Culture

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We trace the quiet collapse of an idea once built on distance, illusion, and desire. From Sex and the City to Tom Ford and Kate Moss, what emerges is not nostalgia, but a question: if everything is visible, instantaneous, and endlessly reproduced, can anything still feel glamorous—or has the spell finally broken?

Who decides what great art is — the artist, the critic, or the market? We explore the fragile authority behind the modern canon, tracing the tangled relationships between originality, repetition, expertise, and commerce — and asking whether the occasional sceptical museum-goer might sometimes be asking the right questions.

In an age allergic to trying too hard, effort has become the ultimate faux pas. We explore the way in which looking effortless became fashion’s most enduring strategy, migrating from courtly codes to contemporary cool — and why studied indifference now signals authority, influencing everything from the red carpets to the political stage.

PEOPLE 

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We speak with Casalta founders Catherine and Nathan Bruckner about the evolving language of interiors, from the shifting role of atmosphere and authorship to the blurred boundaries between collecting and design. Moving between Old Masters, modernist lineage, and today’s image-driven design culture, the conversation probes questions of taste and aesthetic authority, asking whether interiors are still shaped by discernment—or increasingly by performance, branding, and the quiet theatre of display.

We speak with Pierre Yovanovitch about the evolving language of design, from the legacy of Andrée Putman to his stewardship of Écart International. As historical references move from rediscovery to recontextualisation, the conversation turns to authorship, taste, and how a contemporary sensibility reshapes what it means to preserve—and to edit—design history.

We asked figures from the worlds of art and design — including Nicolas Schuybroek, Halleroed and Sophia Roe — to name the influences, tangible or abstract, that have shaped the way they see the world.

Upon entering the burnt-brick hues of the hotel’s Neo-Greek lobby, one quickly loses all sense of the outside world, entering a richly layered mise-en-scène, a throwback to a golden age of luxury. Beguiled by its inherent charm, I met the designer, François-Joseph Graf, for a tour, after which, we discussed his influences and inspirations, the decorators he most admires, and more pressing concerns, such as where to get the best steak tartare and frog legs in Paris.

“Hotel Château Voltaire is anything but a decoration,” explains Thierry Gillier, “It is a place of today to be experienced today by people of today.” With that in mind, we spoke to Charlotte de Tonnac and Hugo Sauzay of Festen architecture, not only about their design for this 32-room five-star Paris hotel, but also their likes, dislikes and, in the case of the former, a long-harboured desire to moonlight as a dancer.

We spoke to Andrea Bokobsa, co-founder of Pied-A-Terre Paris, about his passion for art and design (in part inspired by his mother, a former designer for Baby Dior and Bonpoint) and where he hopes to take the company in coming years