360 DEGREES Weblog

Qantas is set to dramatically up its luxury quotient next week when it opens the doors to its glamorous new first class lounges in Sydney and Melbourne international airports.

Designed by famous Australian born industrial designer Marc Newson (who’s designed everything from airplanes to bags), the lounge, which is rumored to have cost A$20 million (US$16.5 million), boasts features usually seen only in super-luxe designer hotels.

We’re talking a food menu put together by fine dining king Neil Perry; a full concierge service; a day spa (yes, day spa) where 1st classers can indulge in facials and massages for free; individual marble lined shower suites stocked with Payot cosmetics and Kevin Murphy hair products; a library stocked with best selling books, magazines, newspapers and board games; and an ‘entertainment zone’ with plasma TVs and Sony play stations. Oh, and if you care to do some work in the midst of all that luxuriating there are fully equipped workstations with internet access.

Why would someone buy a Bentley Arnage instead of a Rolls Royce Phantom? How about a Chevrolet Corvette vs. a Ferrari F430? Or a Lexus LS 460 over a BMW 7-series? As we do with our clothes, hobbies and careers, we define ourselves through our vehicles in some way or another — yes, even the Honda Accord owner — and it never ceases to fascinate. That’s why a recent article in Forbes outlining what our cars say about us caught our attention.

Forbes went out and interviewed loads of PR guys from various automakers, poured through studies about typical owners of a particular brand and model, and stirred in a little stereotyping to come up with gems like these:

-Bentley Arnage owners are likely self-made, more interested in rewarding themselves and staying anonymous, unlike owners of the Rolls Royce Phantom, who want to stand out in a crowd.

-Aston Martin owners are also self-made and discreet. According to a company spokesperson, Aston Martin owners are “the sort of people who would prefer to wear the designer brand on the inside rather than the outside.”

-Unlike owners of other SUVs, Jeep Wrangler drivers actually go off-road.

-96 percent of Dodge Viper owners are men, they enjoy to drive, and they want to beat every other car out on the road.

Check out the link to see what your car says about you.

Link:Forbes

Maybe they’re outside in the garden. They could be playing softball. Or perhaps they’re just plain bored.
In TV’s worst spring in recent memory, a startling number of Americans drifted away from television the past two months: More than 2.5 million fewer people were watching ABC, CBS, NBC and Fox than at the same time last year, statistics show.
Everyone has a theory to explain the plummeting ratings: early Daylight Savings Time, more reruns, bad shows, more shows being recorded or downloaded or streamed.
Scariest of all for the networks, however, is the idea that many people are now making their own television schedules. The industry isn’t fully equipped to keep track of them, and as a result the networks are scrambling to hold on to the nearly $8.8 billion they collected during last spring’s ad-buying season. (ASSOCIATED PRESS)

Karl Lagerfeld has photographed the Audi R8 for a calendar which is to be delivered to all the people who have ordered R8’s. The photographs will also be displayed in an exhibition over the next two weeks at the Audi Forum on Park Avenue in New York. The photograph’s were taken by Karl Lagerfeld in France and feature the R8 in an abstract form. Karl Lagerfeld is an avid photographer and his recent work includes the photography for the 1998 vintage Dom Pérignon and 1996 vintage Dom Pérignon Rosé advertising campaign.

Pop-up retail may be a bit passé, but pop-up-everything-else is still going strong. Next up? A pop-up nightclub in Australia.

The SoCo Cargo Experiment, created for Southern Comfort, consists of four shipping containers that can be stacked side by side or on top of each other, like giant building blocks. SoCo Cargo can be assembled within a day, with an entirely adaptable interior. The venue usually contains a bar, stage and lounge area, but the main focus varies per location. One time it will be a nightclub, next time a live music venue or art gallery, popping up by the side of the road, near a festival, carnival or other outdoor event. The temporary club premiered on Sydney’s Cockatoo Island in October. During Melbourne’s St Kilda festival in February, SoCo Cargo hosted a number of up-and-coming live acts. Then it was on to Adelaide’s Garden of Earthly Delights (another festival), where the containers held a slick dance lounge featuring hot DJs and late night grooves.

For an old liquor brand trying to reach a new group of consumers, specifically young adults, the pop-up approach seems to be working. Surprise creates buzz, and buzz is good, cost-efficient marketing.

To the relief of many, a visit to a winery no longer has to resemble an agricultural outing with the mandatory trudging along dirt paths and in dark cellars listening to winegrowers go on and on about the terroir of their cru. Wineries – and not just in the newer wine-producing regions – are starting to wake up to today’s design sensibilities.

With winery buildings now often designed by famous architects, and with spectacular winery hotels, wineries with luxurious spas, cool wine-tasting bars, and imaginative wine shops popping up everywhere, the once stuffy wine culture is beginning to feel a bit more like something that even someone without a burning interest in either viti- or viniculture could enjoy.

Following our recent post about an upmarket food retailer for children, comes a class in cooking for babies.

Dutch Baby Cooking organizes classes for parents who’d like to learn to whip up nutritious, tasty and varied meals for their infants and toddlers. Classes are taught by a food stylist and editor of cookbooks and food magazines, who is also a mother of two. The baby cooking workshop starts with 90 minutes of information about infant nutrition, the benefits of home cooking baby food and the food phases a baby goes through between the ages of 4—18 months. Then it’s on to the kitchen, for an hour and a half of hands-on instruction.

While the two concepts we covered earlier provide options for parents who don’t (always) have time to prepare food for their children, there’s definitely something to be said for the DIY approach. Which means there’s a business opportunity for gastronomically-inclined entrepreneurs who can teach parents to cook for their offspring.

How simple it really all is. Instore signing for Strongs Delivery service, a supermarket in Canada.

Timing is everything. With summer eeking its way into April and May, trying to fathom the perfect moment to don the shades throws even the most climate conscious among us. It can make the difference between fashion faux pas and fashion icon. Thankfully, a young Berlin-based design team specialising in top-quality glasses have opened a store just when that eyewear uncertainty starts to creep in. MYKITA, the brainchild of Philipp Haffmans and Harald Gottschling is a top-of-the-range eyewear brand that has quietly been gathering praise in design circles since its launch in 2004.
Known for their handmade frames, the brand won the 2007 iF product design award and the collection’s “Rocco” model won a red dot design award in the same year. With those credentials it’s no wonder their new store has been designed with the utmost precision and craft. The uber minimalist décor is disturbed only by the subtle perforations in the industrial shelving. By day, the shop interior is lit by row after row of spotlights. But by night, the atmosphere transforms in to a beautiful array of animated light sequences that reflect the movements of the street outside.