Robb Report October 2015

Between the artist and the collector there sometimes exists a special intimacy—a sympathy of spirit that entwines fates. Such was the case with an obscure 20th-century Dutch painter and his most famous admirer, whose patronage secured the virtuoso’s place in history. Born in the Netherlands in 1889, Henricus van Meegeren developed a lifelong fascination with […]

A carefully thought-out tourbillon reflects the 18th-century legacy of Ferdinand Berthoud. “I got to know who Ferdinand Berthoud was through my grandfather’s pocket-watch collection,” recalls Karl-Friedrich Scheufele, a copresident of Chopard. “The more I read about him, the more I admired what he did.” In honor of the 18th-century horologist, Scheufele—who has built up his […]

Alfa Romeo’s 4C Spider is a feisty little roadster. It has been said that in 1968, no production car could cover a kilometer faster than the V-8-powered Alfa Romeo 33 Stradale—not even the Lamborghini Miura or the Ferrari Daytona, each of which was equipped with a V-12 engine. Alfa Romeo engineers understood that speed is a […]

The Metropolitan Museum of Art takes a rare trip to the auction block. The Metropolitan Museum of Art has long transported visitors through time and space, sending them to ancient Egypt, medieval Europe, and the Roman Empire in a single day. This month, the New York institution will offer the rare opportunity to own a […]

Valérie Messika’s jewelry designs lay bare the gemstones’ beauty. The diamonds in Valérie ­Messika’s imaginative jewelry designs appear to float, with no obvious metal settings to detract from their pure sparkle. “Diamonds are already a creation; I’m only here to put [them] on the skin of a woman,” says Messika. The 39-year-old Parisian jeweler herself dons layers […]

Dom Pérignon unleashes a warrior wine with the 2005 vintage.  Earlier this year, on a crisp spring evening in Barcelona, an eager and thirsty crowd assembled outside the Catalan capital’s Palo Alto Market, a hefty former factory wrapped in the bright pinks and purples of climbing bougainvillea. Just after the last drops of daylight had […]

Nat Sherman’s latest release celebrates the brand’s past and points to its future.   Michael Herklots leans back in a chair at the Nat Sherman Townhouse in Manhattan and takes a long, easy puff from one of the brand’s new 85th Anniversary cigars. Exhaling slowly, he taps the ash and smiles. “It’s a killer cigar,” […]

“Be sure you are completely dry prior to entering the cryotherapy chamber,” says Barbara, a steely technician at the Lodge at Sea Island’s Performance Therapy Center. “Any moisture on the skin will most certainly cause frostbite.”  I am seated at a lovely china-laden table set for high tea in the ladies’ drawing room at Georgia’s famous […]

Gail Folwell’s sculptures convey the sensations of sports. Gail Folwell recalls the time in 2001 when a Canadian hockey player viewed her first sports-themed art piece, a 1999 bronze that she cheekily dubbed Pas de Deux. He could not contain himself, she says. “He was almost dancing around the thing.” The sculpture depicts two hockey […]

Driving the new Ferrari 488 GTB on the company’s test track and through the countryside outside Maranello shows there is no turning back from the car’s turbo-enhanced V-8. The bridge at Fiorano, Ferrari’s 1.9-mile test track near Maranello, Italy, will reveal a car’s character. The figure-eight circuit rises to a crest, dips, and rises again […]

The direction of the aircraft market—climbing, leveling off, or descending—should inform your plans for buying a plane.  With the economy healthy and so many recently introduced models in production or in the pipeline, now seems like an opportune time to be in the market for a new aircraft. But whether this really is the right […]

With a new flagship store and enhanced services, a venerable shoemaker steps up its game.  New Bond Street’s boutiques did not lack for foot traffic on a particular summer day earlier this year, but perhaps no shop on London’s famed thoroughfare was as lively that afternoon as Bally. Inside, on the store’s second level, clients […]