Porsche. Bentley. Dolce & Gabbana. Armani. Even for people who will never be able to afford their products, these luxury brands are household names. Now, they’re also becoming homes. A growing number of luxury brands, from cars to fashion to fine dining, are linking their names to high-end residential projects around the world. Branded luxury residences are now on the rise in Dubai, South Florida, New York, and Phuket, Thailand, where single units can sell for hundreds of millions of dollars. With prominently placed logos and interiors that recall or reflect the aesthetics of a select bran ..read more

Most people who read a lot will tell you that many of the novels they love are way better than the ones on the various “best books of the year” roundups from major newspapers and BookTokers. But if those novels are superior, why don’t they make it onto those lists, instead? Much of it comes down to awareness. Those reviewers are aware of the titles that make their roundups mostly because those books are among the few dozen or so each year with large marketing and publicity budgets behind them. Money won’t buy a novel a spot on a coveted list, but it can definitely buy a higher likelihood that ..read more

We called it back on January 24, 2023: the Cybertruck has a serious design problem. Industry experts believe that its design is so bad that it affects the company’s ability to manufacture it, as Tesla CEO Elon Musk himself later admitted. So bad, in fact, that it may actually require a complete redesign or, perhaps, even a product cancellation at some point this year. But the number of reported problems have resulted in a disastrous timeline that culminated today with the physical recall 3,878 units (which appears to be every one on the road) because of a faulty gas pedal. So here is the defin ..read more

Looking for a versatile building material that can be used both indoors and outdoors? Have you considered cork? Designer Yves Béhar is using the material most commonly associated with wine bottle stoppers and push pin bulletin boards to create “Port-All,” an installation made from patterned cork tiles. The tiles will eventually be available for purchase. “Cork is a unique material that is versatile, resilient, and sustainable, with a large range of performance characteristics,” Béhar tells Fast Company. “It has become my new favorite material since I have become more familiar with all of its c ..read more

The companies making the biggest impact in travel and hospitality this year are easing longstanding travel pain points by creating technology—chatbots, search engines, and booking tools—that provides one thing that all travelers crave: flexibility. “There’s a lot of anxiety around rising travel prices and binding bookings, especially after Covid,” says Dr. Ulrike Gretzel, a senior research fellow at USC’s Annenberg School for Communication and Journalism, who specializes in the use and impact of emerging technologies. “These new tools are saying, ‘We’ve got you. We acknowledge your problem, an ..read more

If I asked you to envision the cover of a romance novel, your mind would probably conjure up Fabio in various states of undress, a burning sunset, some over-the-top embossed novelty type, and maybe—just maybe—a hulking broadsword. And that’s fine, because that’s how romance novels traditionally looked throughout the ’80s and ’90s. These “clinch covers,” which describe cover art featuring steamy embraces, has long reigned supreme. But times change. And in a move to keep up with them, Harlequin has overhauled its branding and approach to design for its 75th anniversary, giving its logo some mode ..read more

Except for the 94% recycled steel used for its frames, everything in Mater’s new Alden collection is fully biodegradable. The sustainable Danish design company worked with Spanish architect and designer Patricia Urquiola on the collection, which debuted at Milan Design Week. The indoor-outdoor furniture includes square- and oval-shaped lounge tables, a side table, and a stool that come in terra-cotta, light green, sand, and earth gray. Patricia Urquiola [Photo: Nicklas Hemming/Mater] Mater crafted the furniture from two new versions of its patented Matek material, which mixes either coffee was ..read more

Google recently made headlines globally because its chatbot Gemini generated images of people of color instead of white people in historical settings that featured white people. Adobe Firefly’s image creation tool saw similar issues. This led some commentators to complain that AI had gone “woke.” Others suggested these issues resulted from faulty efforts to fight AI bias and better serve a global audience. The discussions over AI’s political leanings and efforts to fight bias are important. Still, the conversation on AI ignores another crucial issue: What is the AI industry’s approach to free ..read more

Nashville-based independent music company Concord has agreed to buy Britain’s Hipgnosis Songs Fund for $1.4 billion, the companies said on Thursday, to gain rights to the catalogues of artists including Shakira and Neil Young. Hipgnosis, a music rights investment company founded by industry veteran and former CEO Merck Mercuriadis, launched a strategic review last year after a shareholder revolt led to a board overhaul, a portfolio revaluation, and a dispute with its investment adviser over a call option. Its investors will get $1.16 per share in cash, representing a premium of about 32% to We ..read more

Former star of The Office Rainn Wilson is starting a new small business, and he invited some old friends from the hit show to join in. “Dream With Rainn” is a luxury pillow with an embedded speaker that plays calming, snooze-inducing vocalizing from the man who gave us Dwight Schrute. “Dream with Rainn” is part of a new ad campaign for AT&T Business, that focuses on small business customers and their need for a reliable network. Created with ad agency BBDO, it features Wilson, and fellow Office alumni Craig Robinson, Jenna Fischer, Creed Bratton, Kate Flannery, and Brian Baumgartner. Val ..read more