ONE OF TWO HANDSOME yet outwardly conventional timepieces Grand Seiko has used as a launchpad for its ultra-fine accuracy (UFA) movements, the SLGB003 may be the most versatile evocation of an everyday wristwatch seen at this year’s shows. Considering the Japanese marque’s own track record, that’s quite the compliment.
Its latest sports watch seeks out new landmarks in accuracy. While Grand Seiko’s Swiss counterparts measure precision in months, weeks or, at best, days, the piece boasts a deviation rate of -20/+20 seconds per year. Such monster performance is made possible by proprietary Spring Drive technology, and one has to give Grand Seiko credit for making it available in a package as wearable and reasonably priced as this.
The 37 mm case in high-intensity titanium plays well in a variety of settings, now even over the cuff of your wetsuit thanks to the introduction of a bracelet with toolless micro-adjustment that fans of the brand have long been clamouring for.
ONE OF TWO HANDSOME yet outwardly conventional timepieces Grand Seiko has used as a launchpad for its ultra-fine accuracy (UFA) movements, the SLGB003 may be the most versatile evocation of an everyday wristwatch seen at this year’s shows. Considering the Japanese marque’s own track record, that’s quite the compliment.
Its latest sports watch seeks out new landmarks in accuracy. While Grand Seiko’s Swiss counterparts measure precision in months, weeks or, at best, days, the piece boasts a deviation rate of -20/+20 seconds per year. Such monster performance is made possible by proprietary Spring Drive technology, and one has to give Grand Seiko credit for making it available in a package as wearable and reasonably priced as this.
The 37 mm case in high-intensity titanium plays well in a variety of settings, now even over the cuff of your wetsuit thanks to the introduction of a bracelet with toolless micro-adjustment that fans of the brand have long been clamouring for.
FOR A BRAND WITH as much genuine heritage as Zenith (its “El Primero” chronograph is just the beginning), the Le Locle outfit has often chosen to actively shirk its own history, concentrating instead on material innovation and clever pop culture tie-ins. Fortunately, vintage lovers are catered for this year, as the brand revives an incredibly important movement—the Calibre 135—for its 160th anniversary.
Originally made over a 14-year period (between 1948 and 1962) the Calibre 135 is notably the most lauded chronometer movement previously offered by Zenith; 2025 marks its official return to the fold, complete with technological refinements that improve energy efficiency and lift its rate of accuracy to -2/+2 seconds per day.
For this reincarnation of the Calibre 135, Zenith has wisely chosen an aesthetic that sets it apart from chronometer watches of yore. Named after the initials of Zenith’s founder Georges Favre-Jacot, this design language consists of a 39 mm platinum case, encircled around a blue dial that is itself made up of three ornate segments—lapis lazuli, mother of pearl and brick-motif guilloché. Limited worldwide to 160 pieces.
AFTER NEARLY A DECADE spent playing third fiddle to Patek Philippe and Audemars Piguet (who hasn’t exhibited at the fair, or its predecessor the Salon International de la Haute Horlogerie, since 2018), Vacheron Constantin is now staking its claim as the most exciting of the “Holy Trinity”.
Any one of the brand’s releases—including its headline-grabbing Solaria Ultra Grand Complication—could have formed the linchpin of a quieter year, which is why we’re adamant that this Traditionnelle limited edition (127 pieces worldwide) deserves its hosannas.
This model is powered by the self-winding Calibre 2160. A new movement at Vacheron Constantin, it combines the brand’s distinctive cross-shaped tourbillon with a perpetual calendar mechanism for the first time. That undoubtedly all sounds very busy, yet the Traditionnelle’s refined style cues give form to a piece that is as, if not more, wearable than most 42 mm dress watches.
In line with the brand’s more “entry-level” anniversary editions, the dial features a geometric guilloché motif—only here, it’s executed in the classical manner, using a hand-operated straight-line engine. As it turns out, even in the world of haute horlogerie, some watches are more equal than others.
WHEN IT WAS INTRODUCED in 2000, the Chanel J12 (affectionately pronounced “J Douze” in French) instantly became a symbol of contemporary watchmaking, thanks to its landmark use of a ceramic case and bracelet. But until now, the resulting line’s many references were available in only white or black.
“It was evident from the start that we could make other colours,” says Frédéric Grangié, president of Chanel watches and fine jewellery. “And we are. But the one [we] bring to the market had to remain. It has to stay. So, J12 started black. Three years later, white. For its 25-year anniversary, it’s blue.”
Though it might be a timeless shade, this is no ordinary blue. As with the best innovations in watchmaking, the deep, rich hue required time—five years of research and development—to complete. That’s because colouring ceramic is a labour-intensive process, especially if you want to create a consistent level of durability and luminous depth across batches.
To enhance the colour’s allure, Chanel has developed nine new references in the blue material, underscoring its striking visual appeal with black PVD-treated elements. There are even haute horlogerie variations that incorporate blue sapphires and a diamond-set tourbillon. An ultra-limited transparent-blue-sapphire watch, the ultimate flex, ensures the range has something for almost everyone.
“The J12 Bleu looks and feels different from the black and the white versions, the original watches,” Grangié says. “It is quite a departure, thanks to its finishing, which is matte and slightly satin. I’m sure that the existing clientele for J12 will enjoy this one, but I think it will also open up the market to a new, different customer.”
Though it has many fans now, the original J12 was born out of a personal project. In 2000, Jacques Helleu—then artistic director for Chanel’s fragrances, beauty, watches and jewellery—sought to design a watch for himself, one that stood apart from the maison’s signature camellias and pearls. He found inspiration in the aerodynamic lines of J-Class yachts and named his finished design for the company’s 12 m racing category.
In 2019, Chanel reinforced its horological credibility by introducing an in-house J12 movement developed with Kenissi, a renowned Swiss manufacturer cofounded by Chanel and Tudor. The COSC-certified Calibre 12.1 elevated the J12’s precision and reliability, turning it into a watch—and a brand—aficionados could get behind, and no shortage of bona fide collectors have since added a Chanel watch to their vaults. Case in point: Shark Tank’s Kevin O’Leary recently purchased a one-of-a-kind Chanel Boy.Friend model at a Phillips auction for nearly US$250,000 (or around $385,000).
As Chanel celebrates a quarter of a century of the J12, this blue-hued transformation is more than an aesthetic shift—it’s an assertion of strength and intent. “The J12 is here to stay,” says Grangié. “Twenty-five years later, the watch world is taking notice. The J12 evolves, but with the same model and reference design for 25 years, it starts getting serious.”
Swedish-Australian futurist Anders Sörman-Nilsson, one of the world’s most sought-after innovation strategists, will headline the Future of Property Summit, hosted by our sister publication, Kanebridge Quarterly Magazine, this August in Sydney.
Held at the elegant Royal Automobile Club of Australia, this evening event will bring together some of the country’s most forward-thinking property and finance minds to decode what lies ahead for investors, developers and capital leaders.
Sörman-Nilsson is globally recognised for helping businesses navigate disruption and turn emerging trends into competitive advantage.
With clients including Apple, ING and Macquarie Bank, his high-energy keynotes blend behavioural science, futurism and technology, delivering insights that challenge the status quo and ignite strategic action.
His session will explore the tectonic shifts in demographics, sustainability, artificial intelligence and climate-driven design—and what they mean for the built environment.
Also on the agenda is Dr Andrew Wilson, Chief Economist at My Housing Market, who will deliver a sharp analysis of Australia’s evolving economic landscape, with insights into interest rates, inflation, migration and what they signal for the housing sector over the next 12–24 months.
The gold star line-up also includes Darren Younger, CEO of Assetora, a fast-growing platform bridging the gap between property and fintech innovation; and Paul Chapko, from JLL Capital Markets, who will offer exclusive insights into capital trends, financing shifts and what’s next for global property investment platforms.
Designed for high-level professionals across property, investment and finance, the evening will include networking, light refreshments, and access to rare, high-impact thought leadership in a premium setting.
Event Details
📅 Wednesday 7 August 2024 🕠 5:30pm – 8:30pm 📍 Royal Automobile Club of Australia, 89 Macquarie Street, Sydney
AT A SALON FILLED WITH mechanical brinkmanship and overhauls of iconic designs, the Polo 79 was not a new watch. Well, not strictly speaking.
Piaget’s 21st-century remake of the extravagant jetset sports watch of the same name made its comeback early last year in yellow gold. The release of a white metal variation wins the vaunted Swiss jewellery house no points for innovation, but its compelling source material means this fresh addition is sure to pull focus among the “bling is king” and jewellery-stacking crowds.
As close as any brand has come to conveying the emotion of wearing Fort Knox on one’s wrist, Piaget has also imbued this reincarnation of the disco-era Polo with several subtle but key differences. The original design language is upsized to a canvas of 38 mm; and on the caseback, that space is convincingly filled by the same micro-rotor movement Piaget uses in its ultra-thin range of Altiplano watches.
Best of all, the new Polo 79 isn’t dogged by the same issues of supply as the watch that inspired it. Piaget’s own records indicate that fewer than 200 vintage Polos were produced in white gold (many with quartz movements). For impatient collectors, a trip to the boutique now offers a surefire solution.
Taken out of context, Omega’s decision to release a new women’s watch line—a female-focused evolution of its best-selling Seamaster Aqua Terra—would appear in lockstep with the industry’s overall trend toward more considered products for the ladies. After all, catering to women in this male-dominated space is not just a good look, it’s good business.
But make no mistake, the Aqua Terra 30MM is not an attempt to jump on the bandwagon (a 2024 report by Deloitte stated that women remain “underrepresented and insufficiently targetted by the industry, meaning there is untapped potential for growth”). Rather, it’s a genuine extension of Omega heritage. In 1902, the brand introduced wristwatches designed exclusively for women, a progressive step in an era when all eyes were on the guys. And throughout the last century, Omega has consistently innovated, introducing the 1970 Constellation—designed for a woman by a woman—which was on display, among other groundbreaking female designs, at the brand’s roving “Her Time” exhibition in 2022.
Omega Seamaster Aqua Terra 30 MM Solid Gold, $54,650.
The Aqua Terra, per its name, clocks in at a sporty-chic 30 mm case size. In total, there are 12 new references for this one watch, including five stainless steel models, the remainder offered in precious metals—the brand’s proprietary 18K Sedna Gold (rose-ish), 18K Moonshine Gold (yellow) or two-tone. Dial colours vary by metal in several shades (white, gold, silver, purple, blue, black).
But as handsome as these watches appear, Omega made a promise decades ago to “make women’s watches that work as beautifully as they look”, and this is where the impact of the new Aqua Terra 30MM is most profoundly felt. Because, although many contemporary watch brands are working harder to provide more inclusive product offerings, most “ladies” pieces are still powered by quartz (a.k.a. battery) movements. Without getting into the mechanics and politics of what exactly that means, just know that quartz, however efficient and affordable, is widely regarded as the inferior way to keep a watch moving.
Tucked within the stainless-steel Aqua Terra 30MM are the Omega Co-Axial Master Chronometer Calibre 8750, and Calibre 8751 for the models in the precious metals—two new extremely accurate movements that do not break the bank [prices TBC]. The “Co-Axial” here refers to the historic coaxial escapement, created by legendary watchmaker George Daniels in the 1970s, which reduces internal friction within a movement, significantly upgrading timekeeping accuracy.
Ashley Graham
Would Omega skimp for the ladies? How dare you even think that. Built into the teeny-tiny Aqua Terra movements is everything you’d expect from the men’s offerings, down to the depth and magnetic ratings (useful for a jaunt into space with Blue Origin). To celebrate this, Omega has enlisted the help of six accomplished women from music, fashion, stage and cinema for a campaign explicitly centred on the movement itself. If you can get past the coquettish “shh” poses modelled by the talent, you will realise that the “secret” in the “What’s Your Secret?” tagline refers to the mechanics of the watch, visible through an exhibition caseback.
“The most beautiful part of the watch is the one you cannot immediately see,” says Raynald Aeschlimann, president and CEO of Omega. “Our new calibres represent Omega’s highest expression of engineering, hidden within, yet defining, the watch’s essence.”
However fluffy this language reads to you, it marks a deep push forward for women’s watchmaking at the brand and the industry at large. By focusing on the interior mechanics of the watch, a precedent is being set, encouraging women to peek under the hood and understand what’s been preached to us in self-esteem-oriented marketing for most of our lives: true beauty lies on the inside.
There exists a certain romantic mythology around racetracks, one that plays on victory, valour, helmeted heroes—the Sennas, the Schumachers, the Hamiltons—slaying the concrete dragons before them. Then there’s the visceral reality: primordial soup-bowls overflowing with grease, dirt, fumes, heat, hairy-chested machismo. And if you are not paying attention, an oversteer here, an errant accelerator nudge there, these automotive terrordomes will gobble you up and spit you out without mercy.
Japan’s Magarigawa circuit does not try to redress this imbalance between fiction and fact: rather, it completely rewrites the narrative of what a racetrack can be. That starts with not calling it a racetrack. This is, as the brochure keenly points out, a private “luxury driving club”—the world’s first of its kind at that. Competing is forbidden. Instead, the course, an hour’s road journey from Tokyo in the mountainous Chiba region, is a discreet temple to distilled motoring enjoyment, where the megacity’s ultra-rich congregate to get acquainted with their elite performance machines, and then bathe in the venue’s country-club-meets-Tony-Stark vibes.
A Lambo tackles one of the circuit’s steep ascents.
The hushed tones of sober Japanese luxury are whispered on arrival: the attactive, landscaped access road chaperones members past a series of glass and stone villas and into a tunnel that leads to the main clubhouse, an amalgam of traditional Shinden-zu (an ancient architecural style reserved for palaces and the residences of nobles) and modern aesthetics, sitting regally on the apex of a hill with views fanning out over distant Tokyo Bay. To avoid cluttering up the forecourt with a bunch of parked supercars—clearly an assault to the eyes—the designers, Tokyo firm 16A, worked in a deftly angled portico to usher affiliates neatly into the foyer.
If it wasn’t for delicious cameos of the track as it snakes around the clubhouse—a building that riffs off Scandinavian clean lines as much as native sensibilities—it would be easy to forget that Magarigawa is a motoring spin-off. Here in the central hub, members can access the onsen (natural geothermic hot springs), spa treatment rooms, an outdoor infinity pool and a gym with personal trainers on permanent stand-by. Unlike many circuits and private driving resorts in the US, Europe and Australia, the club was not meant to be a testosterone-fuelled, male amusement park: there are play areas for children (Baby Bugatti pedal cars, naturally), and a dog park for four-legged family members. Continuing the boutique theme, there is also a wine-and-cigar club and a formal fine dining restaurant with vistas towards Mt. Fuji, no less. And those chic roadside villas on the drive in? One-to-three-bedroom private residences, nestled in lush surrounding forest, from which guests can, according to the management, “wake up to birdsong and the morning sun”.
The club’s founders, the Japanese conglomerate Cornes & Company—which through two of its subsidiaries is the official national retailer for Ferrari, Lamborghini, Porsche, Rolls-Royce and Bentley—spent many years scoping out a location that offered a unicorn combination of seclusion, understated drama and easy access to Tokyo and nearby airports. But that was never going to be enough. For Magarigawa to be special, the circuit itself had to sing.
Local supercar owners can treat their machines to a proper workout.
To that end, the big cheeses recruited Formula One super-builder Hermann Tilke, the man behind tracks at Circuit of the Americas, Abu Dhabi, Saudi Arabia and Bahrain to name a few, to carve something tectonic into the 100-hectare site’s then-virgin hillside. The result is a 3.5 km ribbon of tarmac that twists through the verdant woodland of a naturally v-shaped valley, comprising 22 corners, an 800 m main straight, and descents and ascents of 16 and 20 percent respectively—including an elevation change of 250 m and a liberal sprinkling of blind corners. Exhilarating, but sans any accompanying terror.
“The track is designed to allow even novice drivers the chance to get 80 to 85 percent out of their car right away,” Japanese pro racer and official Magarigawa team member, Hideto Yasuoka, told Robb Report’s sister publication in the US when it visited in March. “It’s narrow enough that you can’t really mess up the racing line.”
A chic portico greets members.
For all of its world-class driving experiences and Zen amenities, Magarigawa is the only circuit on the planet where man and machine are treated with equal reverence. Adjacent to the clubhouse sits what must surely be the swankiest pit area ever conceived—a surgically clean, glass-walled, wood-panelled auto lair, home to up to 36 cars spread across 18 bays, with leather furniture and flatscreens beaming live feeds from the track, and staffed by a team of pit crew. Another two on-site storage “garages” can house a total of 450 member cars. For privacy reasons, the club is loath to reveal exact model names, but suffice to say, an Aston Martin Valkyrie hypercar holds the current track lap record.
Right now, 80 percent of the club’s members are from Japan, with the remainder hailing from Asia, Europe and the US. And while, predictably, only a handful of new recruits are admitted every year, Australian drivers with an eye for life’s finer trimmings have until June 30 to submit applications.
Driveway into the main building.
For those that do not make the cut, however, all is not lost. As the love affair between luxury and motor sport intensifies—à la Formula—do not be surprised if Magarigawa seeds a new phenomenon. As we speak, the $150 million Black Rock Motor Resort is under construction near Lake Macquarie, NSW (designed by Tilke also), promising a local take on upscale, members-only racetracks for 2027. The future is less grime, more glamour.
Wild-food foraging is having a gourmet moment. From the jungles of Cambodia to the fjords of Sweden, the promise of gastronomic experiences in untamed settings is attracting curious travellers seeking to reset their relationships with nature—and with food. The appeal is understandable: anyone can get a table at an award-winning restaurant, but only a select few can catch a fish in the morning and watch it get turned into sushi the same evening.
“I think the new luxury is learning new things, being with people who know their trade extremely well and [want to share] that information with you— whether it’s a leatherworker, potter, chef, or barman,” says Valentine Warner, a British chef, writer and TV host who founded the Kitchen in the Wild project last year. Through its elaborate culinary retreats in the Kenyan bush, guests team up with an array of cooks to collect edible plants in a combination master class and gathering mission. “We aim to fill everybody’s heads up with wonderful things,” he adds. For food-minded travellers with an adventurous streak, we’ve selected five experiences around the world where back-to-basics foraging meets wild gastronomy.
EL KARAMA LODGE x KITCHEN IN THE WILD
Laikipia, Kenya
Petros Teka
During this six-day escapade at the family-owned El Karama safari lodge, a local botanist will teach you how to identify and use indigenous plants, such as curry leaves and wild basil, in cocktail and cooking classes. If you’re not squeamish, you might even hunt termites to add a bit of crunch in your morning eggs. But the biggest meals will be prepared by Jackson Boxer, whose work at Henri in London and Cowley Manor in the Cotswolds has made him a rising star on the UK culinary scene. And it’s not all bugs: expect inventive preparations of fresh seafood or local goat, cooked on an open fire. October 2025, from around $18,550 per person
SONORA RESORT
British Columbia
Accessible only by sea or air, this Relais & Châteaux wilderness lodge is set within Canada’s Discovery Islands archipelago. Its Tide to Table experience is open to seasoned anglers and novices alike: out on the water, fishing experts will help you catch local Chinook salmon, lingcod, Dungeness crab and spot prawns. Back at the resort, chefs will clean and prepare the daily catch, turning it into sashimi, tartare or grilled fish for dinner. May to October, from around $3,600
THE CULINARY ADVENTURE, DO THE NORTH
Sweden
If you’re not above roughing it, this four-day kayaking and camping expedition around Sweden’s Sankt Anna and Gryt archipelagos offer a food-focused walk—or should we say paddle?—on the wild side. What you lose in resort-style accommodations is made up for by the food: breakfast can include waffles with wild rhubarb and raspberries; dinners look more like juniper-roasted venison shot by a local hunter, with green sauce made with foraged mint, chives and garlic. June and September, from around $2,380
A JOURNEY INTO SLOVENIA
Slovenia
Andrea Cairone
Along with visits to Slovenia’s wine country and several cooking classes (you’ll learn how to make local delicacies such as traditional cumin-spiced flatbread), luxury tour operator Black Tomato’s 11-day trip features a truffle-hunting expedition in Istria, the peninsula that Slovenia, Croatia and Italy share. The search for the vaunted gourmet fungi takes place on a local family’s private woodland and is followed by a four-course tasting menu studded with your finds. June to October, from around $18,690 for two people
SHINTA MANI WILD
Cambodia
To access this luxurious tent retreat deep in the rainforests of Cambodia’s Cardamom National Park, guests can strap into a zip line and slide for 400 m over the jungle canopy. Chef Preeti Bomzon invites visitors on her daily foraging trips to harvest herbs, mushrooms and jungle fruit, including mangosteen and kuy (it tastes like the love child of an orange, a mango and a passion fruit) for meals that will be prepared back at base camp. Year-round, from around $3,860
In 2012, ambitious Swedish geologist Peter Bergman sought investors for his fledgling company OreDog. Bergman claimed he could train German shepherds to sniff out gold deposits up to 12 m underground, revolutionising prospecting. “I would predict that people who invest in our company now will be very rich,” he said. One problem: gold may be history’s most enduring symbol of wealth, but it has no smell.
Luxury, on the other hand, does. And while it’s precise fragrance may be hard to define, in our own way, each of us intuitively understands what high-end smells like, just as we know its weight on our wrist, its feel against our skin, or how it delights the eye. The biscuit and green-strawberry notes of a layered Tasmanian pinot noir. The salty cedar and citrus adagio of an Amalfi afternoon. The smoky baroque of NYC’s storied Gramercy Park Hotel. The zestily refined redolence of Singapore’s remodelled Raffles .
Luxury is a visceral experience, and science tells us that no other sense connects so immediately, or so uninhibitedly, to our amygdala and hippocampus—the brain’s emotional and memory centres—like scent. It follows on, then, that the world’s finest brands insist their associated spaces provide the right olfactory aura. Indeed, for many of the world’s best perfumers, or “noses”, “scent branding” is a full-time job.
Past clients of French parfumier Annabelle Coffinet include Gucci, Montblanc and Rochas. And yet she has spent the past two years developing an “immersive fragrance concept”, Rolls-Royce Scent, for the inestimable automaker. Launched in February, it is specifically crafted for the marque’s magnificent, million-dollar saloon, the Phantom. “I have two decades of experience working for renowned luxury fragrance houses,” she says. “I was intrigued to explore new dimensions of scent application.”
During her research, Coffinet spent countless hours considering how a Rolls-Royce occupant engages with their space—both physically and mentally—and eventually decided the fragrance should “evoke the feeling of serenity”. “To match the resilience and calmness you experience when you ride in a Phantom,” she adds, “evoking the sensation of a magic carpet ride.” The olfactory equivalent of Rolls-Royce’s “flight on land” suspension.
While model-specific, ultra-high-end automotive scent branding is a new concept, it’s the logical extension of decades of increasingly sophisticated marketing by smell. The Phantom delivers its scent via a specially developed, and now patented, diffuser. It is light years ahead of an earlier technological development that opened the door to olfactory branding—and placed it in the environment where it arguably remains most polished: the world’s finest hotels.
AromaSys Inc., and American company, first marketed its “fragrance-dispensing machines” in 1992. They weren’t cheap, particularly for an entirely new variety of product. An early hotel-scale commercial diffuser cost up to US$15,000 (US$34,000 today, or around $53,000). It was innovators such as visionary Gramercy Park developer, Ian Schrager, the one-time Studio 54 impresario and co-creator of the boutique hotel concept, who were the earliest of adopters. Schrager tapped a then-struggling NYC perfumery start-up Le Labo to create the soon-to-be iconic scent for his zeitgeist-grabbing hotel. In Paris’ 1st arrondissement, the smoky, sexy Fashion Week staple Hôtel Costes was already on a similar path, in collaboration with famed perfumer Diptyque. It would inspire a generation.
“The scent that filled the corridors of Hôtel Costes became part of its mystique,” says world-renowned perfumer Johanna Monange, the Singapore-based former global creative director for L’Oréal’s fine fragrance division, whose personal portfolio includes La Vie est Belle, Acqua di Gioia and YSL’s L’Homme trilogy. “It was intimate, provocative, comforting, sensual… people would walk in and feel enveloped in something they couldn’t quite name—but they never forgot.”
Olfactory branding became a thing. And not just the preserve of the luxury cosmos. From the maximal preppie whiff that once announced an Abercrombie & Fitch location well ahead of its shirtless greeters, to the unmistakable aromatic cudgel of every Subway store, scent has expanded into a legion of different corporate identities. Since 2018, Apple has added a signature mint-and-apple-noted scent developed by master perfumer Christophe Laudamiel to the HVAC systems in its stores. Nike’s signature scent is claimed to be inspired, in part, by the smell of a rubber basketball sneaker. Singapore Airlines infuses its brand smell into its hot towels.
As ultra-luxe scent branding pioneered the artform, though, so has it continued to lead the way. And, in doing so, it has armed those noses at the cutting edge of the genre with a deep understanding of the evolution of modern luxury. Before founding Australian luxury fragrance brand The Raconteur, Craig Andrade says he asked himself one question: does the world need another candle, or eau de parfum for that matter? “Generally,” he says, “the answer is no—unless you’re making something truly unique that doesn’t already exist.”
Scent branding offers creative challenges like few other arenas in the fragrance world. And so, in keeping with luxury’s long, welcome road away from conspicuous consumption, Andrade has been deeply invested in place, narrative and genuine connection. His clients have included Paspaley pearls, Sydney restaurants Otto, Quay and Bennelong, and Lord Howe Island’s boutique castaway hotel Capella Lodge. “I think we’ve moved on,” Andrade says. “I think that ultimately, the scent of luxury [now] goes to this question of subtle communication: how to invite curiosity, how to create a moment of reflection in time.”
For Paspaley, Andrade spent time on the rugged terrain of the Kimberley coast with pearl farmers, emerging with a unique botanical called Kimberley Heath. For Capella, he painstakingly recreated local botanicals that World Heritage laws dictated he could not remove. Authenticity is key. “I think when it’s loud, when it’s dominant, or when it’s overwhelming, I don’t think that’s the volume that luxury speaks at,” he says. “I think it speaks quietly. I think luxury speaks with a subtle tone and invites you to observe, and to engage at your paste.”
Johanna Monange agrees. Her company, Maison 21G, has worked with everyone from lavish resorts in the vein of AlUla in Saudi Arabia to halo brands such as Ferrari and Hennessy, and elite spaces like Singapore’s La Reserve—but more on that in a moment.
“Ultra-luxury,” says Monange, “is not about selling a sandwich. It’s about building an atmosphere of refinement, trust, memory and desire.” Modern opulence, the world’s finest noses imply, has evolved to be a narrative one is invited to explore, rather than something to be imposed. “What I love about luxury brands is that there is always a history; there are deep values that we can translate,” continues Monange. “When I worked with [the] Williams [Formula 1 team], we leaned into energy and innovation. When we created the scent for Raffles Sentosa, it was about grace, legacy and luxury.”
Which leaves La Reserve. A fragrance collaboration that, arguably, took abstract premium branding to its zenith. Billing itself as a “systemic wealth protection facility”, La Reserve is a mega-capacity vault—a private members’ Asian Fort Knox—storing palettes of bullion for the world’s 0.01 percent beneath towering, reinforced 30 m ceilings.
“It’s one of the biggest reserves of gold, and it’s just beautiful,” says Monange. “A lot of wealthy people have gold, as you know, so they wanted to create a lounge around it: you come, you bring your gold, and you can have an indulgent experience.” And so, Monange was asked to create the scent… for a metal without a scent.
“Everybody loves it,” says Monange. “They don’t say, oh, it’s the smell of gold. It’s just the smell of luxury. At the end, that is how I translated it. And they were so passionate: even in the bathroom, they insisted that the hand soap should smell like gold. It was a perfect project.”
The smell of gold, you say? Peter Bergman’s German shepherd would like a word.
IT’S THE FINGERS YOU NOTICE FIRST. When Arsha Kaviani talks, he moves his hands, absent-mindedly, like a conductor, his long, elegant fingers dancing through the air. At other times, he seems to be gliding them over an invisible keyboard, a pianist forever stuck mid-recital. And perhaps, subconsciously at least, Kaviani is always on the concert stage: Now 34 years old, the former child prodigy has grown into a sophisticated music professional, adept not only at performing the classical works of his conservatory training and at composing but also at operating a business that marries those talents for the luxury consumer. There’s a rich, centuries-old history of wunderkinder like this, but Kaviani stands apart, as he has found clever ways to modernise the long tradition of musical patronage for the 21st century.
When he was growing up in Dubai in the 1990s and early aughts, there was nowhere to obtain classical sheet music. “So I would find a library in Uzbekistan that had uploaded it in pdf format, and every single day I would send something to my father, who printed it out from his office computer,” he recalls, sitting in a basement practice studio in London’s Soho, where the walls and ceiling are covered in ornate sound-muffling wallpaper. “Every night it was like Christmas. I can still smell the photocopies.”
He has come a long way since then. Now based in London, Kaviani jets around the world as a composer for hire: Under his Maison Musique Kaviani banner, he runs a unique operation, accepting commissions from wealthy patrons for original compositions, whether a single musical portrait or an entire album’s worth of songs.
He started playing piano by accident, after his parents noticed he’d go quiet when they put on a record or his older brother (who now works in finance and moonlights making electronic music) was practising for his piano lessons. The couple had eventually settled in the UAE after emigrating from Iran in the revolution’s wake. “What was amazing about being born in the Middle East then was that essentially it was a blank canvas for life,” Kaviani says. “There was no template for me to follow in the classical-music space.” There was also little infrastructure, as his scouring for sheet music showed. Winning the Young Musician of the Gulf Competition in Bahrain at 14 gained him notice, and he ended up at Chetham’s School of Music in Manchester, England, boarding as a teen on a full scholarship. His time there, and then at the Royal Northern College of Music, was transformative, propelling him into a new orbit, both via his teaching and the circles he could now access. “I would get picked up at the train station by Vladimir Jurowski,” he recalls, name-checking the acclaimed Russian-born conductor, “with Wagner blaring out of his Ford Fiesta, and we’d drive to the backstage at Glyndebourne, where I’d play a concerto that I was working on to him.”
Kaviani performing at London’s Royal Albert Hall in 2023. Photo: Matt Crossick
Indeed, perhaps Kaviani’s unacknowledged talent isn’t musical but interpersonal: Like the best Renaissance artists and classical composers, he collects powerful patrons, and his conversation is peppered with familiar names. In person, he’s ferociously loquacious and, well, composed. He doesn’t blanch at the opportunity to mention that his first music teacher described him as having “the musical-equivalent IQ of a little Mozart,” but he’s also disarmingly candid. He doesn’t bat away any questions, and he answers thoughtfully each time, both in the practice studio and another day when I join him at a client’s lavish townhouse in Knightsbridge.
Kaviani is dressed all in black, staring intensely, and it’s easy for me to see the teenager who arrived in a cold, rainy Manchester 20 years ago. It was just as WAG culture—when wealthy soccer pros and their wives and girlfriends (or WAGs) became pop-culture fixtures—had crested. Many Manchester United players lived nearby, and younger athletes signed to its prestigious youth team trained on the same grounds. Kaviani found himself in their midst, albeit without the monetary support a football contract guaranteed. “A lot of my friends were footballers, around my age, and they were in a similar situation to me,” he says, before correcting himself. “Financially, very, very different, but they also needed to have a sense of self-belief, keeping themselves steady while you have your eye on the prize.”
The prodigy was primed for a career as a concert pianist, sponsored by Steinway and signed by an agent at the age of 20—all thanks to an intervention by renowned pianist Krystian Zimerman, Kaviani says: “He called them up and said, ‘I’ve never done this before, but I need you to take this guy on.’.” In Kaviani’s view, the biggest obstacle to his rise was his Iranian passport: With that country an international pariah, he was constantly running into red tape when traveling, unable to accept last-minute bookings to perform—say, stepping in for a cancellation at a concert in Denmark—because he could not get a visa in time. (Adding to the frustration: Kaviani was born in Dubai and has never lived in Iran.) “I was almost living the life of a middle-aged lawyer, going out to whiskey bars and talking about interest rates,” he recalls. “I think the people with empathy saw just a kid who was trying to figure life out, probably very scared and very lonely, and someone who finds it difficult to find people to relate to, because I had a really fucking weird upbringing.”
The big difference between him and actual middle-aged lawyers? Money. As he studied for his postgraduate degree at the Royal College of Music in London and tried to carve out a career as a pianist, Kaviani was coming up short when paying his bills. “I had to put my entrepreneur hat on,” he says, “and do everything in my power to survive, using the skills I have.”
Kaviani was already chafing at the constraints of a typical performer, as keen to compose as to play. He’d found that music schools, though, emphasised the latter. “About 85 percent of musicians in a conservatory cannot improvise,” he says. “They haven’t learned to compose.”
A sampling of his compositional process.
Most of his peers embraced music that was solidly in the canon and, by definition, had been performed by greats for centuries—loosely speaking, like using modern paints to trace over an old master. He wanted to paint something wholly original instead. “A lot of classical music today is the Einsteinian definition of insanity, in the sense that it’s doing the same thing but expecting different results.”
HAVING MOVED TO LONDON, he was living in a tiny apartment in Knightsbridge, cobbling together an income via teaching and occasional performances, when Eckhard Pfeiffer and his wife made a life-changing commission. The for.mer Compaq president had seen a teenage Kaviani perform and had never forgotten his talent; he’d followed the pianist’s career and in 2012 asked the musician to compose a piece for his son’s wedding. The groom was an avid violin player, and Kaviani wrote his first musical portrait for that celebration. “There were enough tears in the audience that I thought, ‘Maybe this is something,’” he recalls.
That “something” is now his signature creative expression: a five- to 12-minute composition, often similarly a pièce d’occasion, with a median price of about $30,000. He might sit down with a subject, portrait painter–style, and spend hours improvising riffs to see what appeals to them. He can also create a piece on spec, without ever meeting his subject, solely through the description of a loved one—a few words, perhaps, or a sense of their passions and interests. That was the case when a friend of Ceawlin Thynn, Viscount Weymouth, and his wife, Emma, commissioned a work as a gift for the couple—two individual portraits that then united. The viscount was in on it, but the work was a surprise for Emma, a Nigerian billionaire’s daughter and fixture in London society who made headlines in Britain when she became the first Black marchioness. Kaviani premiered the composition for them in a private mini-concert at their home, Longleat House, in 2013. “She was in tears for 10 minutes and then said, ‘Can you play it again, and again and again?’ ” About a year later, he performed the piece at their anniversary party, which provided the perfect audience for Kaviani’s nascent business: Soon he was receiving similar requests from the Weymouths’ wealthy friends.
He has since built his clientele almost entirely through word of mouth, and briefs for pieces now go beyond simple portraits. One Monegasque businessman—a video-game and chess fanatic—asked Kaviani to turn a specific match between grand masters Magnus Carlsen and Vishy Anand into music. The composer responded in part by transposing the eight-by-eight chessboard onto the keyboard, with eight octaves on the piano, and devised an experimental score that notates the movement of various chess pieces to given squares on the board. Another recent commission came from a woman who asked Kaviani to compose a piece as a gift for her husband, a passionate opera buff. Yet another was a request from a fan of classical Chinese poetry to translate several poems and set them to original tunes. Some clients are content with sheet music, but others opt to have Kaviani press vinyl copies; one had him record a musical portrait for each family member as a Christmas gift. Some of the compositions are instrumental only, though he’ll write lyrics or set existing poems to music if asked. “I’ve done it with a calligraphic handwritten manuscript, too, that is scannable and will take you to a Dolby Atmos–produced immersive audio of it, and some people have even commissioned music videos to go with the piece,” he says. “There’s literally no limit to the presentation of it.”
Kaviani’s business as a composer for hire goes beyond one-off pieces, though. He likens Maison Musique Kaviani to a fashion house, with different product levels. Those one-of-a-kind commissions are the couture, but his creative equivalent of ready-to-wear is working with the likes of Charlotte Rossé, a Polish-born, classically trained singer and songwriter who now lives in London. In the hopes of launching a pop career, she hired Kaviani to help her after dissatisfaction with other, better-known producers who’ve worked with the likes of Beyoncé and Alicia Keys but approached songwriting with a production-line efficiency. “It was so templated,” she laments. “If you’d said, ‘Can you play me Ravel or Debussy?’ they wouldn’t even know who that is.”
Kaviani at work on the ivories.
Rossé posted a help-wanted ad on the Soho House app, hoping to find a more collaborative creative partner, and Kaviani replied. “It’s never happened to me before, but we both speak the same musical language—we’re the black sheeps of classical music,” she says with a laugh.
Working together several days a week for six months, they cowrote all 11 songs on her upcoming album, The Golden Age of Melancholia. Rossé, who describes her style as poetic and eclectic, nodding to the likes of Kate Bush and David Bowie, might come to the studio with fragments of lyrics and ideas, which Kaviani would nurture. “I can make such a difference to somebody’s musical confidence, unlocking something in them, and that’s one of the most worthwhile things,” he says.
It was Rossé’s partner, Monaco-based investor Luca Tenuta, who funded the enterprise. “I call [Kaviani] a. maestro, because he has real talent and is so knowledgeable about music,” Tenuta raves. “And it’s worth every penny we’ve spent so far.” Kaviani has been completing the sheet music so that a producer can work with Rossé on the final recordings, aiming to release the album by summer.
Another string to Kaviani’s bow is cinematic scoring. He is working on the music for a new film by art-house director Anna Biller (The Love Witch), whose next movie, The Face of Horror, will be an adaptation of an 1825 kabuki play but set in medieval England. The two have had several sessions to determine the right sound. “I’m very hands-on with my scores,” Biller says. “I’ve worked with other composers, and it hasn’t ended up working out, because they have a more limited tool set. Sometimes the ego and defensiveness comes into play when the person doesn’t have the scope” to do what you’re asking. “Arsha has pristine taste,” she adds. They met when Biller and her husband, Robert Greene, an author he has known for years, came to town. Kaviani hosted a dinner party for the couple at his apartment in Kensington, with Persian food and his own particular parlor game. “He asked people to come up with six notes, and he would improvise and make a piece out of it, sitting down at his beautiful Steinway,” Biller recalls. “He was very charming, and everyone was completely enraptured.”
Indeed, Kaviani is winning company: He’s engaged, intense, but eager to please—the perfect modern courtier. He’s ambitious but also somewhat conflicted about the unusual career he has carved out. How do his parents— particularly that father who would diligently print out sheet music at the office—view what he’s doing? “As they’ve seen it work more and more and more, they’re much more at ease,” he says, pausing. “I think there’s a joke that an artist of Asian descent won an Oscar, or something like that, and a week later his mom was like, ‘When are you going to get an actual job?’”
Starting from scratch with two watchmakers and an artisan specialising in movement finishing is testing for anyone, and the sky-high expectations that come with Jean-Claude Biver’s name only dialled up the risk factor. Debuting in a declining 2023 market, the $550,000 Biver Carillon Tourbillon was a bold move, but has the audacious debut paid off? I visited Jean-Claude’s growing namesake family company, Biver, where Pierre Biver is creative director and Filipe Biver is responsible for the Asian market, to find out how the company is faring in a challenging market.
Jean-Claude Biver in the Biver Atelier
We’re not out of the post-pandemic market reset yet, but Jean-Claude Biver’s eponymous brand has experienced growth and considerable up-staffing. James Marks was headhunted from Phillips as CEO in October 2024, and Nolan Buchi has taken the role of marketing director after previously working as a consultant for the brand. Marks mentored Pierre Biver at Phillips, underlining the Biver family’s love of vintage timepieces. Alongside his father, 25-year-old Pierre brings youthful insight and a sharp eye for design as co-founder and plays a key role in the brand’s focused direction.
But let us first address the horological elephant in the atelier. The Carillon Tourbillon was not met with universal praise and thunderous applause—some felt it was too much, too soon. I loved the bracelet with its intense detailing and complex design on its own merit. Likewise, the 42 mm case had a natural sense of balance with lugs to die for. But the triple threat of stone dial drama, a tourbillon, and a minute repeater made it appear overpowering. However, my initial impression changed with the pared-back Automatique and wearing the intricate Carillon Tourbillon in Givrins, where the Biver atelier is located in Switzerland, was eye-opening. With two monochrome takes on intricate guilloché work the new dial designs come across as more restrained, even with baguette-cut indices. And just like the 39 mm Automatique, the ergonomics are mature and well-measured for such a young brand.
A larger-than-life doyen of Swiss watchmaking, Jean-Claude Biver made a name for himself in the industry for his irrefutable business acumen and larger-than-life personality. But does his corporate business savvy translate to independent, small-scale watchmaking? The Biver atelier is in a converted farmhouse about 50 minutes north-east of Geneva, and over a second helping of croissants, I asked the former head of watches and jewellery at LVMH if the first two years had met his expectations.
“I would say, yes. Thank God,” says Biver. “It would be dramatic to say no, but it could have happened. Nevertheless, there were a few unexpected elements, and unlike being a boss surrounded by people, suddenly I had nobody around me. I was alone”. His answers often incite him to pound his fist on the meeting table, interspersed with loud exclamations. He doesn’t hold back and he often reveals an unrelenting and deeply personal focus.
Biver Carillon Tourbillon Minute Repeater in platinum. Thor Svaboe
After decades of working with large corporate teams and personal assistants, he works only with his two sons. “We were together, but we were two debutants starting a new adventure, which was very special,” says Biver of himself and his son Pierre, who founded the company with him in Switzerland. “I also realised the importance of the unmentioned people (in a larger corporate team). They might do a job that is not always valued, but if these people leave you, you are naked.” His technical director, François Perez, is one of those key members and his fervent enthusiasm nearly matches that of his boss.
Still, there were other surprises in store for Biver with the launch of the family business, including a learning curve on what clients would be willing to pay. “I had expected more attraction from the Carillon, but I underestimated the importance of price,” he says. “At half a million Swiss Francs, it was an expensive debut, and customers told me that we were close to their pain threshold, even if our finishing was extraordinary. And we felt it in slow initial sales. On the contrary, interest in the three-handed Automatique (launched September 2024) was unexpectedly high. So, while I felt slightly disappointed, I could see it turning into an incredible success.”
Biver Automatique in platinum. Biver
Biver also knows his unshakeable reputation comes from big brands, not crafting bespoke timepieces. “I had a little bit of goodwill because of my name, which helped us overcome the market challenge, and the Biver brand name meant something,” he says. The elevated position of a brand with watches above $500,000 needs to be deserved, a point which is not lost on Biver. “Our duty is not to offer perfection, or to produce the best quality,” he says. “It is much more, because we must master all the parts that nobody can see. And by mastering this invisibility, that will set us apart.”
This focus on the unseen details is a valid reason for a high markup. At $80,000, the Automatique offered these thoughtful nuances at a more palatable price. Taking a loupe to a detail like the soldered, angular lugs, it all becomes clear. Their dramatic shape is engineered for durability despite their soft gold structure, with lug holes meticulously fitted with strong titanium inner sleeves for strength and versatility. “It’s normal to have elaborate finishing on what you can see, but we polish the heads of our screws that are unseen inside the movement,” says Biver. “For me, the invisibility that we master means we come close to eternal perfection, because a perfect movement will still work after 500 years.”
Biver Carillon Tourbillon in Rose Gold. Biver
Under the technical guidance of Perez, the number of watchmakers and finishers has also grown considerably in this short space of time. “People came to me because of my reputation and because word spread about our quality, and this crazy guy who says that invisibility is his speciality,” says Biver. The draw of small-scale independent ateliers is clear, as skilled watchmakers find more variation, instead of being relegated to more repetitive tasks. At the Biver manufacture, watchmakers are often working on multiple steps of the process and have ownership of the complete assembly of a single watch. “I believe each one could be mentioned as one of the best, devoted watchmakers I have ever employed,” says Biver. “They get to follow one watch, doing what they were trained to do, and are in synchrony with their job. I’m amazed by the quality of my people. This is something that I never expected to have come so easily and, at our level, people are the key. People are the key to everything.”
He admits, however, his biggest challenge is to stay grounded. “When independent people, including myself, receive compliments and too much success, we forget that the boss will always be the product,” says Biver. “So, the biggest threat is forgetting to be humble.” And while I wouldn’t call the 39 mm Biver Automatique a humble design, it speaks a subtler horological language than the flamboyance of the Carillon. The Automatique entered the stage in September last year, including two Atelier stone dial versions. The Pietersite iteration was like a thunderstorm framed in rose gold but the design was still restrained, with immaculate details like the multi-faceted indexes. Not surprisingly, being very close to his father, a well-known Patek collector, vintage aesthetics inspire Pierre Biver. And judging by the smile of his technical director Perez when I bring it up, Japanese horology has also been an inspiration to the team.
Biver Automatique Atelier Series Pietersite in rose gold. Biver
Considering the retro twist of soldered lugs that match the aggressive indexes for drama, the design is contemporary. Wearing the Automatique with its angled lugs, the mature ergonomics struck me, and the platinum monochrome version epitomises stealth wealth. And despite my predisposition for smaller case sizes, the same applies to the Carillon Tourbillon. Especially the two 42 mm grade 5 titanium versions, featuring guilloché-engraved inner dials in Obsidian or a clean silver-white Mother-of-Pearl.
Biver Carillon Tourbillon Deep Blue in white gold and sapphires. Biver
The details are perfected, but unlike some brands at this level, not clinically. The passion is felt through each index, and I’m even drawn to the high drama of the $1.5 million extravagance of the Deep Blue—the least understated of all Biver’s creations. An overpowering number of sapphires encircle a hypnotic hyperspace-inspired white gold guilloché dial. These are set in two rows, echoed in the full gem-set bezel. And just like the fan-shaped guilloché pattern of the titanium Carillon, each sapphire has a familiar wedge-shaped form, a trademark Biver cut.
With today’s rising interest in the brand, production is limited by the size of Biver’s atelier and, I wouldn’t be surprised to see further expansion or even a move to larger premises to cope with demand. Biver has strong feelings (cue fist on table) on waiting lists and production times. “We should be focused on the customer,” he says. “You are making a great watch, but you are not the king. The customer is the king. We might tend to become arrogant, but if a watch cannot be delivered within a year or two, say so and be sorry that you cannot deliver the watch earlier. But you can’t tell a customer they can’t buy the watch for eight years, see what I mean?”
-->
LIVE A LUXURY LIFE
Sign up for exclusive offers and invitations, our dedicated concierge service and the ultimate in luxury living.
Accessible only by sea or air, this Relais & Châteaux wilderness lodge is set within Canada’s Discovery Islands archipelago. Its Tide to Table experience is open to seasoned anglers and novices alike: out on the water, fishing experts will help you catch local Chinook salmon, lingcod, Dungeness crab and spot prawns. Back at the resort, chefs will clean and prepare the daily catch, turning it into sashimi, tartare or grilled fish for dinner. May to October, from around $3,600
To access this luxurious tent retreat deep in the rainforests of Cambodia’s Cardamom National Park, guests can strap into a zip line and slide for 400 m over the jungle canopy. Chef Preeti Bomzon invites visitors on her daily foraging trips to harvest herbs, mushrooms and jungle fruit, including mangosteen and kuy (it tastes like the love child of an orange, a mango and a passion fruit) for meals that will be prepared back at base camp. Year-round, from around $3,860
