Luxury magazine: November 2022

The architecture of style

Clean lines, textured fabrics and intricate details are the modern gentleman’s go-tos

Photographer: Daron Bandeira
Fashion director: Sarah Maisey
Model: Francesco at Art Factory
Photographer's assistant: Shamim at MMG

With thanks to Emirates Palace Hotel, Abu Dhabi

Kelly Hoppen regularly receives messages from children, telling her she is their idol and asking her for advice. On the morning we speak, she has just finished replying to one of these letters, from a young boy who is struggling with his mental health. “Just believe in yourself”, is her response to him – and one gets the sense that these words have held her in good stead over the course of her own meteoric 43-year career.

She famously started out at the age of 16, designing a kitchen for a family friend. “It was a disaster,” she says with a laugh. “I wish I still had pictures. But it wasn’t what it looked like, it was the fact I had the tenacity to do it. I was so driven and passionate about starting my own business.”

Since then, she has worked on thousands of projects, including homes, luxury hotels, private jets, super yachts, cruise ships and commercial airlines. She has written nine books, received countless awards, enjoyed enormous success in Asia, created a range of products for the home and featured on numerous television shows. In 2020, she was presented with a CBE for promoting creativity in British business, having received an MBE in 2009.

She thrives on the connection she builds with her clients, particularly when designing their homes. “If it’s a private home, the relationship you build with someone is very intimate,” says Hoppen, who was born in Cape Town in South Africa, but moved to the UK as a child. “A dream client is a client who wants you and that you have a relationship with, so you can create something exceptionally personal.”

One of the key lessons she has learnt along the way is to let go of ego. “I think when you’re younger, you have a massive ego. Everyone does. But, you know, the older I’ve got, the wiser I’ve become and I don’t think ego plays a part in a profession where you are helping someone create their home.”

Her experiences designing her own homes over the years have helped cement this point, although she admits to being “the client from hell”. She is currently designing a new house for herself, but refuses to disclose any details.

“I know how difficult I am, because it’s such a vulnerable state you’re in. I think because I have done so many homes for myself, it’s made me a better listener and a better person when creating homes for other people. And also, the older I’ve become, I just think you have to enjoy the process. It doesn’t need to be a fight. There’s enough of that in the world.”

Her experience designing private homes informs her work on larger projects, ensuring they remain intimate, real and “liveable”. She is currently in Dubai, having delivered the keynote address at Downtown Design and unveiled her designs for Lanai Island Estates, a new project within Majid Al Futtaim’s Tilal Al Ghaf community.

Designed by award-winning South African architecture firm Saota, the homes offer “wishlist” levels of luxury, Hoppen says. Even when designing on this scale, she starts by envisaging an imaginary client in her head and, in this instance, it was “somebody fabulous, of course. It’s someone who appreciates art, culture, history, the land and the environment.

“The architecture is extraordinary in itself. It’s very much that ‘inside-out’ living, but because of the scale of it, the challenge was to make it warm and inviting and liveable, and that’s something we do well here, because we love the scale but also we love the intimacy. So it was all about the lighting and the levels and creating texture with marble and stone and wood.”

Hoppen has long favoured a signature East-meets-West aesthetic, which combines the order, harmony and balance of eastern design with the more maximalist elements of the West. Unexpected juxtapositions are her forte. “I like finding balance in everything and so I like the elements of nothing with everything. That’s probably the simplest way to describe it,” she says.
Her definition of luxury, in a design context, is something that is warm, workable, balanced and beautiful. “It’s about having things around you that you like to touch and see and taste. And that’s on a very primal level.”

Her biggest design no-no is chintz. “I don’t like rooms that are so full you can’t breathe. That’s just not my design. I admire what people do in that format, it’s just not who I am and I will never be that.”

One of the few things left for her to design is a train, she says, and she would also like to do another city hotel, as most of her hospitality projects have been on the beach, including the new Lux Grand Baie Resort and Residences in Mauritius. Hoppen thinks there is much that could be done in the hospitality sphere to eradicate “the sameness” that has crept into a lot of hotel design.

“I think hotels have to give more than they potentially have in the past. I think people want to be in environments that are a home away from home, but give them a taste of something else. Everything has become too the same. I think we need to go back to discovering new things in new places, and that needs to be taken into account in hotel design, rather than sticking with a formula.”

She has already redefined the cruising industry through her collaboration with the Miami-headquartered Celebrity Cruises, which resulted in her designing the 1,500 suites aboard the Celebrity Edge and, more recently, the Celebrity Beyond, which set sail this summer.

“When we launched Edge, it changed the face of the industry. That was my intent. I said I wouldn’t take the project on unless I could do that, and I was very fortunate that at Celebrity, all the people involved at the top level gave me such a long rope to be able to really push the boundaries. It was a real moment in my career because it was such a big thing, at such a different level to what we do. But I loved it and my team loved it.”

More than four decades on, Hoppen still gets excited about design. “Yesterday, somebody came and showed me a new technique on marble, and that excited me. Looking at the sustainability of build and design is something I’m learning more about and that’s exciting. I have such an amazing team of young people and they are really enlightening. It’s amazing to mentor them and build a business around them.”

Although she does say she hates being the boss – “because you don’t see yourself as that, but you are”.

The trend: Tasty ice cream tones

GIVENCHY

Givenchy has released the Mini Kenny
bag in a shade of pistachio. Made in
satin and paired with chunky gold
hardware, it looks good enough to eat.
givenchy.com

STELLA MCCARTNEY

The vegan Frayme Puffy has a
diamond-cut chain and echoes the
hue of Victorian-era blackberry,
raspberry and violet petal ice cream.
stellamccartney.com

LOEWE

In a zesty shade of orange sorbet, the
small Puzzle bag by Loewe in satin
calfskin comes with a top handle, a
crossbody strap and a chain.
loewe.com

DIOR

In a tasteful shade of blueberry, the
Lady-D Joy bag is an update of the
classic Lady Dior and, as such, will
never go out of style.
dior.com

Armed for love

“Love is a battle,” says Augustin de Buffévent, creative director of Fauré Le Page. “If you want to seduce, you have to make a lot of effort. And if you want to maintain love, you have to fight even harder.”

This is the premise that underlines the latest iteration of Fauré Le Page. The luxury brand started life in 1717, as a maker of decorative weapons for the French aristocracy. “These were weapons of prestige,” de Buffévent explains. “Nobody fought with them – they were far too expensive. But when you had a pair of pistols by Fauré Le Page, it meant that you were a man with style.”

The company became entangled in French history, as de Buffévent has discovered while sifting through its extensive archives. “Sir, I graduated in shooting at Le Page’s, in Paris,” Honoré de Balzac wrote in The Wild Ass’s Skin in 1831, one of the numerous writers to reference the house in his works.

In 1830, when Muhammad Ali Pasha, the ruler of Ottoman Egypt, presented France with the gift of a Luxor obelisk, which stands until this day in Paris’s Place de la Concorde, he received Fauré Le Page pistols as a thank you. And while the maison started out supplying weapons to royalty and aristocracy, during the French Revolution, it also supplied weapons to the revolutionaries.

Instead of guns, the new Fauré Le Page, which de Buffévent acquired in 2011, nearly three centuries after its launch, creates bags and accessories that are meant to double as weapons of seduction. They are tools to be used in the battle of love.

Bags are crafted by artisans in limited quantities. The house’s signature is a scale motif that extends across its aptly named Daily Battle and Battle Ready totes, as well as the cross-body Calibre bag, which features the outline of a gun, and models such as the Pochette, Quiver, Good Knight and Parade.

“The scale, which was also used by the former Fauré Le Page, to me is a symbol of protection because it’s like an armour, as well as a symbol of seduction. All the legendary creatures, like sirens, are covered in scales. It’s also really rounded, so it is masculine and feminine at the same time.”

One of the latest additions to the Fauré Le Page offering is the Saga City line. It took two years for the team to reinterpret the brand’s scale motif in a jacquard design. Consisting of 23,000 stitches per square centimetre, the material is extremely resistant and visually striking in shades of blue and yellow. New additions to the line were launched last month, including the Saga Battle Ready 57 tote, the Saga Quiver bag and Call Me 12, a crossbody case with enough space for a phone and credit cards.

The pieces are available in Fauré Le Page’s Dubai Mall store, which opened in June. “We have eight stores worldwide, and we are very happy to be in Dubai and very proud of being in The Dubai Mall,” de Buffévent says.

“It was high time for us to come to Dubai. It is one of the capitals of luxury. I don’t know which market can be compared to Dubai. Plus, it’s a very refined market, with such a knowledge of luxury. It’s a very demanding market, and I like that.”

A visit to the Brunello Cucinelli factory in the Umbrian countryside in the heart of Italy is an unusual introduction to the world of high-end fashion manufacturing.

Pulling up to the complex right outside the city of Perugia feels more like visiting a modern monastery, rather than a facility that makes some of the country’s most finely crafted clothes.

And, much like in a monastery, I see how at a regular point in the early evening, work stops and silence descends. The company has a strict no-work policy after 5:30pm.

The impressive atmosphere of the place is the result of the sprawling intellectual ambition of Brunello Cucinelli, 69, who, despite growing up in rural poverty, is now firmly entrenched in the most elite circles of Italian industry. Although, interviewing him, I quickly get the sense he is prouder of being in more humble ones.

Cucinelli enters his office pondering out loud the afterlife and the friends that will help him get there. It very much sets the tone for the next hour and a half.

“If I don’t get even a tiny spot in paradise I’m going to be very upset. I have all these friends, friars and monks, whom I help out. They say they are praying for me in return,” he says with a laugh.
His service to them is in large part helping with the upkeep of the historic places in which they reside and worship.

“I have this passion for guardianship and safekeeping, you see. They have always been my guiding principles. When you restore something and know that it’s going to be there for the coming centuries, you have not spent or squandered your money. It means you are guarding something for the future,” Cucinelli says.

I fear that my opening questions about the brand’s autumn/winter 2022 collection may fall a little flat after an introduction like that. But there is no need to worry. The answers to my questions do not interrupt his grand train of thought.

“Our collections have always been contemporary,” he says, turning to observations on history to support his point. “If you look at style after the trauma of Spanish flu at the beginning of the 20th century, there was a decade when people wanted to dress elegantly. After two years of the pandemic, we feel similarly, wanting to feel sleek, refined, elegant, polished.” His autumn/winter collection is just that.

Labelled In The Elements, the approach, in typical Brunello Cucinelli style, is to focus first on comfort and quality. From there, a Nordic style emerges, a slight diversion for the very Italian company.

Cucinelli stresses, however, that the core principles of his collections never change. “Our company still cherishes the feeling that when we buy something, we truly appreciate it, we don’t ever want to throw it away.” Or, in other words: “John Ruskin stated that when you build, always remember to build for eternity. Beautiful isn’t it?”

His clothes are designed to be enjoyed, restored and reworn. The lightweight blue suit jacket he is wearing perfectly exemplifies this. It was made in 2014 and he has been pictured in it many times before. It is this approach that distinguishes Brunello Cucinelli collections from the more radical season-by-season aesthetic shifts seen from other designer labels.

This flexibility also means that the brand works in all corners of the globe. Until this point our conversation has focused on European tailoring and tradition. But when I switch to questions about the Middle East, he does not skip a beat.

“I’ve been studying Islamic culture for two decades now,” Cucinelli tells me, expounding his love for the medieval Arab philosopher and historian Ibn Khaldun and the Persian polymath Avicenna, among many others. One year, his Christmas gift to his staff was a copy of the Quran.

When it comes to the Middle East, he sees a particularly interesting business opportunity because Italian and Arab culture, in his mind, are similar. One of the 10 principles in his manifesto on Humanistic Capitalism, which he presented to the G20 Summit last year, is respect for forefathers, because “they taught us to respect the law, and our story is written in their words”. In our conversation, he calls family one of the three great ideals, something to which many in Middle Eastern societies would relate.

Aesthetics are similar, too. The traditional clothes of the Gulf focus on understated style and comfort. “I like this comparison very much. We are a no-logo brand, and after a five-year cycle when fashion has been on the flashier side, I think the next few years will see a focus on simple, linear elegance. Chic, but not too much.”

Most of all, he recognises in the Gulf a similar optimistic energy to the one that has driven his success. “There is something brewing in that part of the world,” he says at one point.

Cucinelli’s plans to consolidate his brand’s presence abroad are clearly getting the same intellectual treatment as his European operation, then. But however global his label might become, it will always be rooted in Italy.

For all the talk of a global future, the way our conversation goes implies that his vocation remains guarding the best of Italy’s humanistic past, in a modern market that all too often decimates the traditional way of doing things.
It is a battle that needs to be fought. Twenty-first century economics has not been kind to rural Italy. An increasing number of young people are leaving countryside villages for the cities, a trend seen all over western Europe. In Spain, France and Italy, it is now possible to buy abandoned villages for tiny prices.

Cucinelli has used his commercial success to keep one of these hamlets not just alive, but thriving. The village of Solomeo, which is perched on a hill just above the factory, is now the spiritual home of the company, with a Renaissance-style theatre and amphitheatre, as well as a vast humanities library that is currently under construction.

Perhaps most importantly of all, I am shown an old stone studio in which five young tailors are being paid by the designer to learn the difficult art of suit-making. It could hardly have been a more successful example of keeping a proud tradition going in modern Italy, by using the best of sustainable capitalism.

The impression of the visit is that Cucinelli’s brand has been built up around strong ideals, not in spite of them. Fashion is obviously an industry that knows how to put on a show, and it is the case that the company’s philosophical message serves as a form of branding. But there is proof enough in our conversation and tour of something deeper. Quite simply, he treats his staff, culture and environment well.

“I am basically here to help take care of creation,” Cucinelli says. Whether that’s nurturing the next generation of artisans or an increasingly global business, there is a strong sense that this part of the world, which might otherwise be scarred by less sustainable industry at best, desolated at worst, is now thriving and full of life.

His final line at the end of this remarkable presentation? “Don’t be afraid.” He might mean many things. For my part, I feel less afraid that modern fashion and industry must necessarily harm the planet and human dignity.

The Ellinikon is a $7.7 billion project set to transform the Athenian coastline, using former Olympic sites to revive the capital’s fortunes, writes Razmig Bedirian

The Greek capital is emerging from the debilitating shadow of the 2004 Summer Olympics. A $7.7 billion project is set to transform a 3.5-kilometre stretch along the coastline of Athens into a verdant commercial, residential and touristic hub.

The Ellinikon, a project by Lamda Development, seeks to revitalise a key part of the city – including several defunct Olympic sites, as well as the now-inactive but architecturally significant Ellinikon International Airport, which has been unused for almost two decades.

Some may be suspicious of sweeping, expensive developments – considering the $11bn Greece spent preparing its capital for the Olympics. The amount was double the initial budget and ballooned as projects hurried towards completion at exaggerated costs – as is often the case with such mega-projects. The development was criticised for being ill-planned and short-sighted.

As the financial crisis of 2009 set in, dozens of sites built for the Olympics were forgotten, including a sprawling man-made kayak and canoe course and arenas for table tennis, judo and field hockey. The facilities were fenced off, with security patrols preventing public access.

What was supposed to be a celebratory moment for Greece instead became a symptom of a profligate government and the instigator of an economic meltdown that left about a quarter of the country’s population unemployed.

Greece has since been able to put many of its troubles behind it. And with The Ellinikon, there seems to be a more conscientious plan in the works. Lamda is one of the leading development companies in the country, known for a string of shopping malls and the Flisvos Marina.

Now it is seeking to turn the Athens Riviera into “a symbol of a resurgence in local prosperity”. The Ellinikon will transform the area into a place for public enjoyment, business, education and luxury living – a smart city where “everything is accessible by pedestrians or cyclists within 15 minutes”. All while recycling materials dismantled from Olympic sites.

The project is unique for its location and size – a whopping 6.2 million square metres, three times larger than Monaco. It will include a green space bigger than London’s Hyde Park, shopping malls, landmark skyscrapers, a casino, sports fields, luxury hotels and a cultural trail, as well as universities and offices. Smart apartments and beachfront villas are also available, although “the residential portion is overfunded for the first five years of the project”, according to Lamda Development, meaning you’ll have to wait a while if you’re in the market for a home in Greece.

The project will also feature a newly developed beach that stretches for a kilometre, as well as 310 berths in an upgraded marina. The masterplan of The Ellinikon was developed by Foster + Partners, the British architecture firm that has also designed Cupertino’s Apple Park, Zayed National Museum, The British Museum, as well as Index Tower in Dubai.

“This is an iconic development not only in terms of architectural aesthetics, but also in terms of numbers,” says Odisseas Athanasiou, chief executive of Lamda Development. “In terms of employment, it is going to create 75,000 new jobs. Within the first two years, we expect more than 10,000 people to be employed at The Ellinikon.”

A significant portion of the development is scheduled to launch by 2025. The project’s first building will be delivered by mid-2023. A complex of 11,000 square metres, it will be home to four associations dedicated to working with children with disabilities.

The project takes its name from Ellinikon International Airport, which was rendered defunct when Athens International Airport opened for the Olympics. While the new facility is better equipped for modern travel technology, the Ellinikon has an architectural charm that persists despite its current, boarded-up condition.

The airport had two terminals, one of which was designed between 1960 and 1969 by famed Finnish-American architect Eero Saarinen. After its closure, the airport was repurposed as an Olympic venue for sports such as field hockey, baseball and softball. The airport will be preserved as a cultural centre, becoming part of a 12km culture trail that connects various archaeological sites and cultural spaces in the Greek capital.

For all its historical depth, Athens has traditionally had a somewhat anaemic appeal when it comes to tourism, particularly when compared to other parts of Greece, such as the islands. Many who visit the country spend no more than two days in the Greek capital before leaving for other hot spots such as Mykonos or Santorini.

Part of The Ellinikon’s ambition, Athanasiou says, is to improve what Athens has to offer, both for its local population and those coming to visit. Tourism is a lifeline for the Greek economy but was, for several years, hamstrung by the financial crisis and then the pandemic. However, things are already picking up, and Athanasiou says this project will be a further catalyst for growth.

“The Greek economy is coming back,” he explains. “Last quarter, we experienced a GDP growth of 7.5 per cent. We expect on an annual basis to grow by 5.7 per cent, which is supported to a great extent by the record numbers in tourism. We believe this year we’re going to have more than €20bn in tourism revenue.

“Tourism has a lot to do with Ellinikon. We believe based on consultant estimates that Ellinikon alone will bring about a million more tourists to Athens
than before.”

A single landmark destination, such as the Marina Bay Sands in Singapore or the Guggenheim Museum in Bilbao, can work wonders in elevating a city’s touristic appeal, Athanasiou says. “We’re going to offer more than one landmark.”

Among these is the Riviera Tower, the first sustainable high-rise in Greece. The residential building, designed by Foster + Partners, will be 200 metres, or 45 floors high, making it the tallest green beachfront high-rise in the Mediterranean region. With its slim outline and lush balconies, the design of the Riviera Tower is a reflection of the surrounding landscape. The tower is built according to cutting-edge sustainability standards and technology and, sitting right on the waterfront, will offer unparalleled views of the sea.

The Riviera Tower will be one of six high rises that will loom over the Athenian coastline. Special permits were needed and a law changed to allow its construction. “We received special permission for the high-rise buildings,” Athanasiou says.
“Before The Ellinikon, you could only build up to certain parameters. In The Ellinikon, we will create six buildings that rise 200 metres above sea level. A number of internationally famous architects have designed the buildings.”

Among these is a section of the Ellinikon Commercial Hub, which will become the largest mall in Greece. The project is designed by acclaimed Hong Kong architecture firm Aedas. The shopping centre will feature several retail outlets and office spaces, while the adjoining tower will be home to a hotel, office and apartments.

The Hellinikon Integrated Resort Casino Tower, one of three hotels currently planned for The Ellinikon, will also be the first of its kind in Europe, Athanasiou says. Another notable structure in the project is the Marina Galleria, which has been designed by Japanese architecture firm Kengo Kuma and Associates. Stretching along the coastline with an undulating water-inspired design, the high-end fashion and shopping destination will be home to numerous Greek designers, as well as a premium culinary offering by local and international chefs.

But while the towers and marina will add glitz to the Athenian landscape, it is the project’s environmental efforts that are perhaps most impressive. The districts will be connected by walkable, bikeable pathways, while electric vehicle facilities will be available throughout. The Ellinikon will also integrate the most advanced smart city technologies from the ground up, promising improved safety, more efficiency and a better quality of life.

More than 70 per cent of the development will feature green and open areas. At the heart of The Ellinikon is a two-million-square-metre green space that will be the largest coastal park in Europe.

It will showcase Greek floral biodiversity by housing more than a million native trees and 50km of pathways. The park’s features will be made using recycled materials from the abandoned airport buildings and Olympics sites.

Last December, Lamda Development launched the Ellinikon Experience Centre and Park, offering Athenians and tourists a sneak peek at the area’s lush, tech-savvy future. The space is repurposed from a restored 1950 Air Force hangar that has been listed as a national monument. It features five themed zones, offering interactive ways of exploring The Ellinikon – from virtual boat and bicycle rides that take you through the project to a liveable model of a residential unit, complete with vistas of the water. Digitally manufactured, the view from the apartment gives a lasting impression of what it would be like to live at The Ellinikon.

The development’s Ellinikon Experience Park, meanwhile, features about 80,000 plants and 900 trees. As with the future park, this relatively diminutive sibling features benches and paths made from recycled materials, as well as a smart irrigation system that waters plants by collecting rainwater in dedicated “rain gardens”. The experience park has already proven to be a hit, drawing more than a million visitors since its opening.

Construction of The Ellinikon is already well under way. It remains to be seen whether the project can meet its lofty ambitions, but by deconstructing derelict Olympic sites and using the materials to build something more sustainable and usable, Lamda Development has lit a new torch for the Greek economy – a light that has been dim ever since the country brought home the Olympic flame.

$18,100...

... is the price of this limited-edition perfume by Guerlain. Here’s what makes it special

To celebrate the 110th anniversary of L’Heure Bleue, Guerlain has released an artist’s edition of the famed fragrance – limited to 30 pieces worldwide. The inverted heart bottle, reimagined by Raymond Guerlain in 1912, has been covered in international Klein blue, a hue patented by French artist Yves Klein.

The scent was originally created by Jacques Guerlain to represent that fleeting moment when “the night has not yet found its star”. It was conceived during a walk along the banks of the Seine in 1912, when Jacques had the idea for a perfume that would encapsulate the dual facets of femininity – delicacy and sensuality.

The perfume has top notes of bergamot and anise intertwined with neroli, carnation, tuberose and rose. Its powdery scent is drawn from violet and iris, which are complemented by tonic, vanilla and balsamic benzoin. Housed in a new, sculptural, 1.5-litre bottle, the latest scent is an extrait de parfum, presented in its most highly concentrated form.

Born in Nice in 1928, Klein was a key figure in post-war European art and a driver of the Nouveau Realisme movement. Before his death at the age of 34, he patented his own shade of blue – a deep, vibrant ultramarine that encases the bottle of L’Heure Bleue.

The shade elevates the perfume’s inverted heart bottle, which was originally crafted in Baccarat crystal and was a technical feat at the time.

For the L’Heure Bleue 110 Anniversary Yves Klein Edition, the bottle was produced by renowned glassmaker Waltersperger and transformed into a mini work of art. Entirely handcrafted by an artisan, each of the 30 pieces of the 110 Anniversary Edition takes a whole day to execute. The large-format, transparent glass bottle is entirely covered with International Klein Blue, first applied with a brush, then spray-painted over several layers to obtain the same velvety matte finish as the artist’s monochrome sculptures.

The bottle is presented in a raw wood box that references the crates used to transport artworks. Only two bottles have been made available in the region – a UAE edition that has already been sold and a Qatar edition that is being retailed at the Guerlain boutique in Doha’s Place Vendôme for $18,100.