Innehållsförteckning för July - August 2015 från Cigar Aficionado

Hear the name, Bentley, and it likely calls to mind a luxurious, if lumbering beast, perhaps a uniformed chauffeur sitting up front, its passengers sipping Champagne in the spacious back seat. Well, a quick glimpse of the new Bentley Continental GT Speed is certain to change that impression—all the more so if you have a chance to take one for a ride. While the British marque today produces some of the world’s most high-toned automobiles, its roots trace to the track. The legendary “Bentley Boys,” a group of racers assembled by company founder W.O. Bentley, dominated the grueling 24 Hours of Le Mans in the era after World War I. The maker has been showing that same stuff once again in recent years, including a 2003 Le Mans win with…

It’s curious that something as American as cooking outdoors in the summer lends itself so well to a diversion so Continental as what the French call l’heure de l’apéritif (roughly: the time for pre-dinner drinks). Nevertheless, a cooling and aromatic drink is just the thing for slaving over a hot barbecue at that hour. And few libations fill the bill like the currently fashionable Negroni. While cocktails are an American invention of the nineteenth century, this drink is an Italian import from the 1920s. Until recently it didn’t get a lot of notice in the ongoing cocktail rebirth—and truthfully it had been snubbed a bit beforehand. (Both The Savoy Cocktail Book, of 1930, and David A. Embury’s The Fine Art of Mixing Drinks, of mid-century, didn’t even mention the Negroni.)…

More exclusive than the Super Bowl, older than the NBA, and steeped in time-honored traditions, sports fans worldwide turn their attention to the Masters every spring to witness the unoffi cial kickoff to golf season. But while Augusta National, the masterpiece where the tournament is held, is a great place to watch golf, it’s a lousy place for a golf vacation. Not only is it nearly impossible to get a tee time to play the course, there are few other notable courses nearby. Fortunately for golf-loving travelers, there are a number of traditional and historic choices that make up a classic golf vacation. These are immersion golf destinations that have long combined myriad world-class courses with everything else you could possibly want in a vacation, from luxury accommodations and fi…

Night has not yet completely fallen on the rainy evening of March 31, as the waitstaff of the Four Seasons Restaurant prepare to serve some of the biggest players in the wine, spirits, cigar and financial world. By 6:30 dozens of cigar boxes are open and on display. Auction lots are in place. Empty Martini glasses twinkle even in the Grill Room’s soft lighting while dozens of uncorked Cabernet bottles stand at attention on a long marble counter. In a half hour, the room will resonate with the unmistakable scent of cigar smoke. This is the Night To Remember, the annual charity gala for the Prostate Cancer Foundation started by Michael Milken and Marvin R. Shanken, editor and publisher of CIGAR AFICIONADO and Wine Spectator magazines. Now in its 21st…

In a world of fast food and one-size-fits-all sensibilities, how often does something feel made especially for you? The “Made for You” section celebrates those items that are created with such high quality of hand workmanship and degree of customization that they become individual to you. In each issue, our editors will endeavor to bring you special things from anywhere on the globe, choosing them solely on the basis of outstanding quality. Our goal is to give you guidance on the best of everything. 1 HYBRID ON THE LINKS—ECCO 1 Traditional golf shoes are great for swing time, but are out of place off the course. For a more seamless stroll from the 18th green to the locker room to the real world, Ecco—the Danish maker of footwear for all…

It’s hard not to admire Richard Overton. He fought for his country in the Second World War, built his home with his own two hands, puts the occasional splash of whiskey in his morning cup of coffee and smokes cigars every single day. Oh—and did we mention that he is 109 years old? Overton celebrated his most recent birthday on May 11, and he began his day the way he has for the past 90 years or so—with a cigar. He rose at 3 a.m. (not unusual for him) and took a seat on the front porch of his home in Texas. Then he lit a cigar, the first of many that he would smoke that day. Later in the day, he enjoyed a few whiskey cocktails, the only medicine…

Like artists and sculptors who make smaller replicas of their larger works, a few lighter companies have miniaturized some of their classic models and done so with careful consideration to scale, character and operability. One particularly impressive study in proportion is S.T. Dupont’s Line-8. It’s a smaller, more compact version of the celebrated Line-2, but faithful to the defining details that made its older sibling so legendary in the world of lighters. Despite its smaller scale, it has the weight and solid feel of a lighter twice its size. The Line-8 produces a natural flame and is offered in eight finishes ranging from subdued shades of blue and black to brushed metal. The lighters shown here—a regal shield on black lacquer (atop the ashtray, $440), or a simply sanguine Red…

It’s likely you want an Apple Watch. According to a recent Reuters/Ipsos poll, about 15 million Americans plan to buy one. While you bide your time, so to speak—appointments are required just to demo the watch—it is well to consider that alternatives preexisted the Apple phenomenon, Samsung is preparing its (gasp!) round-faced rival and luxury watchmakers like TAG Heuer plan their own smartwatches. The Apple Watch is trumpeted as a category-defining product, and in many ways it is, but for features as simple as calculating the distance you’ve walked, Apple’s watch will need a smartphone’s wireless tech. In this sense, the Apple Watch is the ultimate iPhone accessory—except it costs much more than the device it supplements. One alternative, Pebble, also imagines the smartwatch as partner to a smartphone, but…

Defending the baseline by trying to track down and return every ball your opponents hit until they eventually (hopefully) err is a sound strategy for some tennis players, albeit with a few shortcomings. First, you are relying on your opponents to make mistakes while they dictate the pace of play. Second, baseline defenders must possess great speed, agility and endurance to retrieve balls for an entire match. This tentative tactic is best left for the young. A more aggressive style—hitting powerful groundstrokes with a judicious amount of topspin, then attacking the net to decrease the angle and return any short balls for a winner—means you not only better direct where the ball is played and control the point, but also run less. To aid aggressive, offense-style tennis players, venerable sporting…

Vince Vaughn, all six-foot-five of him, rolls the large Cohiba between his fingers as he sits in a back room at the Grand Havana Room in Beverly Hills. On this Monday in early April, Vaughn is taking a break from filming “True Detective,” which returns for its second season June 21 on HBO. He stars opposite Colin Farrell, Rachel McAdams and Taylor Kitsch as the hit show makes a fresh start in a limited run of eight episodes. It’s one of the most eagerly awaited second seasons in recent years. The multi-Emmy-nominated first season—which teamed Matthew McConaughey and Woody Harrelson as conflicted cop partners chasing a backwater occult killer in rural Louisiana—was a TV phenomenon. The casting announcement for the show’s second round received coverage as breathless and eager as…

Gale-force winds have shuttered the island’s airports and covered the old road sign with a thick crust of snow. Out here, on the back side of the Langjökull glacier, even our navigation system doesn’t work. So, trusting little more than instinct and some fresh tire tracks, we keep moving towards the rift valley where the Mid-Atlantic Ridge is slowly tearing Iceland apart. Finally, we spot the rest of our group. There’s just one problem: a fast-moving river separating us from them. The easy way would be to drive to the nearest bridge. That would also be the slow way, adding an hour or more to the journey. The alternative? To dive or, rather, drive right in. Of course, it helps to be sitting behind the wheel of the new Land…

Next time you’re complaining about the heat on the golf course and yearning for the respite of the halfway house, consider this fashion dictum for the active man from Edward Spencer’s 1900 treatise Clothes & the Man: “...if a man is going to row hard, play tennis or take any hard exercise he should wear a soft-fronted shirt of fine flannel.” Have mercy! Flannel is the polar opposite of a wicking material and the unlucky man who wore it was likely to be covered in it. Golfers and tennis players of the period were typically swathed wrist to ankle with long sleeves, long pants and even sometimes a necktie. It’s time to thank the style gods that we now have sweat-forgiving action fabrics and the abbreviated classic shirt that makes…

The rain was a welcome excuse to chuck my plans for my first day in Glasgow (garden and museum touring) and enjoy a lazy lounge-about day enveloped in the comfort of Hotel du Vin & Bistro. The row of five Victorian houses, which was built in 1886 as homes for wealthy merchant shipping families, was transformed into the original boutique hotel in the United Kingdom a century later by connecting buildings through corridors on different levels. However, the feel of a private residence remains, and so do the stained-glass windows in house No. 4 that were commissioned by Sir William Burrell, the same shipping magnate whose art collection I was forgoing by staying in. As I explored, I once or twice had an oddly thrilling moment when, having turned a…

When Alan Mulally joined Ford Motor Co. in September 2006, the Michigan automaker was fast losing sales and market share and hemorrhaging cash. The former Boeing exec’s desperate turnaround “One Ford” strategy focused on the core “Blue Oval” brand. The long-struggling Mercury was soon abandoned, while Ford sold off a once-promising mix of foreign luxury marques. Along with Jaguar and Land Rover, the orphans included Britain’s Aston Martin and Sweden’s Volvo. Long known for its steady supply of safe and reliable—if boring—station wagons, Volvo was ill-prepared for independence when it was purchased by China’s ambitious Geely Automobiles in August 2010. The new parent is placing an $11 billion bet on Volvo’s revival, funding a broad array of new products and setting up two new factories in China. The first big…

Birthday number 109 began as a typical morning for Richard A. Overton. He rose early (3:00 a.m. on this particular day), brewed some coffee, and went to the front porch of his home in East Austin, Texas. The temperature was in the 60s, not bad for Texas hill country in mid spring, and he lit a cigar, the fi rst of about a dozen he would smoke that day. Business as usual for Overton. But when the sun came up, the day got busy for the oldest living U.S. veteran of the Second World War. His phone began ringing more than normal. “People wishing me a happy birthday,” he said to one reporter. Then it was time for cake with Gov. Greg Abbott of Texas and his fi rst lady,…