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2009 Bentley Mega-Coupe
May 2008
Spirit of Brooklands
Paul Dean
The Brooklands, the new high-performance coupe from Bentley, is mechanical eye candy. The vehicle’s namesake is a defunct and dilapidated racing circuit just southwest of London that is decaying at about the same rate that it is being restored. And...
North American Adventures
The Editors
Journeying into the wild need not mean sacrificing the trappings of civilization, as these three trips attest. Whether you brave the rapids of an Idaho river, hunt ducks in Mexico, or observe polar bears on the Canadian tundra, you can enjoy...
North American Adventures: The River Civilized
Mike Nolan
We are enjoying a 2003 Bredif Vouvray Chardonnay and awaiting the crab cake appetizer’s arrival when the maître d’ announces, "Moose." He lifts one of his arms, which is cloaked in the sleeve of a stiffly pressed white shirt, and points to a...
North American Adventures: Marsh Madness
Bruce Leonard
A boat engine roars, prompting thousands of birds to take flight. Their retreating formation darkens the morning sky above a lagoon where 10 hunters, outfitted in camouflage and khaki, are boarding three airboats. The boats’ captains, flanked by...
North American Adventures: Bearing Witness
Karen Cakebread
Polar Bear Provincial Park, on Canada’s Hudson Bay, seems an unlikely spot for an extravagant wildlife safari. For one thing, the place has no visitors’ facilities, and its description on the Ontario Parks web site might deter, not encourage, guests:...
Bearing Witness: Mutiny and the Bounty
Karen Cakebread
Hudson Bay was the geographic heart of what has become, over four centuries, the world’s oldest continually operated corporation, the Hudson’s Bay Co. (HBC). But for its discoverer, Henry Hudson, the bay and its bitter winter added up to doom.
The...
Keep on Playing Together
Kim Kavin
The way the owner of Mine Games sees things, a yacht’s sundeck should be more than just a place to get a tan. For the sundeck of his new, 164-foot, four-deck megayacht from Mississippi-based Trinity Yachts, the owner had interior designer Patrick...
Art and Sole
William Kissel
Makers of custom shoes might employ centuries-old techniques, but their footwear still can appear surprisingly modern. Take, for instance, the shoes made by Tony Gaziano and Dean Girling of England’s Gaziano & Girling. "Instead of making a...
100 Favorite Restaurants
The Editors
Elite winemakers cannot afford to let their knowledge stop at the cellar door. Just as they tend the grapevines, they must tend to restaurants as well, to ensure that their vintages gain places on the right wine lists. Paying frequent visits to...
100 Favorite Restaurants: The Great Dish of China
Sheila Gibson Stoodley
The next-best thing to eating Peking duck at the Forbidden Palace—where it was invented centuries ago by the emperor’s court chefs—is savoring it at Made in China, inside the Grand Hyatt Beijing. The five-year-old restaurant cannot claim the...
100 Favorite Restaurants: Vintner's Canteen
Sheila Gibson Stoodley
Robert Mondavi, Naoko Dalla Valle, Ann Colgin, and dozens of other winemakers are among the regulars at Redd in Yountville, Calif. They keep coming back to his restaurant, says owner Richard Reddington (above right), because it offers what Napa...
100 Favorite Restaurants: Spanish Fry
David Lyon
Australian winemaker Chris Ringland never had tasted paella until a business partner took him to lunch at the Paco Gandia restaurant in the Alicante hillside village of Pinoso, Spain. His meal was unforgettable. Instead of serving the familiar...
100 Favorite Restaurants: Reds, Whites, and Blue
Sheila Gibson Stoodley
Nadine Brown encourages oenophiles to broaden their palates without leaving this country. She is head sommelier and wine buyer at the Washington, D.C., branch of Charlie Palmer Steak, a restaurant that offers only American wines and, when possible,...
100 Favorite Restaurants: Aw, Shucks
Shaun Tolson
To be the best at shucking oysters, you need power, speed, and finesse, and the staff at Wiltons, a 266-year-old seafood restaurant in London, possesses all three. Led by Patrick Flaherty, the restaurant’s head oysterman for the past 44 years,...
100 Favorite Restaurants: Taco Heaven
Sheila Gibson Stoodley
Isidoro Gonzalez opened La Super-Rica in Santa Barbara, Calif., 28 years ago because he wanted to serve tacos like those that he had eaten while living in Mexico City in the early 1970s. Gonzalez, who is now 58, piled grilled meats, fresh chilies,...
100 Favorite Restaurants: Asking for Truffle
Kim Fredericks
The most popular dish on Marc Haeberlin’s menu at Auberge de l’Ill, in the Alsace region of France, is an irresistible paragon of excess. Dubbed La Truffe Sous la Cendre and invented 40 years ago by Haeberlin’s now-semiretired father, Paul, it...
100 Favorite Restaurants: Uncorking the Possibilities
Karen Cakebread
Wine and Indian food are just beginning their courtship, and Vikram Vij, a 44-year-old native of Mumbai and owner of Vij’s, an Indian restaurant in Vancouver, British Columbia, is doing his part to bring the two together. “It’s like going on a date...
100 Favorite Restaurants: A Lotus Blooms in the Vegas Desert
David Lyon
With all due respect to Joël Robuchon, Thomas Keller, Jean-Georges Vongerichten, and other world-renowned chefs who have flocked to Las Vegas, some of the city’s greatest meals are off the Strip. The best Thai restaurant in Las Vegas—and maybe in the...
100 Favorite Restaurants: Feeding Desires
Sheila Gibson Stoodley
Te Mataré Ramírez transforms dining into an R-rated experience. Sensual artworks decorate the walls of this 13-year-old restaurant in the Palermo Soho section of Buenos Aires, Argentina, and between courses, you are treated to pornographic puppet...
100 Favorite Restaurants: The Tastemakers
The Editors
Each of the 100 featured restaurants was selected by one or more of the following vintners.Santiago Achával, Achaval-Ferrer, Mendoza, ArgentinaDavid Adelsheim, Adelsheim Vineyard, Newberg, Ore.Bart and Daphne Araujo, Araujo Estate Wines, Calistoga,...
Robb Design Portfolio: Let’s Play Two
Bailey S. Barnard
The Duo Grand, a conjoined pair of 6-foot-long grand pianos from Brunswick, Germany’s Grotrian Pianos (www.grotrian.de), was designed for duets. That much is obvious. Less apparent is the soundboard bridge that connects the two instruments,...
Robb Design Portfolio: Elite Eight
Larry Bean
1952 Siata 208S Spyder
The 208S represented a reversal of roles for two Turin, Italy, automakers: Siata (an acronym for Societa Italiana Applicazione Trasformazione Automobilistiche), which once had been a source of power for Fiat, became a...
Wings & Water: Going Global
Michael Schulze
The young customs man is at a loss. On this sweltering December afternoon in Grand Bahama Island’s Freeport Harbor, he is the only official on duty; his supervisor is visiting Miami and cannot be reached; and a green-hulled, four-deck superyacht has...
Going Global: A Visit to Lo Country
Justin Ratcliffe
Martin Lo is just one of the leaders of the Chinese boatbuilder Cheoy Lee: The others are his seven brothers. Each brother has the word Director printed on his business card. “It works better than you might think,” Lo said during a walk through the...
Leisure: Four Star Italians
Brett Anderson
Though the winemaking traditions of the Italian peninsula are almost immeasurably old, the push among vintners to produce wines of a level of quality to compete with the finest wines grown elsewhere in Europe has been relatively recent. Unlike the...
One Last Thing...
Sheila Gibson Stoodley
The Item. This is the passport that Wilt Chamberlain carried during his travels to Europe and the Soviet Union with the Harlem Globetrotters, whom he joined in 1958, after his junior season at the University of Kansas. NBA rules prevented a player...
FrontRunners: Select Smoke
The Editors
Although history’s most storied smoker has a cigar shape named after him, his grandson, Winston S. Churchill, felt the great man deserved something better. In 2005, the younger Churchill approached Davidoff with the idea of making a Winston Churchill...
FrontRunners: Best of Show
The Editors
For close to 20 years, Robb Report’s sister publication ShowBoats International has hosted the ShowBoats International Awards and Rendezvous (www.showboats.com), a gathering of yacht owners, designers, and builders in Monaco. The event’s highlight is...
FrontRunners: Salon Culture
The Editors
The Massachusetts-based boutique speaker company Revel kept its original Salon speaker unchanged for eight years while it waited for significant technological improvements to emerge. The wait clearly was worth it, for the new Revel Ultima Salon2...
FrontRunners: From the Robb Cellar
The Editors
Life’s finer things sometimes have dubious origins. Such is the case with Springbank Distillery’s whiskies, originally produced from an illicit still run in Campbeltown, on the southwest coast of Scotland. The enterprise begun by Archibald Mitchell...
FrontRunners: Grand Event
The Editors
During the week beginning July 20, as many as 12 wine lovers will have a chance to sample each of Burgundy’s 33 grand cru varietals as they cruise along the canals of the region, from Mâcon to Dijon, aboard the barge Napoléon. In addition to stops at...
FrontRunners: Ghost Rider
The Editors
This summer, Rolls- Royce Motor Cars will begin production of the Phantom Coupé (www.rolls-roycemotorcars.com), a hardtop sibling to the Drophead Coupé. The Phantom Coupé features rear-hinged suicide doors and an optional brushed stainless steel...
FrontRunners: Third Impressions
The Editors
Through June 6, Adelson Galleries in Manhattan is offering a collection of artworks by the American Impressionist Mary Cassatt (1844–1926). Over the past eight years, art dealer Warren Adelson has sold more than 300 works on paper by Cassatt. The...
FrontRunners: Ferrari Auction
The Editors
An exceedingly rare 1960 Ferrari 246S Sport Dino Fantuzzi racecar could fetch as much as $6 million on May 18, when Ferrari hosts the second annual Leggenda e Passione classic car auction at its headquarters in Maranello, Italy. The racer, one of...
FrontRunners: Sporting Life
The Editors
Cirrus Design cofounder Dale Klapmeier says that when he thinks of the Cirrus SRS sport plane (www.cirrusdesign.com), he envisions children pressed against an airport fence, dreaming about flying. "It will generate that kind of excitement," he says....
FrontRunners: Arms and the Man
The Editors
Call it sculpture for your wrists. Armrevolution (www.armrevolution.com), a design firm with offices in London and New York, has debuted a line of futuristic, mechanical-looking cuff links and is working on other men’s accessories that will have very...
Watches: Performance Art
Laurie Kahle
Atop a table in Geneva’s Grand Théâtre and surrounded by dozens of male dancers, Elisabet Ros moved to the measured crescendo of Ravel’s Boléro. The performance by Ros, principal dancer for the Béjart Ballet Lausanne company, was part of a private...
Motorcycles: Positive Charge
Jack Lewis
The bicycle jockey was working so hard at being good. Perspiring profusely, he downshifted and then stood up to grind his pedals as he approached the Broadway Bridge in Portland, Ore. I waved and smiled while I shot past him on the Enertia, an...
Autos: Exemplary Feline
Paul Dean
Gently prod the start button and it glows red, then pulses, like a beating heart. Touch it again and the overture becomes a performance as the cushioned explosion of a big V-8 smoothes into a grumble.
Now the Jaguar XF sedan is poised to romp, and...
Aviation: Material Benefit
Bailey S. Barnard and Michael Schulze
A mock-up of the spn, the upcoming light business jet from Grob Aerospace, displays one of the aircraft’s main attractions. The cabin, created by Porsche Design Studio, is unusually roomy for a light jet, especially in this six-seat executive...
Sport: Shark Bytes
Susan Farewell
The St. Johns river in DeLand, Fla., is not a good place to tip a rowing shell; it is home to countless alligators. It also was the host site, during a week in January, for the All-American Rowing Camp, an event that serves as one way for Northern...
Golf: Power Play
Mike Nolan
The 16th tee of the Powerscourt Estate’s West Course invites lingering. You will want to stop at this hillside spot 12 miles south of Dublin, Ireland, and enjoy the sweeping views across the valley to the 1,700-foot-tall Great Sugarloaf Mountain. You...
Dining: Cultivated Risks
Sheila Gibson Stoodley
The Garden at Arrows, the Ogunquit, Maine, restaurant run by chefs Clark Frasier and Mark Gaier, offers pleasure for both the eye and the belly. The three-quarter-acre plot is the source of at least half of the chefs’ ingredients in early spring and...
Spirits: Pot (Still) of Gold
Mike Nolan
Too many chefs usually spoil the pot, but this was not the case during the blending of the Jameson Rarest Vintage Reserve. So claims Dave Quinn, the master of whiskey science for Jameson, the Irish whiskey maker. Quinn collaborated on the blend with...
Art: Handy Man
Sheila Gibson Stoodley
It is January, and David Calvo’s studio is quiet, just as he prefers at this time of year. The two craftsmen he employs are not working on any wood-carving, bronze-sculpting, or furniture-making projects. Instead, Calvo has given them the month off,...
Music: Sound Goods
Bailey S. Barnard
"Why don’t you play something for us?" asked Dan DeMars, owner of DeMars Guitars, an instrument maker from Norwich, Vt., that was among the roughly 1,500 companies displaying their wares at January’s International Music Products Association trade...
Collectibles: The Wizard of Odd
Sheila Gibson Stoodley
William Jamieson’s wares are not for the faint of heart. His 6,500-square-foot triplex apartment in Toronto that doubles as his showroom displays 12 genuine shrunken heads, an unwrapped Egyptian mummy, and a 19th-century self-defense kit for vampire...
Home: The Latest Dish
Lori Bryan
When Traditional Arts made its debut on January 31, 2007, the London-based tableware maker kept a low profile. The Prince of Wales announced the start-up to just 80 guests during a dinner at his London home. The invitees—patrons of the prince’s...
Contributors: Feeding a Taste for Adventure
The Editors
Last year, Robb Report’s inaugural dining guide, "America’s Finest Dining: 57 of Our Favorite Restaurants" (March 2007) highlighted some of the finest restaurants in the United States. We extended the geographic parameters this year and invited a...
From the Editors: Soul Food
Brett Anderson
"I am a great artist." This declaration issues from the lips of the Communard refugee whose gastronomic tour de force furnishes the title for Isak Dinesen’s "Babette’s Feast." After regaling her humble employers’ guests (a group of Norwegian...