Stories by name

Fiesole: Gianni Pettena is an outsider, and proudly so. Born in Bolzano, he trained in Florence at the same faculty as those who made radical architecture and design famous, with groups from Superstudio to Archizoom. He’s always been included among the first radicals and has largely committed himself to promoting their radicalism by curating catalogues...

Concept by Apartamento Studios in collaboration with Marta Armengol        

A man of many hats Tokyo: If you’ve ever been to a fashion show in New York or Paris, you may have wondered to yourself, ‘Who is that amazingly dressed man in the front row with the incredible head of hair?’ It would be Gene Krell, international fashion director of the Japanese editions of Vogue, Vogue...

Music had Judy and Liza, Hollywood has Debbie and Carrie, fashion now apparently has Madonna and Lola and television had the Gilmore Girls. Food has Gloria Pinette and Anaïs Melero, mom and daughter food styling powerhouse duo. Based in San Juan, Gloria has been working in the industry for the past 35 years. She’s worked...

Hidden genius New York: Known perfunctorily to many as the leader of influential bands Throbbing Gristle and Psychic TV, Genesis Breyer P-Orridge is as prolific a writer and visual artist as she is a musician and performer. Widely hailed as one of the foremost pioneers of alternative culture as we know it, she has dedicated her...

Locals only Buenos Aires: Gustavo Di Mario is an Argentinian self-trained photographer who, for 15 years, has been printing his fashion photos with a flavour of the local and native, faithful to the origins of the peaceful and modest neighbourhood where he was born, Ramos Mejía, where he still lives with his mother. But his roots...

Youth prophet of the suburbs Moscow: Gosha Rubchinskiy is 26. He’s an average Muscovite who lives in one of the city suburbs in a huge Soviet blockhouse called ‘Khrushchyovka’. Buildings like this were built between the ‘60s and the ‘80s, and they still exist all over Russia and ex-Soviet countries including East Germany. Low ceilinged (around 250cm),...

This year sees the 20th anniversary of two of the most pioneering and influential design institutions in the world, which have both continuously redefined how we see, analyse and understand design. To mark the occasion we have met in The Design Museum with Deyan Sudjic, director of The Design Museum in London, Alexander von Vegesack,...

I lived in Paris for five years, and for the last couple of years I thought all the time about how much I wanted to come home to New York. I would imagine the apartment I would have here: a brownstone in Brooklyn, wood floors, windows that looked out over backyards, a spider plant, a...

Pantelleria: I first met Geneviève and Gabrio Bini at dinner in Pantelleria two years ago. They arrived at home with their dog, Agung, and a few bottles of their wine. I didn’t care much about natural wine then, and I still do not care about it much now. Unless when I remember what Gabrio Bini,...

It has been suggested that there is no such thing as a weed. It’s just a plant that happens to be growing in the wrong place. I thought about this recently as I yanked out some of the plants that had grown in the wrong place on my roof. Technically, I guess you could argue that all of...

London: Gary Card makes magic with masking tape. The prolific artist studied theatre design at Central Saint Martins before building a cult following as one of the most original and imaginative set designers of our times. He is inventive and un-precious, motivated by principle and process more than prestige. That said, he has created props...

On meeting Gertrude I first encountered Gertrude—perhaps ‘observed’ would be a better term—at the South Side Art Fair. I had moved to the south side in 1952 at the end of my second year at the Art Institute of Chicago. I was 19 years old. At the art fair she did not just take a...

On being weird New York City: Gary Panter lives in Brooklyn, between Prospect Park and Coney Island, a perfect location for an artist who seeks quiet for his labour-intensive work, but who needs the noise of popular culture to feed his wild ideas. It’s also appropriate that he refers to the Victorian house he lives in...

No other interiors magazine has done it yet? And with good reason: to enter the ‘inside’ of Gaspar Noé is an impossible mission. We are good friends, he’s often been around to my place, we’ve shared some nice memories… but he is a little defensive when I ask him to talk about the movie he...

A true picture of an artist It’s funny how sometimes when you discover something or someone very good, you like to keep it as a secret, but when that’s not just good but extremely good, keeping the secret becomes unbearable and you feel an urge to share it with who ever you can. This is...

I find a little bit of a mess relaxing, so I have to make an effort not to clean up when someone comes over. Of course I don’t like dust and I hate mould, but some things lying around give a room character. There are a lot of things on a particular side table we...

When I was a kid I attended after school activities at the local church. I was born secular. My parents even made a point of not baptising me to give me the chance to decide what I believed for myself. Even so, sending me to the church’s youth group was something very natural. Everybody did...