Category Archives: Profiles

Cook Books: ‘Family Meal’ By Designers/Illustrators (Support NYC Restaurants)

We were a website, and now we’re a cookbook. We’re a project by illustrators and designers to help raise money for New York restaurants and their employees. We’re 38 recipes from 38 restaurants for you to cook at home. And we’re a $20 donation for every book sold to New York City restaurants, through ROAR’s employee relief fund. 

You can read more here.

Collections: The Amazing Classic Cars Of Germany’s Michael Fröhlich (Video)

From 0 to 100 km/h in 2.4 seconds – that’s how fast the Elektrus can accelerate, making it one of the fastest electric cars in the world. It’s just one of the many exceptional cars in Michael Fröhlich’s collection. The German multi-millionaire collects and designs cars of all types; from vintage vehicles to curious custom-builds that more resemble works of art. He even owns one of the Queen’s old Rolls Royces, but he’s deliberately letting that fall apart…

Website

Artwork: ‘The Harvesters’ By Dutch Renaissance Painter Pieter Bruegel The Elder, 1525-1569 (Video)

Artist: Pieter Bruegel the Elder (Netherlandish, Breda ca. 1525–1569 Brussels) Title: The Harvesters

The Harvesters is an oil painting on wood completed by Pieter Bruegel the Elder in 1565. It depicts the harvest time, in the months of July and August or late summer. Nicolaes Jonghelinck, a merchant banker and art collector from Antwerp, commissioned this painting.

On view at Metropolitan Museum: https://www.metmuseum.org/art/collect…

Pieter Bruegel the Elder was the most significant artist of Dutch and Flemish Renaissance painting, a painter and printmaker, known for his landscapes and peasant scenes; he was a pioneer in making both types of subject the focus in large paintings.

Profile: Chef Jonathan Brincat Of Restaurant Noni In Malta (Video)

The MICHELIN Guide takes you to Malta to discover the treasures of the island: its chefs, its products and producers. Following the launch of the first MICHELIN Guide Malta in February 2020, we take a closer look at Noni, One-Star restaurant, and its chef, Jonathan Brincat. At the crossroads of cultures, the Maltese gastronomic scene is a reflection of its rich past which marries culinary influences from Italy, Mediterranean countries, North Africa, and Great Britain – not to mention contemporary trends.

At Noni, Chef-Owner Brincat passionately brings a modern approach to traditional Maltese and Mediterranean cuisine. The attentive staff are happy to make recommendations from the concise menu, showcasing quality seasonal products in well-balanced dishes, all cooked with an eye for detail.

Tributes: French Fashion Designer Pierre Cardin Dies At 98 (Video)

Legendary French fashion designer Pierre Cardin died Tuesday at the age of 98 at a hospital in Neuilly in western Paris, his family told AFP.

Pierre Cardin, was an Italian-born naturalised-French fashion designer. He is known for what were his avant-garde style and Space Age designs. He preferred geometric shapes and motifs, often ignoring the female form. He advanced into unisex fashions, sometimes experimental, and not always practical. 

Interviews: Ballet Dancer Misty Copeland (Podcast)

Was the first black principal dancer at the American Ballet Theatre earlier denied roles because of her skin colour? She tells host, Anne McElvoy, how dance saved her from a difficult childhood and about her first performance in a classic Christmas production. And, which ballets would she remove from the repertoire?

Misty Danielle Copeland is an American ballet dancer for American Ballet Theatre, one of the three leading classical ballet companies in the United States. On June 30, 2015, Copeland became the first African American woman to be promoted to principal dancer in ABT’s 75-year history

Artwork: ‘The Orange Chair, 1944’ By British Painter Cedric Morris

Sir Cedric Lockwood Morris, 9th Baronet was a British artist, art teacher and plantsman. He was born in Swansea in South Wales, but worked mainly in East Anglia. As an artist he is best known for his portraits, flower paintings and landscapes

Video Profiles: Asha Deliverance And Her ‘Fabric-Welded Domes’

In 1979 Asha Deliverance sewed her first geodesic dome on an old Singer sewing machine, finishing it in time to become her eldest child’s first home. Motivated by the work of Buckminster Fuller, she continued to build dome homes for friends until she responded to increasing demand and opened the country’s first retail dome company in 1980.

Today, Asha has stopped sewing and relies on her team at the Pacific Domes headquarters in Ashland, Oregon to fabric weld her domes. The company provides shelters for families, glamping sites, greenhouses, climbing, events (e.g. Coachella) and extreme outposts. “To test some of the possible challenges of living on Mars, NASA joined forces with Pacific Domes in early in 2013 to erect a 44-foot geodesic-engineered dome on the northern slope of Mauna Loa, Hawaii.”

The company offers DIY dome kits starting at $5,500 for a 16 foot (5 meter) shelter that can be erected with their manual in a couple of days (instructions for the deck are included). When we asked Deliverance about the frustrations of some dome builders like Shelter Publications’ Lloyd Kahn she explained that in the ‘60s people were building domes out of wood which required sealing multiple joints, but that using fabric has made all the difference.

Video Profiles: French Nobel Prize Author Albert Camus (1913 -1960)

This week, we’re putting the focus on Nobel Prize-winning French author Albert Camus. As 2020 saw France mark 60 years since his death in a car crash, Camus’s seminal work “The Plague” was unexpectedly thrust back into the spotlight by the Covid-19 pandemic.

From the UK to Japan, the 1947 novel established itself as a global sensation, topping sales charts and pushing publishers into a rushed reprint. But Camus’s prolific and multi-faceted career extends far beyond this viral hit. We tell you more about the author’s life, starting with his humble beginnings in French-ruled Algeria. 

Tributes: British Author John le Carré (1931-2020)

John le Carré, who forged thrillers from equal parts of adventure, moral courage and literary flair, has died aged 89.

Le Carré explored the gap between the west’s high-flown rhetoric of freedom and the gritty reality of defending it, in novels such as The Spy Who Came in from the ColdTinker Tailor Soldier Spy and The Night Manager, which gained him critical acclaim and made him a bestseller around the world.

On Sunday, his family confirmed he had died of pneumonia at the Royal Cornwall Hospital on Saturday night. “We all deeply grieve his passing,” they wrote in a statement.

His longtime agent Jonny Geller described him as “an undisputed giant of English literature. He defined the cold war era and fearlessly spoke truth to power in the decades that followed … I have lost a mentor, an inspiration and most importantly, a friend. We will not see his like again.”

Read more at The Guardian