Board game sets suitable for high rollers
As many of our readers relax on their yachts and in villas in the South of France the Hamptons and Ibiza, many will be enjoying the odd board game of an evening. Here, we highlight five of the best sets currently available (more…)
This “Hearst with a heart” is a special projects editor at Town & Country magazine and the founder of Friends of Finn, a committee dedicated to stopping the “inhumane treatment of dogs in puppy mills”. A graduate of Fordham University, Amanda Hearst also happens to be the great-granddaughter of the inspiration for Citizen Kane, William Randolph Hearst, and once modeled for Tommy Hilfiger. She loves the ocean, California, the Hearst Ranch Winery and doing good.
As David and Victoria Beckham continue their search for a new home in London, The Steeple Times suggests five of the best options
This morning, yet more “sources close to David and Victoria Beckham” were telling the press that they’re on the search for a London home. This unnamed individual stated that they need a “minimum of 10 bedrooms” (more…)
ASmallWorld announces plans to charge members $100 per year
On the same day that Patrick Liotard-Vogt, the chairman of the social network ASmallWorld, is hosting a cocktail party for his members at The Gin Room in Madrid, the Swiss title Bilanz announced plans by the site’s management to charge members $100 per year to use it.
Our reaction to the BBC Lab UK’s Great British class calculator
Yesterday, Twitter and Facebook were abuzz with talk of a new class calculator created by the BBC Lab UK and a pair of academics that claimed it could grade the position of each and every one of us in society.
Gone, they say, are the 20th century definitions of working, middle and upper classes and the restrictive Downton Abbey type pigeonholing of individuals by birth and social standing. In their place, modern Britons, they suggest, are identifiable by an astonishing seven categories that range from the “elite” to the “precariat”.
Russians in London up their security
Following in the wake of the death of Boris Berezovsky, a number of his friends and acquaintances have stated that they believe he did not commit suicide.
Berezovsky, like many other London based oligarchs, was always surrounded by bodyguards. Both he and his former associate Roman Abramovich were accompanied to court by them last year and on the occasions I saw either man elsewhere, they were never far away either.
Today, as I walked through Knightsbridge’s Lennox Gardens and Belgravia’s Eaton Square, I saw two separate sets of bodyguards accompanying two separate sets of wealthy looking Russians as they walked nervously along.
Though the sight of Russians with protection in the area is not uncommon, today the mood was markedly different. In the past, the bodyguards of the elite were discretion personified. Today, they openly displayed their walkie-talkies and when a passerby got, as they perceived it, too close, they agitatedly shoed them away.
However Mr Berezovsky met his end, the thoughts of the most elite Russians in London must now be: “Who’s next?”
Matthew Steeples bemoans an overused word
They’re everywhere: you’ll find them on magazine covers, on the television and at events. They stalk out the cameras, they behave badly and make utter fools of themselves. In fact, they’ll do just about anything to keep in the “media eye”. Allegedly, Lindsay’s one, Katie’s one and Justin’s one too. They’re forced upon us so much that they don’t even need surnames anymore. The “celebrity” is the force de rigueur and they and the word that describes them has spread like cheap margarine throughout the land.
At a book launch this week, a photographer I spoke with complained that he had become bored of tiresome and pointless individuals who consider themselves famous. The truly famous, instead, just want privacy. There are now, indeed, “celebrity stylists”, “celebrity chefs” and even our Prime Minister, David Cameron, has a “celebrity personal trainer”.
Fame used to be the reserve of the truly iconic. Frank Sinatra is, without doubt, deserving of the accolade, as are Marilyn Monroe, Michael Jackson and Madonna. The cast of The Only Way is Essex and Tulisa are not.
Please could someone just put the word “celebrity” back in its box?
ASmallWorld gets even more small minded
When it started in the same month in 2004 as Facebook, the social network ASmallWorld was ahead of the game. Founded by Erik Wachtmeister with the help of such people as Rob Hersov, it fast found favour with the so-called “elite” of London, New York and Paris. It was a place where people made fun of one another but also a place where people trusted the advice they were given.
Such esteemed (and not so esteemed) people as Michael Ezra, Uri Schneider, Emma Gibbs (now Farah), Emma Louise Hill (now West), D’Arcy Wyvill, Anthony Mamo, Timmy Grech, William Aitken, Emma Rogers, David Reuben Jr, Jakob Eltz, Payam Ghamsari, Gabriele von Lutzau, the Ceveli sisters and Antonine Sorice quickly became the flavor of the site’s forums and others such as a woman who wore sunglasses and furs in all seasons [who since has demanded her name be removed otherwise she’ll report us to the police] talked about camels, chocolate and basements. A man named Eddy Chabli even went so far as to recount an encounter with “The Donald” (Trump) and much to the mirth of the membership was met with only: “Just have another glass… [of Chablis]”.
The likes of Robert Bell hosted parties in honour of the website and at some oddballs turned up. I remember an “up the skirt” photographer harassing my friend Kerri Moss (now Beaumont) at one but we laughed like drains the day after.
ASmallWorld, in fact, to the majority of the membership back then, was just another link in our already interlinked worlds. Then, with new ownership, as one could only expect, it went south. In came people who talked about what to do about the prostitutes who frequented the corridors of the buildings where they lived (I do not make this up) and a man named, if I recall correctly, Bruno, who worried about which private aviation firm would be able to let his dog aboard. Bruno later asked if anyone wanted to share his “ride” with him. I suspect this freak deservedly flew solo.
Friends renamed ASmallWorld “the small minded world” and we all turned off. I was, therefore, as someone who’d quit several years ago, surprised to receive the following yesterday:
Dear Valued Member
Trust is important to us. How important? Well, as part of our ongoing efforts to protect the integrity of our membership, we have decided to terminate the accounts of anyone who undermines the unique spirit of openness that serves as the cornerstone of ASW—and sets our community apart. Obviously you are not one of those people! You’re receiving this email because we value your contributions to the community, and we hope you always feel comfortable here at ASW, online and off. The reality is simply that our growth has inadvertently allowed certain members to degrade this trust, and those are the people we’re exiling, effective immediately. It is our hope that this will help you feel even more at ease in sharing your life with the rest of the ASW community.
Warm Regards and Happy Travels,
The ASW Team
P.S. Should you wish to review the conduct expected of an ASW member, feel free to read our rules. In the event that you feel a member is in clear violation of our Rules, please email [email protected].
The team at ASW have not only lost the battle to Facebook, they’ve lost the plot. Not only is their grammar appalling and not only is their use of capital letters awful, they have yet again illustrated all that is wrong about their “world”.
It’s simply time for another world. Next!
Her Evening Standard editor father was known as “Chilly Charlie” and she’s become “Nuclear Wintour”. This New York based Brit states that she’s “lost count” of the number of times she’s been attacked by activists and once retaliated by sending anti-fur campaigners a plate of roast beef when they picketed her Condé Nast offices. In her youth, Wintour went to parties with the Daily Mail’s Nigel Dempster, dated older men and set her stall out clearly in the remark: “You either know fashion, or you don’t”. Now, this divorced trendsetter has morphed into a grande dame and hidden behind her sunglasses and a pageboy bob, this powerhouse of fashion truly does deserve the title: “Unofficial Mayoress of New York”. The Devil Wears Prada may have indeed been based on her, but the reality is far more salacious.
The $95 million apartment of the world’s richest travel agent remains for sale after six months of marketing
The Sherry-Netherland is one of New York’s finest skyscraper apartment-hotels and one of the city’s best known landmarks. The world’s richest travel agent and co-founder of Liberty Travel, Gilbert Haroche, who occupies the entire 18th floor with his wife Charlene, put his apartment there on the market for $95,000,000 in September 2012 but six months later it remains for sale.