The Rake

Men go to comical extremes to avoid romantic entanglements. In an episode of the 1937 T.V. show Little Rascals, the seminal character ‘Spanky’ McFarland protests against Valentine’s Day by proposing to his fellow Rascals that they form a new club: th

Wassail, wassail, wassail. As much as we wish it were not so, we are severely lacking in peace on Earth and mercy mild. We seem desperate to find fault in our fellow man and to punish them accordingly. As John Proctor says to Old Mr. Giles, “Is it th

In the 1930s, the actress Luise Rainier found herself seated next to Robert Taylor, then on the cusp of matinee-idol status, at a Hollywood luncheon. Possibly stuck for small talk, she asked him to sum up his aspirations for life. Without hesitation,

I meet Conor MacNeill at the Almeida theatre in Islington, north London. He’s at the end of a stint performing in Portia Coughlan, a play written by Marina Carr. ‘Haunting’, ‘messed up’, ‘unremittingly bleak’ and ‘disturbing’ are words some critics h

New words and names, introduced in deference to anti-German sentiment after the first world war, have enjoyed mixed longevity. To this day, a Briton would say ‘hot dog’ instead of ‘Frankfurter’, but ‘liberty cabbage’ versus ‘sauerkraut’ was never goi

There is no name more evocative in motorcycling than Commando. The new Norton Commando 961 channels the same flavour of the original, which was released in 1967, with its parallel twin cylinder engine and classic roadster looks. But it ups the ante w

There is a 91-year-old woman in the south of France whose face might make you do a double prise. It might trigger a memory of one life fulfilled and another truncated. For she is the actress Marisa Pavan, sister of the fêted, flawed and funny Pier An

Imagine if Karl Benz had unveiled his ‘Motorwagen’ in 1866 with no wheels on it, instead expecting users to carry it like pallbearers. Ridiculous? Yes, but no more so than the fact that, having invented the earliest progenitor to the suitcase for use

Zac Efron has a cold. O.K., he doesn’t, but I must admit that as I prepared to interview him, I sensed I was having a Gay Talese moment, and so I couldn’t help but start this piece by evoking Talese’s famous 1966 profile of Frank Sinatra. Like Sinatr

Had he accomplished just one of the following things in 2023, Jean Arnault would have been deserving of the Rake of the Year award. Firstly, he recreated Louis Vuitton’s iconic Tambour watch, which was launched 21 years ago. It is now a sleek, beauti

In a downtown Brooklyn street in 1994, Raekwon from the Wu-Tang Clan rocked up to the set of the video shoot for the group’s single Can It Be All So Simple wearing a unique and distinctive yellow-and-blue windbreaker emblazoned with the hotpink words

GROOMING BY LISA VALENCIA @ARLINGTON USING THE GREY MEN’S SKINCARE & PATRICKS HAIR PRODUCTS RETOUCHING BY DAVID CHAMBERS MODEL: ORIOL @SIGHT MANAGEMENT STUDIO SHOT ON LOCATION IN NORWAY ■

Some watch-brand chief executives streamline operations, freshen up the e-commerce strategy, and make the right noises about sustainability. Since joining Breitling in 2017, Georges Kern has overhauled the brand’s entire personality, beefed up its su

In the Rolex pavilion overlooking the 16th green at Marco Simone Golf & Country Club in Rome, as Rickie Fowler conceded the three-foot putt to Tommy Fleetwood that sealed the Ryder Cup for Europe, a small crowd of onlookers had gathered. Royalty, gia

Travelling on choppy water at 54 knots (100km/h) in the 2000 HP chase boat was a wet, knee-crushing, G-force-wrenching, face-distorting yet immensely exciting experience spoiled only by the fumes from the four massive outboard engines. We were hangin

I think people either love Christmas or feel something close to indifference about it. For those in the ‘love’ camp, it is the most wonderful time of the year. For the rest, it’s great to get the extra days off work. The festive season brings good ti

It is, in the words of David Attenborough, “the most hostile of the Earth’s frozen lands, where temperatures can fall to below minus 80 degrees Celsius and winds blow up to 200 miles an hour”. He is, of course, talking about Antarctica, the White Con

Christmas, bringer of that warm, fuzzy feeling. The mulled wine, the mince pies, the mad rush of buying presents for those we love… Jubilant and traditional practices aplenty, but as a Londoner who works in property, I can’t help but ponder another g

Lifelong biking buddies Ewan McGregor and Charley Boorman really started something with the release nearly 20 years ago of Long Way Round, the documentary about their 19,000-mile ride eastwards from London to New York on mighty BMW R1150GS motorcycle

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