How to Find Premium Tequila in a Saturated Market
The agave-based spirit may be shaking off its dive-bar reputation, but the industry is still awash with inferior brands. Here’s how to find the real deal—and why it matters.
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Twenty years ago, tequila was considered the basest of spirits, relegated to dives and college bars. Most of what you’d see were mixtos, cheap versions made of 51 percent agave and 49 percent corn or sugar syrup, resulting in the type of low-quality swill that demanded not only a chaser but also a sort of pre-chaser. You may recall the ritual: Lick a pile of pure salt, choke down the shot, then bite into a lime wedge as your throat burns, your eyes water, and the regrets begin.
Today’s tequila landscape is unrecognisable. The growth has been profound. Tequila consumption in America has roughly doubled in the past seven years, recently overtaking whiskey and set to pass vodka. What’s more, the majority of the ascent has left mixtos behind: In 2022, for the first time ever, 7 of every 10 bottles of tequila consumed in America were 100 percent agave. Tequila is so popular, agave distillates have begun to pop up all over the world, including in South Africa, India, Australia, Peru, and New Zealand—where there’s a distillery making a limited-edition Blue Weber agave that sells for nearly $600 a bottle. The spirit cannot be labeled “tequila,” unless it’s made with Blue Weber agaves in one of five designated states in Mexico, the most famous of which is Jalisco. (That New Zealand bottle is known as TeKiwi.)
Arguably more dramatically, there has been a radical transformation of tequila’s reputation. Since George Clooney and his partners Rande Gerber and Mike Meldman famously sold their Casamigos tequila brand in 2017 for a billion, a tequila company has practically become a lifestyle accessory for Hollywood royalty, TV stars, NBA heavyweights, musicians, comedians, socialites, influencers, and whichever one(s) of these Kendall Jenner is (hers is called 818). Dwayne “the Rock” Johnson’s Teremana tequila, launched in 2020, is already the industry’s 10th-largest brand and the fastest growing in the spirit’s history.
But listen closely enough and you hear a heavy sigh from distillers and aficionados alike. The rapid proliferation of tequilas—there are currently almost 3,000, a full third of which were created in the past five years—means that while consumption has never been higher, it has also never been harder to separate the signal from the noise. With no shortage of folk eager to sell you their $100 blancos, it’s no surprise that many of these products are built more on marketing than on quality. There’s a code of honor in tequila; no one publicly insults anyone else’s brand. But as distillers and professionals will tell you, there are basic universal principles of good tequila making. And if you’re hoping to find a truly premium version, it helps to know what those tenets are.
Complexity From the Ground
Tequila and its cousin, mezcal (a spirit made in Mexico from any type of agave plant), have a superpower: They are the only spirits in the world for which the standard way to enjoy them is neat, at room temperature, and unaged—at least, not the way we tend to think about aging. Blancos, by far the most popular variety, never see the inside of oak barrels.
“With tequila, it’s very important to understand that maturation begins in the fields,” says Sergio Mendoza, who produces Don Fulano and Fuenteseca, among other premium brands. As part of a long line of agave farmers, he’s one of the few tequila producers to own his own plants. “When you talk about maturation, people expect you to start talking about barrel aging,” he says. “But we’re talking about a raw material that is way more complex than most raw materials used to make spirits.”
Agaves take a long time to grow. You’ll almost never hear anyone talk about where the corn or wheat for their whiskey comes from, because those grains are harvested every fall and don’t express much of a sense of place. Blue Weber agaves, on the other hand, take an average of seven years to reach maturity. Agaves have terroir, like wine grapes, and when fully ripe have an inherent complexity. “You can literally put a glass up to the still and you’re drinking a product that has a maturation of seven or eight years,” says Mendoza.
Agriculture is one aspect of the industry damaged by the recent surge of interest in tequila. The agaves that are becoming ripe this year were planted when demand was half of what it is today, inflating their price. Rather than pay the premium, unscrupulous distillers will harvest immature agaves in the name of higher margins. “Harvesting young sacrifices all the richness of flavor, the complexity, the depth, everything we identify with tequila,” Mendoza laments. “There’s nothing you can do in the process to make up for that mistake. That’s why so many of them use additives, to make up for everything they’ve lost.”
Additive Free
Additives are the open secret of the tequila industry, the thing no one used to talk about. Even if a label reads “100 percent agave,” the liquid inside might be only 99 percent agave, because producers can still add up to 1 percent by volume of lab-designed sugars, oak essence, glycerin, or caramel coloring without being required to disclose that they’ve done so. In other words, tequila brands can (and do) say that their vanilla sweetness is a result of extra-special barrels or extra-delicious agaves when, in fact, the flavor comes courtesy of industrial sweeteners they’ve dumped into the tanks.
“Tequila doesn’t taste like cupcakes,” says Eduardo “Lalo” González, who launched his additive-free tequila, Lalo, in 2021. In his view, undisclosed additives mislead the consumer to think “that good tequila tastes like vanilla or bubble gum.” González named his business in honor of his father, a tequila maker himself also called Lalo, who started a brand to honor his father in the 1980s called Don Julio. González believes that a big part of Lalo’s 160 percent year-over-year growth is thanks to consumer demand for unadulterated spirits.
Aiding in the pushback against additives, in 2020 the independent informational website Tequila Matchmaker introduced a Confirmed Additive Free certification to its database of over 5,000 bottles, providing aficionados an easy way to search for uncorrupted spirits. (As of this writing, 102 brands have made the list.) “The additive-free certification is going mainstream,” says Grover Sanschagrin, who, with his wife, Scarlet, operates the site. “Retailers tell us it’s an easy sell and has become a differentiator on the shelf. People are telling us now that they can’t get a distribution deal unless they’re on the list.”
Nick Lutz and Adam Craun, cofounders of the brand-new company El Negocio, sought Tequila Matchmaker’s certification before bringing their product to market—and even before they began production. (The brand debuted on shelves in October.) “When we started interviewing different distilleries, we were only really interested in ones that held true to traditional methods,” says Lutz. “Traditional methods do not include dumping sugar, wood flavor, and all that stuff into the product.” Craun is a winemaker—a cofounder of Memento Mori, makers of a 100-point Napa Cab—so his interest in discerning a sense of place in the liquid, influenced by the weather, the soil, and the agave, means that going additive-free was integral to the project. (In fact, Lutz and Craun have such faith in the ability of tequila to take on terroir that they believe connoisseurs will be able to identify and celebrate the nuances in yearly vintages just as wine collectors do.)
The Sanschagrins, for their part, say that they don’t believe additives are necessarily bad, or that people who prefer tequila with additives are wrong; plenty of consumers clearly favor a sweeter tequila, which reduces the perception of alcohol burn. Rather, the Sanschagrins say they initiated the certification system simply out of frustration with the lack of transparency.
González agrees. “If I have a latte and I put milk and Splenda in it, someone could say, ‘That’s additives!’ ” he explains. “I say, ‘Of course it is! But I know about it.’ ”
Heritage
For every step in the tequila-making process, there’s a way to do it cheaper, quicker, and more industrially. While traditional producers slowly roast their agaves in brick ovens for 36 to 72 hours, others rely on autoclaves, which utilize pressurized steam, to shorten the cooking time to only 7 to 12 hours. Still others employ diffusers, building-size industrial machines that use high-pressure water to shred the agaves without cooking them at all, thereby extracting tremendous yields and completing the whole operation in just a few hours. Critics say that if a brick oven is akin to a slow cooker, a diffuser is like a microwave.
“There aren’t many people who make tequila our way, because it’s so expensive to make it our way,” says Guillermo Erickson Sauza. You may recognize the surname. His great-great-grandfather Cenobio Sauza bought a distillery 150 years ago in a small village in Jalisco called Tequila and started making an agave spirit that he would name after the town. The company passed from father to son for 100 years until Francisco Javier Sauza, Guillermo’s grandfather, sold it in 1976. Today the Sauza tequila brand is owned by the multinational behemoth Beam Suntory, Inc.
In 2005, Sauza dusted off some ancient distilling equipment the family still owned and started making a tequila he initially called Los Abuelos (“the Grandfathers”), though after a trademark dispute, he changed the name to Fortaleza. Sauza endeavored to make tequila by the same methods his family practiced a century ago, using fully mature agaves, brick ovens, pine tanks for fermentation, and small copper stills—and avoiding additives. He also took the process one step further by reviving an archaic technique to separate the fibers from the juice with a two-ton volcanic stone called a tahona, which used to be pulled by a donkey named Chencha. (The electric tractor that has since replaced Chencha is the only bit of electricity in the whole operation.) “We take a hit on yields,” Sauza says but insists the flavor is unmatched.
The point is not that a tahona makes a better product than a screw mill or a roller mill—this question is a matter of some debate among aficionados, though the community finds easy unanimity in condemning diffusers—but that tequila is an expensive and difficult product to make well. Shortcuts are always available, tempting brand owners with promises of higher yields and profits. Unless it’s personally important to the owner to follow tradition, they won’t. “If you’re building a business to sell it off and make money,” Sauza says, “you certainly aren’t going to do it with a tahona.”
Still, he finds equanimity in the shadow of these shiny new giants. While he’d prefer that consumers support family-owned Mexican brands, he points out that the new interest in tequila from multinational companies and consumers around the world is likely a net positive. “George Clooney and the Rock are bringing in people that might never have considered drinking tequila,” Sauza says. “And that’s good for our industry.”
Six to Savor
These bottles from small producers, all worthy of any true aficionado’s cabinet, value process and craftsmanship over influencer hype.
Tequila Ocho Blanco
Ocho was among the first tequila brands to experiment with terroir on a large scale. Batches vary year by year, but expect pepper, tropical fruit, and citrus on a broad base of roasted-agave nectar. $50
Siete Leguas Blanco
Siete Leguas has been a consistent favorite of tequila connoisseurs since its founding in 1952. This bottle features an explosion of roasted agave, with citrus, earth, minerality, black pepper, and honeysuckle-like florals all kept in perfect balance. $50
G4 108 High Proof Blanco
While tequila sold in the U.S. is almost always bottled at 40 percent alcohol, it can legally go all the way up to 55 percent. This excellent high-proof example, from the third-generation producer Felipe Camarena, sits at 54 percent but doesn’t read hotter so much as louder, fuller, and more impactful. $116
Fortaleza Reposado
Tequila is its truest self when unaged (blanco), but a touch of barrel maturation can enhance
its flavors. This full-bodied tequila (frequently sold by retailers for more than twice its sticker price) spends six to nine months in used bourbon barrels, resulting in an almost buttery richness. $70
Cascahuin Tahona Blanco
This special edition showcases the classic agave and pepper flavors alongside an enticing greener note reminiscent of jalapeños or even olives. It’s made by the same Cascahuín distillery that produces the equally excellent El Negocio. $109
Fuenteseca Cosecha “Huerta Singular” Blanco 2018
The deepest exploration yet into the idea of “single vineyard” tequila, this limited-edition variety was
made from a high-altitude plot in Michoacán. Baking spices, intense minerality, and bold, fresh herbs bound out of the glass. $235
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This Speedy 70-Foot Power Catamaran Is Designed to Cut Through Rough Waters
The 70-foot T-2000 Voyager can hit 60 mph in flat conditions, and then take waves up to 30 feet.
Back in April, Storm Kathleen slammed into the west coast of Ireland as a fearsome Force 10 gale, packing 112 kph winds and 15-foot waves. While locals sandbagged their homes and prepared for the worst, Frank Kowalski decided it was a swell day for a boat ride.
As owner of Safehaven Marine in County Cork, he’d just launched his brand-new, 70-foot T-2000 Voyager all-weather power catamaran. What Kathleen offered was a chance to put the new super-cat through its paces.
“We knew from scale-model tests that she should be able to tackle waves of more than 65 feet high,” Kowalski tells Robb Report. “But you never know until you’re out there. In the height of the storm, she just shrugged off the waves and weather and performed flawlessly.”
Evolved from Safehaven’s 75-foot XVS20 monohull launched in 2018, Kowalski used his expertise in building commercial, work-boat power catamarans to design the twin-hulled T-2000 Voyager to offer speed with stability.
“The stability in beam seas is what’s key here,” he says. “While we were out recently in a Force 8 with 40-plus knot winds and 12-foot seas, we were able to stop and leave the boat to drift while we retrieved a drone. It just took the waves on the beam with ease. In a monohull, it would have been rolling so badly you couldn’t have stood on the deck.”
Then there’s the sheer velocity that comes with twin, scalpel-thin hulls slicing through waves. With the T-2000’s pair of 1,550 hp MAN V12 diesels driving France Helices SD5 surface drives, the Safehaven can hit a top speed of 91 kph.
“It’s just the most amazing sight, standing on the stern, watching these huge roostertails behind,” Kowalski adds. “We’ve also incorporated retracting swim platforms so you can see the props spinning on the surface, plus valved exhausts that switch between silenced and straight-through. The noise from those V12s is sensational.”
While Safehaven has been building its Wildcat range of 40-, 53-, and 60-foot power cats for everything from oil-rig support, crew transfer, and even as a military cruiser for Britain’s Royal Navy, they were always pure, no-frills work boats. With this new T-2000, Kowalski is looking to appeal to private buyers searching for something a little different.
His hull No. 1 demonstrator boat has all-diamond-quilted marine leather, well-finished cabinetry, colored LED lighting, and below-deck accommodations for six in three cabins. Hull No. 2—already sold and due for completion in the next 18 months—will up the luxury factor.
“It’s going to a client in the Middle East who plans to use it for just himself and his wife,” says Kowalski. The client has specified a full-width owner’s suite with a central, king-size bed and oversized his-and-hers bathrooms and closets in each hull. “He also wants to go fast—very fast,” Kowalski continues. “So we’ll install twin 2,000 hp MAN V12s, again with surface drives, and a central hydrofoil to reduce drag. The plan is for it to hit a top speed in excess of 100 kph.”
The new T-2000 is also designed to go the distance. With the 10,977 kilogram tanks, it has a range of more than 1,000 nautical miles at 55.2 kph, and 1,700 nautical miles at 28 kph. Throttle back to 19 kph and range increases to 3,000-plus nautical miles.
Much of this is down to the yacht’s symmetrical, semi-wave-piercing hulls, made of a carbon-fibre-composite construction, with inverted lower bow sections and a double-chine arrangement that projects spray clear of the boat. The hydrofoil in mid position also means that, at speed in calmish seas, the T-2000 rides with half its hull length out of the water.
To eliminate waves slamming into the bridge deck windshield, Kowalski moved the pilothouse farther back. It also makes for a sleeker profile, giving the T-2000 the look of a single-hull sportsyacht.
As for creature comforts, the main, open-plan salon features an L-shaped Corian-topped galley, with a U-shaped dinette opposite. To enjoy the action, there are bucket-style, shock-absorbing seats for the captain and copilot, a wraparound sofa on the port side, and a single bucket seat to starboard.
The entire helm area gets flooded with light courtesy of the four-panel, angled windshield and quartet of fixed skylights above. To see the boat’s hydrofoil in action, the bridge has a glass panel in the floor that’s also designed for viewing marine life below at night. Most of the windows have half-inch-thick toughened panels to shrug off cascading water.
In finer weather than typically found on coastal Ireland, the T-2000 has a small flybridge with a helm station and sun-lounge area up top, plus a covered stern cockpit with sofas and table for alfresco dining.
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Six Senses Are Suddenly Everywhere. Inside the Luxury Resort’s Growing Global Empire
With 26 properties now open, another 43 to come, and the U.S. square in its sights, the rapidly growing wellness-focused resort and hotel brand is now asking the hard questions
If someone hit you in the head (hard) just before the pandemic, and you’re only waking up now, in the middle of 2024, you’ll have noticed some changes. For instance, the global proliferation of Six Senses hotels and resorts.
Once a relatively quiet group of wellness-focused Asian resorts for in-the-know Europeans, Six Senses is now in the midst of a breakneck opening spree with the U.S. square in its sights. Since 2019—when hotel giant IHG dropped $440 million in cash to acquire the operator’s then 16 hotels and resorts from private equity group Pegasus Capital Advisors—it’s grown to 26 urban hotels and destination resorts in 21 countries across four continents. (Its Vana resort in India is one of Robb Report‘s 50 best luxury hotels in the world).
Blink again and that number may have doubled. By 2026, Six Senses, now the flagship brand of IHG’s luxury and lifestyle portfolio, hopes to have a shingle hanging in London, Bangkok, Dubai, Lisbon, Napa, and Tel Aviv. There are currently 43 Six Senses in the pipeline, which will extend Six Senses footprint from the Carolinas to Victoria Falls. Many of those new properties will come packed with branded residences.
So is Six Senses trying to conquer the world via ayurvedic medicine, longevity spa treatments, and mindfulness exercises?
“It’s been a hell of a ride,” admits CEO Neil Jacobs. “But the answer is no, and we have a real point of view on that.”
More on that point of view momentarily, but it’s worth pausing to note that despite his protestations, Jacobs comes to Six Senses with 14 years of experience with a hotel group that is arguable much more overtly interested in turning planet Earth into one massive 5-star hotel lobby: namely, the Four Seasons. As senior vice president of operations for the Four Seasons’s Asia Pacific region, he witnessed the company expand from roughly two dozen hotels into the 130-ish-address, Bill Gates– and Prince Al-Waleed bin Talal–owned leviathan of luxury it is today. The Four Seasons’s stated goal is 200 hotels. But Jacobs tells Robb Report it’s neither his or IHG’s intention to turn Six Senses into the Michael Kors of opulent wellness resorts.
“We think less is more,” he says of that aforementioned point of view. “Our competitors are all about growth. With Six Senses the conversation is very much the opposite of that. You’ve got to be really careful about what you do and where you go. I mean, we started with eight resorts in 2012. Then there were 11, and we got rid of two or three. Today, there are 26. So we’ve only opened 18 in nearly 12 years, really.”
Still, the Bangkok-based company is hurtling toward 60-plus properties, a number Jacobs says he is “comfortable” with. What happens beyond that is stickier.
“We have four projects in Italy. We could do another five, but why?” says Jacobs. “Instead, let’s move to another country and spread, rather than just inundate the brand in one country, even though there’s places to do it. It’s a continual argument internally. We have some great places coming to Italy, but we don’t have Venice. So then my team says, ‘If we have a Venice deal, are you going to say, ‘Don’t do it?’ Good question. But the answer is, ‘maybe.’”
Whether it’s Six Senses, the Four Seasons, or Auberge (another brand that has seen a similarly rapid expansion), the answer to the question “When does quantity extinguish the spark of quality?” is worth at least a billion. But it’s also a problem that highlights the welcome fact that, despite the current slump, “luxury” is winning; it may have already won.
From fashion to travel, a growing share of businesses have repositioned themselves to serve the high-end consumer, as growing global wealth supports superior margins realized through the relative simplicity of a luxury rebrand. The affordable family resort of yesterday becomes the aspirational seaside playpen of today. As long as demand for luxury everything is here, deep-pocketed hotel groups will grow to meet it.
At the same time, the success of “luxury” creates a clear existential dilemma: If luxury becomes the standard setting, it is by definition no longer an indulgence, no longer a luxury. And as luxury becomes more gray and undifferentiated, the vague, eye-of-the-beholder quality that was once its strength, is now its liability.
It’s a problem that Jacobs feels that Six Senses was uniquely designed to address.
“That sixth sense in our name, we see it as intuition,” he says. “It’s interesting because one of our initiatives for this year in wellness is spiritual wellness. In the past, we’ve done a lot of yoga, we’ve done a lot of meditation, but we haven’t done a lot of overtly spiritual programs. We think the time is right.”
Those programs serving up, non-religious, lightly-woo spirituality on a silver platter roll out later this year and offer a key differentiator for the brand’s fastest growing customer base: Americans.
“Back in 2012, it was predominately a European customer, I’d say 85 percent,” says Jacobs. “There was no business coming from the U.S. Today, the U.S. is our number market, even though we don’t have anything open in the U.S.”
It’s not for lack of trying. Six Senses planned to open in Manhattan along the High Line in a doomed Bjarke Ingles–designed tower that was crushed by a Gambino crime family construction bribery scandal and the subsequent bankruptcy of its developer. Six Senses has since found a new site on 23rd St. between Seventh and Eighth Aves. in Chelsea, but is at least three years out.
It’s having a better, if not altogether easier, time with the 236-acre farm in Hudson Valley in Upstate New York. The site of a failed “secret hotel” project, Six Senses snatched up the land for $20.2 million in 2022, making it some of the only real estate the brand owns (as with many brands, outside investors typically carry the deeds). Although it would be the first five-star flag in the region, the project has faced community opposition that could scuttle yet another attempt to create a footprint in the U.S.
“I don’t think it’s going to work,” Del LaMagna, whose property shares a border with the site, told the Hudson Valley Pilot. “[IHG] decided they wanted to be here, they started hiring good local people to figure it out, but this whole idea of exclusive resorts for rich people just doesn’t work up here.”
That’s a matter of opinion, but Six Senses plans for the U.S. extend far beyond the town of Clinton. Besides urban hotels in New York, L.A., and Miami, it will open a series of resorts, starting with a 500-acre estate on the edge of Napa and a multi-island project off the coast of South Carolina spanning Hilton Head, Daufuskie, and Bay Point. The gargantuan scale of those properties will eventually facilitate the festivals and retreats that the brand has been recently investing in.
“It’s a lot of yoga, a lot of spirituality, a lot of fun, a dance, a lot of movement,” he says. “Those kinds of festivals resonate with people.”
So if you’re just waking up, welcome to a world where Six Senses is everywhere all at once. But Jacobs hopes that by selecting “extraordinary properties” and by “demonstrating our values in a highly meaningful way” that the resorts will fit into the ecosystem like redwoods in a pine forest. Call it a sixth sense.
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Rolls-Royce Debuted the New Phantom Scintilla at Monterey Car Week. Here’s Everything We Know.
Limited to 10 examples, each car has an interior defined by “painting with thread,” and a rumored price of around $2.6 million.
Visitors to the fabled Louvre Museum in the heart of Paris might remember an exquisite marble sculpture standing proud at the top of the main Daru staircase. Named the Winged Victory of Samothrace, this eight-foot-tall headless goddess—with gossamer wings—dates to 190 B.C.
What has it got to do with Rolls-Royce’s new Phantom Scintilla Private Collection limousine, unveiled during this year’s Monterey Car Week? A lot, in fact. Rewind to 1910 and Rolls-Royce’s managing director at the time, Claude Johnson, who reportedly commissioned well-known sculptor Charles Sykes to create a hood ornament to define the new Rolls-Royce brand. Apparently, Johnson had seen the statue during a visit to the Louvre and fell in love with it.
While a change in direction saw Sykes create the Spirit of Ecstasy, inspired by Johnson’s former secretary, English actress and model Eleanor Thornton, the Louvre statue was always considered by Goodwood to be the original inspiration for its now iconic emblem.
So, when Rolls-Royce designers looked for a muse for a 10-car, Phantom-based Private Collection series to be called Scintilla—derived from the Latin word for “spark”—the marque went back to the Winged Victory of Samothrace statue and its Mediterranean roots.
You see that influence in the car’s Spirit of Ecstasy figurine which, for the first time, features a translucent white, marble-like ceramic coating. It also carries over in the car’s two-tone paintwork—Andalusian White for the upper body, and powdery Thracian Blue, inspired by the color of the Med, for the lower section. A subtle metallic flake in the paintwork is said to mimic the sparkle of sunlight off the water.
Yet as with most bespoke and special-edition Phantoms, it’s the interior where Rolls-Royce craftsmanship is truly exhibited. In this case, the theme is exquisite embroidery or, as the automaker calls it, “painting with thread.”
For Scintilla, the embroidery work involves over 850,000 individual stitches. And at night, illuminated perforations in the material give the doors a wave-like glow. In Phantom tradition, there’s a Starlight Headliner in the roof, but here, more than 1,500 fiber-optic illuminations twinkle in sequence to mimic silk billowing in a breeze.
The centerpiece of the interior is the Phantom’s dashboard gallery ahead of the front-seat passenger. Named “Celestial Pulse,” it comprises seven metal ribbons, each individually milled from solid aluminum and given the same finely grained ceramic finish as the Scintilla’s Spirit of Ecstasy.
Rolls-Royce will build only 10 examples of the Phantom Scintilla, which had its public debut at the Quail, a Motorsports Gathering on August 16. Of that already small number, three will come to North America and, like the other seven, have already been sold. While there’s no official word on pricing, the figure $3.8 million has been reported.
“With every collection, we aim to tell the story of Rolls-Royce Motor Cars and provoke our clients’ imagination, letting them know our Bespoke designers’ artistry is greater than they can envision,” stated Martin Fritsches, president of Rolls-Royce Motor Cars for the Americas, when asked for a comment by Robb Report. “We can’t think of a better way to tell this story than through the history of our idol, the Spirit of Ecstasy.”
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Astonishing Nature, At Its Most Magnificent
Scenic Eclipse hones 6-star ultra-luxury around Antarctica’s raw nature.
Picture this. You’re sitting at the Sky Bar on the Scenic Eclipse II. It’s freezing outside, but you’re warm and dry, sipping a delicious glass of pinot noir as you watch a colony of penguins play on the ice sheet. Is this a dream? Or just another incredible moment from the 6-star ultra-luxury discovery yacht Scenic Eclipse?
It may sound too good to be true, but Scenic has over-engineered their two major Polar ocean-going vessels (Scenic Eclipse & Scenic Eclipse II) to offer up mind-blowing opportunities to connect to untouched nature. While the White Continent continues to hold pride of place on most people’s bucket list, few will ever experience it in such refined style.
With just 200 guests on board in Antarctica for more landing opportunities, Scenic has decked out their vessels out with 6-star hotel facilities, and equipped them with luxury tech toys to satisfy even the most restless traveller.
They offer an impressive close to one-to-one staff-to-guest ratio, up to 10 dining experiences , as well as two state-of-the-art on board helicopters^, Zodiacs and a custom-built submersible^ for further discovery in the destination. Paddle boards and kayaks are deployed regularly (conditions permitting), and guests are provided with polar boots for land-based snow treks.
This is not a floating hotel but a discovery yacht for the discerning traveller. Daily plans are shaped around the weather and sea conditions. A typical day can include a leisurely breakfast and visit to the 550sqm Senses Spa#, morning and afternoon discovery excursions, lunch in your venue of choice or in your suite, and a delicious on board culinary experience for dinner before heading to your spacious suite with verandah to unwind.
When not out with the expert polar Discovery Team relax in the Observation Lounge or indulge in a sauna and massage in the 550sqm Senses Spa# wellness retreat. For your daily entertainment there are whales, penguins, orcas and seals to observe and document.
The two major trips that depart for East Antarctica from our part of the world in the next several months are Mawson’s Antarctica: Along the East Coast, which leaves from Queenstown, New Zealand in December and Antarctica’s Ross Sea: Majestic Ice & Wildlife which leaves from Dunedin in January 2025.
The first itinerary celebrates one of Australia’s national heroes, Sir Douglas Mawson, who occupies a place on the $100 note. This itinerary allows guests to follow in the footsteps of this intrepid explorer, retracing his travels across the continent in the name of scientific research. The trip takes in remote bays and ravishing coves, placing guest in breathtaking landscapes where wildlife reigns supreme.
Led by the expert polar Discovery Team, guests can also opt to dive below the depths of the polar waters in the custom-designed submersible Scenic Neptune II, or take to the skies in the two on board state-of-the-art helicopters (for an additional cost). Guest on this voyage will enjoy a heli-shuttle directly from the discovery yacht to view the remains of Mawson’s Hut. The Mawson 25-day all-inclusive itinerary departs from near Queenstown to Hobart on 15 December 2024 and 13 December 2025 and is priced from $39,270pp* with savings of $13,000pp* and a 50% off the Deluxe Verandah Suite upgrade.
The Antarctica’s Ross Sea: Majestic Ice & Wildlife is voyage of a similar length, 24 days, but here the journey has a very end-of-the-earth feel to it. Striking ice landscapes offer vistas of gem-like glaciers, views to towering icebergs and jagged mountain ranges that form the backdrop to epic wildlife displays.
For nature lovers, the Ross Sea represents a holy grail, one that’s absolutely teeming with whales, orcas, penguins, seals and migratory seabirds. Day trips and land excursions here are all crafted in response to weather, by the expert polar Discovery Team and Captain who know the terrain.
These are side trips and excursions that are well designed to take advantage of the close access to truly life changing experiences and each one is a show-stopper.
Once again guests can opt to book the helicopter^ excursion for an extra cost to fly off and land in the McMurdo Dry Valleys, a place like no where else on earth where the snow is void or take a dive in the submersible^ to see what lies beneath.
This all-inclusive ultra-luxury, 24-day itinerary, departs from Dunedin, New Zealand on 31 January 2025 and 29 January 2026 and the voyage starts from $38,970pp* with savings of $13,000pp* and a 50% off the Deluxe Verandah Suite upgrade .
To learn more, visit: scenic.com.au
*Terms and Conditions apply.
^Flights on board our two helicopters and submersible experiences are at additional cost, subject to regulatory approval, availability, weight restrictions, medical approval and weather, ice and tidal conditions.
#Spa treatments at additional cost.
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The Small Dress Watch Is Back
Drawer the Daytona—a small, slim dress watch is the discerning wristwear of the moment.
For the first time in decades, dress watches—from simple, three-hand Patek Philippes to flamboyant Cartiers—are running circles around sports watches with regard to both desirability and style.
“In terms of taste, things have changed,” says David Hurley, deputy CEO of the Watches of Switzerland group, a retailer with 30 multi-brand and 25 mono-brand partnership stores across the U.S. While until recently demand “was all about the steel sport timepiece, ” he says, “now we’re seeing dress watches and brands such as Jaeger-LeCoultre”—long esteemed for its formal models—“performing well in our stores.”
The genesis of the shift dates back to the early days of the pandemic, when secondary prices on blue-chip sports watches such as the Rolex Daytona, Patek Philippe Nautilus, and Audemars Piguet Royal Oak began clocking staggering monthly increases; by early 2022, some pieces were fetching five times retail value. Then, in May of that year, the crypto collapse triggered both a decline in secondary-market values and an exodus of speculators who were only in the game to make a quick buck. Genuine enthusiasts who had been lured to sports models by the prospect of a rapidly appreciating asset were also free to return their attention to timepieces that better reflected their tastes.
“People who got priced out of these sports models suddenly realised they could go into a Patek Calatrava at retail price,” recalls Eddie Goziker, president of the pre-owned dealer Wrist Aficionado. “The market pushed them in that direction. And once they got there, they saw the value in it and stayed.”
With the vogue for smaller cases already in full effect, the clamor for slim, classic styles presented on a leather strap is now at a crescendo, according to vintage dealer Mike Nouveau. “The Patek 96, the first Calatrava ever, is 30.5 mm, and they made that watch for 40 years,” he says. “I’m buying and selling them like crazy, both for my personal collection and for clients.”
“There’s a ton of interest in Calatravas, vintage Vacheron Constantin, obviously Cartier,” says Eric Wind, owner of Wind Vintage in Palm Beach, Florida. “The steel sport watches used to be an ‘if you know, you know’ watch,” he says, explaining the aesthetic about-face. “The Nautilus 10 years ago used to be unknown. Now everybody on the planet knows what it is.”
And that, he notes, includes thieves, further helping the trend toward smaller, simpler, more discreet timepieces. “I know two people who had Patek Aquanauts stolen off their wrists, and another client had a gold Rolex Day-Date stolen in Brussels,” Wind says. “People don’t have the same connotation if you’re wearing an old dress watch—it’s more of a quiet luxury.”
But in the enthusiast world, of course, the quietest luxury can also be the loudest flex, and for dress watches, that includes the strap. Wind notes that bands by Paris-based leather-goods maker Jean Rousseau are afforded particularly high status. “A baller move is getting a Jean Rosseau with a single punch, just for their wrist,” he adds.
And the tremendous breadth of dresswatch designs, from simple three-hand models to ultra-complicated wonders, is a boon for collectors. If your tastes run to sober, sophisticated German watchmaking, a Saxonia by A. Lange & Söhne is just the ticket. A devoted minimalist? You can’t go wrong with the latest Toric collection from boutique maker Parmigiani Fleurier. Fans of more obscure brands would do well to consider the Patek-inspired (and typically sold-out) timepieces by Kikuchi Nakagawa, in Tokyo. Nouveau, for his part, recommends vintage Piaget and Breguet.
Even traditionally sporty brands are getting in on the action. At the end of May, Audemars Piguet introduced the [Re]Master02, a minimalist, asymmetrical homage to a 1960 model, from its extra-thin hour and minute movement to its matte-blue alligator strap, that’s on trend for the current dress-watch moment.
For yet more proof, consider Rolex’s increasing emphasis on its new 1908 Perpetual collection. Introduced in 2023 and expanded earlier this year with a 39 mm platinum model featuring an ice-blue guilloche dial and a brown alligator-leather strap, the 1908 is as sophisticated and gentlemanly as the brand’s iconic sports watches are rugged.
