

Looking ahead, as the National’s smash gets a transfer, don’t miss out on the chance to see Rosamund Pike in coruscating form in Inter Alia from 19 March – 20 June at Wyndham’s Theatre. Get tickets.

The exhibition to see… 

Lucian Freud Drawing into Painting 12 February to 3 May is a major art world event and you need to book tickets. This huge exhibition includes show-stopping loans of classic portraits as well as masterful new acquisitions to the museum’s permanent collection.

The event to attend…

The David Bowie tea at Café Royal Grill marks ten years since the icon’s death and celebrates the hotel’s connection to Bowie, who retired Ziggy Stardust here with a legendary party in July 1973. Bowie’s favourite Japanese green tea features along with cake creations playing with the enduring magic of his back catalogue. Booking till 29 March.

The collaboration to look out for…

The Valentine’s release of Wuthering Heights as reimagined by Emerald Fennell on February 13 will be as divisive as Saltburn. However, everyone can agree on the fabulousness of the Emily Brontë-inspired Aspinal x Wuthering Heights collection. (And if you are really here for fashion’s love of all things analogue and literary, you’ll be chucking your new Cathy and Heathcliff notebook into your Dior book tote.)

The TV to watch…

Alan Cumming breathes new laughs and life into the BAFTAs as he becomes the new host on 22 February. Meanwhile for a hibernation watch, Bridgerton is back for series four.

The book to read…  

Julian Barnes says Departure(s) released to celebrate his 80^th birthday will be his last novel. Fans can hope otherwise, but part novel part memoir of a familiar sounding Francophile writer called Jules, this is one to savour. Out now.

The album to listen to...

Inspired by time retreating to India, Gorillaz tell us to slow down and commit to a whole album not a brief scroll. For The Mountain they’ve harnessed the talents of many friends and even posthumous collaborations with Dennis Hopper, Tony Allen and more. The result is a spiritual album between continents and worlds, due for release on February 27.

Back in this realm, for tour information check out gorillaz.com with the first UK dates in March.