Offering business class flights at a fraction of the cost, this airline says it’s creating a new niche in luxury travel.
18.07.2024 - 10:25 / nytimes.com
The central Italian region of Umbria — with its unspoiled landscapes and ancient Roman ruins — has long been a source of inspiration for artists; in the 15th century, the region even gave rise to a namesake movement that counted the Renaissance painters Pietro Perugino and Raphael as members. It’s against that backdrop that the Babini family — who also own the Hospitality Experience, a hotel group, and the Place of Wonders, a foundation dedicated to preserving traditional Italian craftsmanship — recently opened Borgo dei Conti, a 40-room resort perched on the grounds of a former medieval fortress about a half-hour drive from Perugia. Inside the property’s original neo-Gothic villa are preserved frescoes and wood-beamed coffered ceilings along with Etruscan terra-cotta floor tiling and furniture covered in fabrics handwoven at a nearby textile atelier. Between meals at Cedri, a fine-dining restaurant placed in a former (lemon greenhouse), and L’Osteria del Borgo, an all-day trattoria serving Neapolitan pizzas, guests can visit the wellness spa — complete with saunas, a salt room and an outdoor solarium — or visit the Italian-style gardens of the surrounding 40-acre park.
Walk down a side street in London’s diamond district and you might catch the scent of frankincense and agar wood as it drifts out of the showroom of Alighieri, a jewelry brand that takes its name from the 14th-century Italian poet Dante Alighieri. “We describe it as the smell of church vaults and old libraries,” says Rosh Mahtani, who founded the company in 2014 to make heirloom jewelry. Now she’s creating items for the home, including this incense. The housewares collection, Alighieri Casa, is made up of tableware and cooking accessories with imperfect finishes. A bright, gold-plated candlestick curves into a lion’s paw — a reference to Alighieri’s best-selling lion medallion pendant, a talisman for courage — while another pair look like asymmetrical silver pebbles. Bottle openers shaped like lobsters and sea horses blur the line between ornaments and kitchen utensils; Mahtani wears one on a length of black leather cord as a necklace. Gold-plated and stainless-steel cutlery are made at a female-owned foundry in Delhi using a method called sand casting. The tactile pieces, which reference tribal hunting tools, feel precious, but Mahtani hopes that people won’t set them aside for special occasions. “Life is tough,” she says, “and most things we can’t control. But we can build rituals for ourselves at home that are beautiful. There’s a lot of comfort in that.”
While the sheer expanse of the Black experience defies easy categorization, a number of artists have focused their practice on chronicling its contours. “Social Abstraction,” a
Offering business class flights at a fraction of the cost, this airline says it’s creating a new niche in luxury travel.
Aug 5, 2024 • 7 min read
Strikes are a regular occurrence in Europe, as employees withhold their labour to fight for better pay and conditions.
With over 34 million TikTok posts, #BookTok has swept the world by storm, captivating people seeking their next literary adventure. As Americans flock to Europe in record numbers this summer, leaving their boring beach reads on the book shelf, Trainline – Europe’s no.1 train ticket booking app – is transporting them to worlds unknown via its new summer book club, The Reading Route. Curated by Emma Roberts, co-founder of the viral online book club BELLETRIST, each of the 10 train reads selected by Roberts have roots in some of Trainline’s most booked European destinations, from London and Paris to Rome and Barcelona.
Get ready to go long with Holland America in the Mediterranean.
In October 2022, I traveled around Italy and Switzerland by train and tried business and first-class cars in hopes of having luxurious, comfortable travel experiences.
Jul 29, 2024 • 4 min read
In Tuscany, the Val d’Orcia, with its rolling fields and untouched landscape beneath the dormant volcano of Monte Amiata, seems created for photo ops. Within it, the town of Pienza is one of the finest examples of Renaissance architecture, designed by the famed Bernardo Gambarelli, better known as Bernardo Rossellino, in white travertine marble and surrounded by palazzi which he also built.
Crystal Lagoons continues to revolutionize cities worldwide by bringing the tropical beach lifestyle through its Public Access Lagoons® model, also known as PAL® model. The global expansion of the multinational innovation company, which totals 1,000 projects in different stages of development and negotiation in 60 countries, is now evident in Europe with a new complex in Seville, a Mediterranean city and one of the most iconic and attractive in Spain, which will have a Caribbean atmosphere thanks to the new project of the company.
To cater to a digitally-savvy India, low-cost carrier IndiGo announced significant digital upgrades to its website and mobile application Friday. As part of this initiative, the airline also looks to introduce in-flight entertainment accessible through the IndiGo app.
Before Australia’s East Coast burnished its reputation as a haven of sun, sand and sea, it was the temperate climate of Tasmania, the country’s largest island, that lured visitors from across the British Empire. Sometimes called the “sanitarium of the south,” it was noted for its salubrious climes, which were considered an antidote to havoc wrought on delicate constitutions by tours in the equatorial colonies. Some two centuries later, the heart-shaped landmass 150 miles off the mainland’s southeast coast is still seen as a place of invigorating isolation.
A TikToker has racked up nearly a million views in a recent video that explained how Europe is becoming a hotbed for American tourists.