Indholdsfortegnelse for May 2023 i Robb Report Singapore

DON’T BELIEVE FOR a second, especially the reticent homebodies among us, that thrillseeking is only for the bold and fearless. We are all adrenaline junkies in some capacity; it is just that we choose our own adventures. So, from within these pages, we invite you to select yours. There are some, as our lovingly curated list, Well Thrilled, demonstrates, that gently tug at the limits of your comfort zone and send your pulse racing. Fancy yourself a couch potato? We show you how to get cosy in a living room that hangs over a cliff. Itching for a vacation or gastronomic journey? There are travel agencies and restaurants that promise to take you way off the beaten track—think far-out Siberia and game-hunting-and-cooking workshops in rural Sussex. Even if your appetite…

WINE IS MADE in almost every corner and continent of the world, and yet the industry built around it has been criticised for its homogeneity—created by, aimed at and telling the stories of white people, almost all of them male. Indeed, the lack of access to careers and education for interested and eligible candidates from other backgrounds, whether actively or by omission, has been all too apparent in recent years. When we attend large wine events, especially consumer galas and fundraisers, on behalf of Robb Report, we see a lot of people who, like us, identify as white. So as we approach the third anniversary of the death of George Floyd at the hands of police in Minnesota, and of the ensuing nationwide protests that shone a light on the…

“A plush and luxurious electric tank.” BMW i7 xDrive60 With its electrified 7 Series, BMW throws down the gauntlet in a claim for electric vehicle (EV) world domination. Yet some BMW diehards might feel that dual electric motors and a one-speed automatic transmission turn the Ultimate Driving Machine into the Ultimate Sewing Machine. No car this year elicited so many polarised opinions from our judges as this 2,715kg cruiser. Certainly, the vehicle’s advanced technology offers impressive convenience and luxury, transforming the cabin into a rolling executive lounge. Some judges connected to the maximalist vibe, including Keith Berglund, who “very much enjoyed the interior styling, the room, handling and classic look”, while also noting “it’s a little slow compared to the Audi”. Rick Westbrook mostly seconded that assessment. “It’s a great…

THE AMERICA’S CUP, yachting’s most storied race, is not where you’d expect to find the next source of emissions-free propulsion for ‘stinkpots’, sailor-speak for motorboats. Yet Emirates Team New Zealand (ETNZ), which won the regatta in 2021 for the fourth time, launched a foiling-power catamaran named Chase Zero (below) last year that could change the future of boating. As Cup defenders, the Kiwis were in charge of creating the new protocol for the 2024 event, for which they sought out areas desperate for new technology. “We realised our chase boats were years behind our foiling race boats,” says Nick Burridge, ETNZ’s operations and reliability manager. “To keep up, the tenders needed big horsepower, so were burning huge amounts of fossil fuel.” ETNZ decided to bypass battery-powered boats and move straight…

THREE-BEDROOM PENTHOUSE LA ROUSSE-SAINT ROMAIN, MONACO Promising breathtaking views over Monaco, this spacious penthouse has been renovated to a high standard. Set over two floors, it has approximately 180sqm of living space and an equally large terrace area. Look forward to light-filled living and dining spaces, as well as three bedrooms with their own en-suite bathrooms and walk-in wardrobes. From the terrace area, one can enjoy spectacular sea views, with the roof terrace offering a jacuzzi and seating area. Residents will enjoy additional perks, such as three parking spaces and one storage room. Price: €17.5 million via Knight Frank SERENITY VILLAS TIANJIN, CHINA Imagine having an 18-hole championship golf course within reach of your residence. And not just any golf course, but one that has been certified by Audobon International…

THE WORLD’S BIGGEST architecture festival is set to kick off. Curated by Ghanaian-Scottish architect and academic Lesley Lokko, the 18th edition of the Venice Architecture Biennale will take place from 20 May to 26 November. As with past iterations, this year’s Biennale promises to be a platform to deepen the architectural conversation across a broad spectrum of topics. It will also feature some of the top names in architecture like David Adjaye and Francis Kéré. Titled The Laboratory of the Future, the main exhibition puts Africa in the spotlight. More than half of the 89 participants will come from Africa or the African diaspora—a first for the biennale. “Africa is the laboratory of the future. We are the continent with the world’s youngest population, the fastest urbanisation, growing at a…

JAMES BOND’S MARTINI is replaced by something far better—whisky. But not just any old whisky. It’s The Macallan James Bond 60th Anniversary Release, a collection of six limitededition bottles inspired by the Bond legacy. After its first celluloid appearance in Dr No in 1962, the box office hit went on to build an impressive film franchise. With the release of new instalments throughout the years, James Bond had to adapt to the ever-changing social landscape while staying consistent with his character. The same goes for The Macallan—in 200 years of whisky distillation, the Speyside single malt whisky faced challenges, evolved and remained stubbornly constant. The shared Scottish heritage isn’t the only bridge The Macallan has with Bond. They have shared the same screen that includes Bond drinking from The Macallan…

IT’S NO SECRET that Marina Bay Sands’ infinity pool is one of the most social media-worthy spots on the planet. Thanks to the resort’s billion-dollar reinvestment programme, however, there’s much more you can look forward to besides scoring that famous shot. Cue The Luxe Collection, Marina Bay Sands’ newest addition to its existing range of rooms and suites. Although the entire hotel is still in the midst of a major revamp, The Luxe Collection, comprising the Sands Premier Room and Sands Premier Suite, offers a more than stirring welcome to its elevated experiences. “Our customers are demanding ever more premium and exclusive experiences. To an extent, this is a response to this changing dynamic,” says Paul Town, chief operations officer at Marina Bay Sands. I had the pleasure of experiencing…

Be Water A collaboration with fashion designer Iris van Herpen, Phantom Syntopia brims with haute couture-inspired creativity, painstaking craft and unbridled ambition. The concept is based on the theme Weaving Water, which references van Herpen’s 2018 fashion collection based on fluid shapes and patterns found in nature. The numbers behind Phantom Syntopia’s creation, however, suggest cold, hard fastidiousness. Phantom Syntopia took four years of research and development. Within its cavernous interior, a single piece of unblemished leather sheathes its headliner, selected from over 1,000 hides. On the outside, the car is coated in an iridescent paint that morphs between purple, blue, magenta and gold, a process that took over 3,000 hours of tests. The list goes on but one statistic stands out: Rolls-Royce counts Phantom Syntopia as its most technically…

Dream Machines | WHEELS IT’S NOT THE ideal reference, but the Mini Cooper, the car that got post-war Britain moving, has a few things in common with Kevin Hart. It’s compact, stylish and it can command quite a presence. It’s also a celebrity in its own right, winning rallies and championships and chasing fame in The Italian Job (both the original 1969 film and the 2003 remake). As far as station wagons go, the latest Mini Cooper S Clubman is a delight to drive. While it doesn’t offer as much ground clearance as your Land Rover, it gives you a good taste of that iconic Mini go-kart handling: fun, confident and quick to react. And even if it’s more zip than zoom (horsepower is just shy of 200 and top…

Dream Machines | TECHNOLOGY AS MODERN DIGITAL cameras put ever more megapixels and endless features into the hands of the everyday shooter, what does Leica—one of the most revered names in photography—come out with for its latest release? A film camera. You read that right. And not even a new film camera, but a reissue of a shooter from 1984, the M6. There’s no screen to review your photos, no button to upload your selfie over Wi-Fi, and— perhaps you should sit down for this— it’s manual focus. Has the company gone verruckt? Not at all, insists Stefan Daniel, executive vice president of technology and operations at Leica. “The prices for the M6 on the secondhand market have been rising constantly,” he says, “and the majority of people who want…

VACHERON CONSTANTIN Traditionnelle Tourbillon Retrograde Date Openface From its name to its design inspiration, everything about Vacheron Constantin’s Traditionnelle Tourbillon Retrograde Date Openface compels us to think of it as a traditional timepiece. The watch’s retrograde display can be traced back to the brand’s 1920s retrograde pocket watches, while the collection as a whole is built on a stylistic philosophy rooted in 18th-century Age of Enlightenment ideals. Yet anyone who gazes upon this watch’s stunning multi-part dial will tell you two things: it is absolutely breathtaking and it is, beyond all doubt, an utterly modern timepiece. Despite the throwback inspirations, Vacheron Constantin succeeds in evoking an elegant, contemporary spirit by melding of-the-moment touches such as NAC treatment with time-honoured techniques such as hand-guilloche. The watch’s open-working is restricted to the…

The Resource | ART & DESIGN FRANK LLOYD WRIGHT might be revered as a visionary architect, but what’s lesser known is that the designer also excelled at crafting work environments that were just as inspiring. Built in 1939, the Great Workroom at the SC Johnson Administration Building in Racine, Wisconsin, is testament to that—a seamless confluence of pleasing, ergonomic workspaces that were way ahead of their time. Now, you can incorporate Wright’s workspace aesthetic into your own home office, thanks to a new collection by Steelcase. It’s the first collaboration of many to come between Steelcase and the Frank Lloyd Wright Foundation—a fitting partnership given that the American furniture manufacturer was also involved in the original SC Johnson project. A faithful reconstruction of the original pieces in terms of style…

The Resource | ART & DESIGN THERE’S A STORY, a pervasive one, about how John Clang became John Clang. Born Ang Choon Leng, during his stint in National Service, he noticed that his badge name truncated his birth name to ‘C L Ang’. But that only tells us about how John Clang got his name. No, the much larger story, the one that added depth to his character that is John Clang, is his body of work. In recent years, he has delved into identity, loss and the distance and relationship between the two. In the series, Being Together (2010), Clang projected a live recording of his family in Singapore via a webcam and projected himself in his living space in New York—his version of the updated family portrait. In…

The Resource | SAVOUR JUST AS GREAT wine is a product of the vineyard, exceptional wine barrels start in the forest. Continuing a tradition that has been in practice for two millennia, the artisans at Tonnellerie Radoux rely on both experience and technology to select oak trees that will be handcrafted into some of the world’s finest wine casks. In 1947, Robert Radoux established a barrelrepair workshop just northeast of Bordeaux, in Jonzac, France; 30 years later, his son, Christian, took over and expanded the business to encompass production, before formally founding Tonnellerie Radoux in 1982. Now one of the globe’s pre-eminent barrel makers, Radoux in 1998 became the first in the category to trade on the Paris Stock Exchange. A decade later it launched Oakscan, technology that instantly measures…

The night’s first stars have started to glow faintly in the cloudless sky. I twist my neck to take them in from the saddle of my horse. Just ahead of me, Creed Garnick removes his dusty cowboy hat and reclines, resting his head on his horse’s back and making the saddle seem like the most comfortable lounge chair. The lifelong horseman and owner of 3 Spear Ranch, a 486-hectare property in Dubois, Wyoming, doesn’t need to watch where he’s going. He and his chestnut mare, X, ride as one. In the distance, the boom of an announcer’s voice and an eruption of whoops and cheers break the silence and interrupt Garnick’s stargazing reverie. He sits up, replaces his hat and gives X a kick as he turns to me and…

ONE OF THE great perks of private aviation is right there in the name: privacy. But the ability to stay hidden from prying eyes applies only inside the cabin. Social-media accounts that broadcast flight patterns of noteworthy names—including Drake, Nancy Pelosi and LVMH chairman Bernard Arnault—have racked up millions of followers. The spotlight it shines is equal parts geeky hobby, gawker-level curiosity and emissions shaming—and Arnault eventually got sick of the glare, selling his Bombardier Global 7500 last autumn and switching to charter flights with private passenger manifests. Anyone travelling via a private jet is sharing information transmitted through its black box. For safety reasons, Automatic Dependent Surveillance-Broadcast (ADS-B) technology transmits GPS co-ordinates, altitude, ground speed and other data to airtraffic controllers and nearby aircraft— but it also gives rise…

THE NUMBER ONE complaint about smartwatches is that for a device meant to sit on your wrist 24/7, they demand to be charged a lot. Garmin is fully aware of this and attempts to address it with the latest Fēnix 7X smartwatch. The Fēnix 7X’s biggest draw lies in its long battery life. The 51mm model features a scratch-resistant and highly antireflective dial housing new solar panels that boast a 200 per cent increase in performance over its previous generation. Add an upgraded Power Manager function and the net total is an overall battery life that can last up to 37 days on a single charge. With that much power in the tank, one can easily take the Fēnix 7X out on a whole smorgasbord of activities. It has more…

ROGER DUBUIS Monovortex Split-Seconds Chronograph Roger Dubuis has done this before: premiere a one-off hyperwatch to debut some extraordinary properties, put it in a glass case, and call it a day while press and retailers can do little but stare at the manufacture’s latest audacity—which is not even for sale, by the way. In terms of function, the Monovortex Split-Seconds Chronograph it is not too different from similarly complicated watches. The trick, however, lies in the way it is done. At 9 o’clock, the Monovortex tourbillon spins itself in a conical path, providing a unique visual appeal. At 12 o’clock is a new winding system, which does not oscillate parallel to the movement like most rotors. Instead, a cylindrical weight spins perpendicular to it, trading flatness for a smaller footprint.…

Clé de Peau Beautè UV Protective Cream Infused with Moroccan thyme extract, the luxury Japanese skincare brand’s reformulated sunscreen for women relies on Adaptable Innershield Technology to fend off harmful ultraviolet rays while simultaneously allowing beneficial red light to pass through. Pair it with the updated Protective Lip Treatment for maximum protection. Hermès Un Jardin à Cythère This marks the second addition to the Parfums-Jardins collection by Hermès’s perfumer, Christine Nagel. Comprising notes of olive wood, grass and fresh pistachio, the eau de toilette is a transportive unisex fragrance capturing the untamed beauty of Kythira, a Greek island on the Peloponnese peninsula and the mythical birthplace of Aphrodite, the ancient Greek goddess of love, beauty and fertility. Guerlain Orchidée Impériale The Micro-Lift Concentrate Over 15 years of research unearthing the…

The Resource | ART & DESIGN WHEN A FLASH flood sent a 1.5m wave sweeping through Mitchelton Gallery of Aboriginal Art last autumn, curator Adam Knight helicoptered in to rescue what he could. The subterranean gallery—part of a luxury resort in the middle of a Victoria winery that’s a 90-minute drive north of Melbourne— is no glorified gift shop, but rather the largest commercial space in Australia devoted to work by First Nations artists. “I had to go myself—I knew what the masterpieces were,” he says. “There were moments when I thought I was going to drown while trying to save some of the key pieces.” Knight’s rescue mission salvaged over 100 works, but more than 300 were destroyed. His determination reflects Aboriginal art’s new-found status both in Australia and…

Underdog Inn From the team behind Sago House, Low Tide and Ghostwriter, we have Underdog Inn, a New Yorkstyle tavern with comfy banquettes and eclectic art. Tucked away in the back alley of Amoy Street, it is every city slicker’s dark, warm bunker that delights in delicious cocktails, nose-to-tail fire-only feasting and counterculture, which is encapsulated best by the drinks menu. It reads like a comic book and illustrates the rise of hip hop in New York—a fun distraction if a date is running late—but what’s more fun is its host of imaginative cocktails, even if they come on tap. Untitled (Modern Times), for instance, is a refreshing gin-based cocktail that shines the spotlight on Empirical’s It’s Not Plum. Only If You Want It, a riff on the margarita, is…

The Resource | TRAVEL IT’S VERY EASY to be distracted, or even blinded, by the bright lights of Monaco. Nowhere in the principality do they shine brighter than in Monte-Carlo, thanks to the scintillating jewels of Hotel de Paris, Hotel Hermitage, Casino de MonteCarlo, Opera de Monte-Carlo and the Yacht Club. The world’s eyes fixate upon Monaco for at least a weekend every year too, with the Formula 1 Monaco Grand Prix and its gathering of superstar fans and superyachts. And let’s not forget the fabled love story of Prince Rainier III and Hollywood star Grace Kelly, which might be the closest we’ve ever come to a reallife fairy tale. However, there’s a lot more to the second smallest country in the world, if you make the effort to walk—or…