New York
Lusso | 5 Feb 2013
An exclusively Club Class flight to new York? It’s not big or clever. Actually, it really is.
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“Caroline Phillips is a tenacious and skilful writer with a flair for high quality interviewing and a knack for making things work.”
An exclusively Club Class flight to new York? It’s not big or clever. Actually, it really is.
They’re a religious folk, those Sicilians – you can barely take a step without falling over an old chapel or crumbling monastery. How clever, then, of Vincenza Jolanda Nifosi, the heir to the aristocratic Nifosi family, to convert this 15th-century convent into a heavenly bolthole.
Although Sukotai is aurrounded by the high-rise buildings of Bangkok, on of the noisiest and most traffic-choked cities in the world, the 210-room hotel is an exercise in Zen. It’s also that rare thing – a resort hotel in the centre of the city. It boasts a stonking six-acre landscaped garden full of Eastern promise, water features, bougainvillaea and even an Olympic-sized pool.
‘Think organised. Think organised squared… and that’s Susanna Hammond. In the space of a day she can change your life for the better. Susanna should be available on the National Health.’ These are the words of Emma Burns, the talented director of interior design company Colefax and Fowler.
If you’re looking to lose weight, get fit, reboot or just get away from it all, let our spa guide lead you to a life of wellbeing and serenity.
Standing under the shade of a tree in the gardens of Castello di Vicarello, Nonna is rolling out a bed-sheet sized piece of pasta on a table. There’s a gentle breeze and the scent of jasmine and lavender fills the air. The 12th-century castle in the Maremma region of southwest Tuscany is framed by vineyards and rolling hills on which wild boar roam.
I’m not ordinarily a fan of Bangkok – too much heat, too many knockoffs – but then there’s the Sukhotai hotel. Yes it’s surrounded by high-rise buildings in one of the noisiest and most traffic-choked cities in the world. But stop a while – inside, it’s pure orchid filled Zen and The Art of Hotel Living. Plus it offers something that’s as rare as a paragliding saffron-robed monk: it’s a resort hotel set calmly in the centre of the city.
I’m at a reunion dinner for some of my erstwhile classmates: ten of us – including a psychotherapist, a doctor and a lawyer – now 50 years old, successful and glamorous. Conversation falls to the topic of food and bodies. Then something startling is revealed. Seven of us admit to having suffered from eating disorders at school – bulimia, compulsive overeating or anorexia.
The couple were cuddled up on a sofa, talking about their good fortune. “We lead such a charmed life,” James Collins told his wife, Sharmila Nikapota. The Cambridge-educated professionals enjoyed the theatre, dining out, romantic holidays. They had a lovely home and planned a family. “The world was our oyster,” Sharmila, now 43, says. James is a commercial barrister, recently made a QC. Sharmila used to be a vet. On July 15, 2002, their perfect world was shattered. Their first child, Sohana, was born with the genetic skin condition recessive dystrophic epidermolysis bullosa (RDEB).
A former Barclays Bank branch has been reborn as the Chuan Spa in the grand 19th-century Langham Hotel, London. Now that the money men have gone, the spa has settled prettily in a brilliant spot on Portland Place – directly opposite Broadcasting House, the iconic home of the BBC, and just a few Louboutin-shod steps from Bond Street and even more exclusive Mount Street.
Switzerland presents the tourist with two competing visions: getting back to nature as you glide effortlessly – or tumble gracelessly – down a black run, and avoiding nature entirely in some of its best hotels, tapping away on your BlackBeryy as you ignore your family. The two rarely collide, so when one of those five-star hotels offers a stay in the most expensive rustic hut on the planet, something uniquely, oddly Swiss is happening.
The sandstone building shimmers like a mirage. Perhaps a huge creamy Moroccan fort. Actually it’s a resort in Puglia – in the heel of Italy – and a feat of vision and design. It’s a place that has opened to oohs and ahhs. And to which photographers from Architectural Digest Italia to Vogue France have been hotfooting it.
Facialogy? What’s that? It’s a combo of a blissful Vaishaly Signature Facial with a relaxing, health-promoting reflexology.
I am lying on a wooden massage bed as two women rub my naked body with hot pouches of cooked rice, milk and medicinal herbs.…
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