Filmmaker Wes Anderson is the man. When the man designs a luxury train carriage, there’s only one thing to do: buy a ticket on that train, wherever it’s headed.
The train appears to have come straight from the set of The Grand Budapest Hotel. Pastel pink and emerald green dominate the colour scheme, with intricate marquetry, art nouveau-style wooden panels and trippy geometric furnishings giving the carriage an elaborate crossover style that sits somewhere between Art Deco and stoner.
It’s the famous Belmond British Pullman train, the luxury chugga-chugga-chugga-chugga which operates out of London’s Victoria Station. Day trip tickets start at around £400 per person.
Texan Anderson doesn’t fly, preferring to catch the train where he can. Combined with his other skills, it means there probably isn’t anyone on earth more perfect man to design the interior of a train.
The train, for what it’s worth, travels from London to the Kent countryside, and back again. Not that that’s important.
Otherworld is a virtual reality gaming bars in London, serving hyper-immersive virtual reality experiences in an uber cool futuristic setting.
The company has opened a second ‘VR Bar’ in central London, to go along with one that has been around for a couple of years in the trendy North London neighbourhood of Haggerston.
There are sixteen unique, multi-sensory virtual realities to take part in, from going into space to navigating creepy theme parks, and even a Rick and Morty themed adventure. There are craft beers and a more than capable kitchen, as well as pods that fit up to eight people.
The experiences appear to be pretty affordable, and absolutely epic.
The Cabin was built by Norwegian man Kjartan for his wife Sally (from Sydney), which would explain the intricate level of detail put into the extraordinary exterior, or the beautifully worked wooden interior, or the gorgeous bathroom, or…pretty much the whole thing.
Woodnest Cabin is luxurious seclusion at it’s best. The cabin is perched high up in a forrest overlooking one of Norway’s fjords, in a surreal setting.
The exact location isn’t given until after booking, but its based in Odda, and is striking distance to a number of epic places, including Trolltunga, one of the most Instagrammed spots in Norway.
If it were any more chic it’d be in Nile Rodgers’ 1980s disco-band of the same name.
A new world building set in old-town Basel, made out of concrete, black marble, and granite, there is a rooftop bar that overlooks Switzerland’s trendiest city, rooms with terraces that do the same, and a gorgeous interior of mostly oak-wood.
If you’re into your art, there are pieces lining the walls of corridors and rooms that change periodically to create a unique experience every time you go.
If you ask us though, the whole hotel is a work of art.
The recently opened Minos Beach Art Hotel is exactly what it sounds like: an exquisite Greek Island waterfront-stay with seriously cool art scattered through the hotel.
The design of the hotel is in sync with the rest of Crete: low-key luxury in low lying villas, set among narrow laneways snaking through the humble fishing villages that have been here for centuries.
The designs ensure that your eyes remain glued to the natural landscape that surrounds you, which is, frankly, bloody beautiful. Crete is filled with beaches, gorges, rivers, mountains, rocky cliffs and ancient archaeological sites from civilizations that were here long before St. Kilda’s last premiership (read: ages ago)
And if you do get sick of the views (you won’t) there is also the art: the 50-ish unique art installations throughout the hotel make you feel as though you’re in a gallery as soon as you leave the front door.
Today, many of the young people of Turkey have turned their backs on rural life and headed to cities like Istanbul and Ankara to find work and fun. Outside the major centres, local businesses are geared towards making a buck from tourism, but modern-day cowboys Ekram and Irfan have taken a different path and are keeping the horse-breeding traditions of Cappadocia alive.
When you meet travel agents in this part of the world, they’re usually quick to mention the name Cappadocia means the Land of Beautiful Horses before ushering you on to a balloon ride that flies above the fairy chimneys and rock formations. Ekram, however, doesn’t approve of the hot-air balloons that dot the dawn sky every morning. He lives in one of the region’s famous caves near his ranch and is known as the Horse Whisperer of Cappadocia.
Irfan lives in the next valley and often travels with Ekram to the mountains where they catch wild horses and return home with them. There they train the animals, using traditional methods and others learned from watching YouTube videos. The duo is keeping alive the horse-breeding heritage of Anatolia, which stretches back hundreds of years.
These are the best of the best. Each year, the Red Bull Illume competition finds the greatest action and adventure sports photography captured during the previous 12 months. In 2016, 34,624 images were submitted by 5645 photographers from 120 countries around the globe, and the results were astonishing. The overall winner was German snapper Lorenz Holder’s shot of professional BMX athlete Senad Grosic taken in Gablenz, Germany. “In my photos,
I like to show the viewers the beauty of the environment where athletes perform,” says Holder.
“I think a great location is one of the key elements for a great action picture.” Now, we may not have the skills of Grosic (or Holder), but these photographs make us want to go out and explore the world. Like yesterday.
If you identify as an extreme introvert, then boy, is this the spot for you!
There’s a house on Elliðaey island (no we don’t know how to pronounce that, either) which is an island seemingly in the middle of nowhere – the most northeastern island in an archipelago near Iceland. It looks completely vulnerable to the elements and if it’s near Iceland, we’re assuming it’s pretty cold as well.
You can visit there but it’s a treacherous trip…as YouTuber Ryan Trahan recently found out.
Check out the 48 hours Trahan spent in the World’s Loneliest House above.
Sitting above a typically rocky, typically stunning section of Cycladic coast, classic Greek island architecture meets chic furnishings and bohemian atmosphere at Soho Roc House.
You need to be a member of the Soho House Group to enjoy this slice of paradise.
In return, you receive access to one of the islands’ hottest spots. There is an outdoor gym, a pool and veranda, bespoke lounge areas, a restaurant that serves organic, home-style Mediterranean food, and as much as anything else, a place to connect with like-minded members.
Next door is Scorpios, a creative space that ‘transcends genres, borders, and stereotypes’ where you can expect a mixture of live music performances, including DJ sets, as well as mind and body rituals and performance.
Svalbard, the archipelago between Norway and the North Pole, is the world’s northernmost a-lot-of-things. The world’s northernmost food and drink festival, Taste Svalbard, is one of these.
That description goes only some way to describing the uniqueness of this festival, held in Longyearbyen every year. With its location, Svalbard was always going to do their own thing when it came to cuisine.
Fresh and sustainably sourced fish, arctic cheese and beers from local breweries are all on the menu, and there’s also traditional local meals like reindeer soup and moose burger, both of which this writer will be reserving judgement on for now. There’s workshops, stalls, lectures and tastings as well.
While the food from this part of the world has a reputation for being delicious, there surely isn’t a food or drink festival set in more extraordinary surrounds. And as it’s held in October each year, on the cusp of winter, you can expect the Northern Lights to be doing their thing.
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