Luxury Lifestyle, Design & Architecture blog

Bah, Humbug and Snow and……….? Well if by now chilly winters fail to remind you of approaching festive season then there is another big hint. The installed 84-foot-tall Norway spruce Christmas tree measuring 48 feet around at New York based Rockefeller Plaza is successful in catching eyeballs and rejuvenating you to bid farewell to this year. The tree has come from Joe and Judy Rivnyak’s yard in Shelton, Connecticut. The illumination of the Christmas tree is most likely the renowned celebration of its kind and is scheduled to happen on 28 Nov. at 7-9 p.m. If you join the mob of millions of visitors dropping here just to view the event live, then the feast is available for your eyes through 3 January. Prior to the traditional tree lighting ceremony on 28 November, a giant crystal star is lifted by a crane to be placed atop Rockefeller Center Christmas tree in New York on 13 November. Decked with Swarovski, precious 25,000 crystals and one million facets, the star has become the...

There's no shortage of designer hotels in New York City, but it seems there is always space for one more. Especially when it is as unique as Chelsea's new boutique High Line Hotel. It may have only just opened, but the cluster of red-brick buildings spanning a whole block on Manhattan's 10th Avenue are a local landmark, giving a long-established feel to the hotel. The interior is a far cry from its original purpose as student housing for the General Theological Seminary though. Guests are checked in almost seamlessly by iPad, and whisked past the Intelligentia cafe and courtyard on the ground level to one of the 60 rooms above. The high life: The rooms at the High Line Hotel are generously-sized by New York standards, and interiors are a far cry from the building's original purpose as student housing for the General Theological Seminary. Unique decor: Carefully-chosen antique furniture pays tribute to the age of the building, offset by one-off piece...

This is a big week for auctions. What else can you say when you have a Picasso and a Gauguin going under the hammer in the same city in the same week? Art collectors have certainly been following the auction scene in London over the past few days. Many have had eyes only for the Picasso that sold for £25.2 million at Sotheby’s on 8 February. The masterpiece in question is ‘ La Lecture ‘, a portrait of Picasso’s mistress Marie-Therese Walter. There is a romantic story about how the pair met. Picasso apparently fell for Walter outside a Metro station in Paris in 1927. Walter was just 17 when the artist took her arm and promised, “You and I are going to do great things together!” The middle-aged Picasso was very much married at the time. Yet, Walter went along with it, becoming not just his mistress, but also his muse. In 1932, Pablo Picasso painted ‘La Lecture’. But it was hardly the only portrait of his muse. Also in 1932, he painted ‘Nude, Green Leaves and Bust’ – a paint...