Table of contents for April 2022 in Robb Report

Jeffery Salter The list of people Salter has photographed reads like a roster of fantasy dinner-party guests: Grand Slam champion Serena Williams, TV legend Judge Judy Sheindlin, opera singer Latonia Moore. For this issue, he might have found the perfect host in restaurateur Mario Carbone, whom he captured for The Answers (p. 58). “He arrived at the shoot not wearing the all-black made-for-art-and-business look, but wearing these really cool, classy tan trousers,” Salter says. “I asked who the designer was, and he gave me a slight smile before saying, ‘I learned how to sew when I was young. I designed and made these myself.’ ” Michael Verdon Perhaps no one burns more shoe leather for our annual yacht issue than Verdon, Robb Report’s marine and aviation editor. But for all…

Cheech Marin can’t help but crack wise about his decades-old habit of acquiring art. “Unfortunately, it’s a mania,” he says. “It’s an addiction: My name is Cheech, and I’m an art collector.” Improbable as it may sound, Marin, half of the iconic duo Cheech & Chong, who spun stoner shtick into comedy gold in the 1970s and ’80s, is widely considered the world’s preeminent collector of Chicano art. Thanks to his gift of roughly 500 pieces from this trove, the Cheech Marin Center for Chicano Art & Culture—or “the Cheech”—will open its doors in Riverside, Calif., in June. A collector of baseball cards in childhood and, later, of Art Deco and Art Nouveau design, Marin, who is of Mexican descent, began buying Chicano art in the ’80s, starting with paintings…

As an Italian American raised in Queens, Mario Carbone was a foodie almost by default. But, more than eating, it was the theater of restaurants that got him hooked on a culinary career. Putting in time at the likes of wd-50 and Café Boulud, “my love of food transitioned into a fascination with restaurants,” he says, describing the ballet between the front-of-house and kitchen as “a magic trick.” Carbone and his partner, Rich Torrisi, have been making magic on a nightly basis since 2009, when they opened Torrisi Italian Specialties and made red-sauce fare a fashionable evening out. Now their Major Food Group (MFG) counts over 30 restaurants, including Sadelle’s, the Grill and Mario’s namesake Carbone, with outposts around the globe. While the chef remains dedicated to the kitchen, he…

WITH FORMULA 1’S 73rd season just off the starting line, motorsport’s premier race series is in the midst of a turbocharged popularity surge thanks to last year’s riveting battle between seven-time champion Lewis Hamilton and heir apparent Max Verstappen—not to mention the Netflix documentary series Formula 1: Drive to Survive, with its focus on the real-life drama both inside and outside the cars. But for the ultimate thrill, try a turn behind the wheel of an actual pedigreed F1 racer. Even decades-old competition chassis remain among the most high-tech, demanding and rare vehicles on the planet, and with the ability to pilot them around some of the world’s most famous circuits, you can consider the rest of your automotive bucket list obsolete. 1 Bovingdon Airfield Hertfordshire, England Instead…

“There’s a clamor in yacht design to find something with a younger appeal,” says Ian Sherwood, broker for Burgess Yachts, which is overseeing the build of the 114-foot Project Fox. Designed for a buyer in their 20s or 30s, the tall, forward superstructure is connected to a giant, open aft deck; although based on an explorer yacht, it looks less like a conventional expedition vessel and more like its shadow boat—and that’s the point. “The new generation of owners wants the ability to do more than just sit at anchor,” Sherwood says. Hence, Project Fox’s 1,200-square-foot rear deck can hold amphibious vehicles, submersibles, Jet Skis, a pair of 25-foot tenders and scuba gear; with clear decks, it becomes a sprawling social area. Fittingly, the yacht will also come equipped with…

Produced by humans for around 8,000 years, wine is slow to change. That said, there has been a lot of innovation recently. Low-sugar wine is a fast-growing category, production of rosé Prosecco is now allowed, canned wine is crazy popular and wine releases paired with NFTs are exploding. Ever since that last item caught our attention, we have replaced checking vintage charts for best quality-to-price ratio with finding out what Ethereum is worth in USD, as many wine-NFT release prices are quoted in cryptocurrency. That said, most of the offers we’ve seen will accept traditional currency as well, whether dollars, euros or pounds. We’re familiar with NFTs by now, right? If not, a quick recap: “Non-fungible token” is essentially a rather clumsy term for a digital asset representing a real-world…

Despite their ubiquity on land, indoor gardens have understandably been rarities in the nautical world. But as yachts become more and more residential and sustainability more important, suddenly tomatoes are ripening and tulips are blooming at sea. When done right, onboard gardens can have practical and aesthetic benefits. Plants can help purify the air in an AC-filled yacht, as well as create microclimates and set different moods throughout the vessel. Some beautiful examples are already on the waves, from Boadicea’s tropical garden and the greenhouse on the explorer yacht Scout to the smart planters and pots programmed to regulate their own water, fertilizer and light exposure on Flying Fox. Axel Massmann, CEO and founder of Yacht-Green, a Hamburg-based firm specializing in interior and exterior greening on megayachts, has created gardens…

Celebrated architects and decorators known for shore-side projects are increasingly taking to the water, where they’re proving they’re anything but “at sea.” Armed with high-profile yacht commissions, these designers are throwing the cookie-cutter layouts and tired aesthetic tropes of typical marine interiors overboard. Instead, they’re employing floorplans that flow more gracefully, luxe furnishings and blue-chip art that would feel at home in the most sophisticated urban pied-à-terre. The force of this shift could be felt at September’s Monaco Boat Show, where new designers brought an outsider’s eye to the industry. One especially envelope-pushing case inpoint: Oceanco recently began aninitiative toreimagine the superyacht from top to bottom, tapping forward-thinking Dutch interiors studio Tank as well as former Rolls-Royce design lead Giles Taylor to make it happen. While we wait to see,…

On the island of Carriacou, the largest of the Grenadines, lives a man who has spent five decades keeping a tenuous hold on a boatbuilding tradition that was the lifeblood of the area for centuries. Alwyn Enoe sculpts his wooden vessels with an ancient cutting tool called an adze, knowing that each will be appreciated for not only its simple beauty but also its impressive speed. Born in 1943, Enoe started his seafaring life aboard island traders until one caught fire. Several of the crew, including his best friend, died that night. Unwilling to return to sailing but residing where water was ever present, Enoe became a shipwright in 1973, honing a skill that was brought to the islands by Scottish immigrants centuries ago. He is now widely thought to…

Not all vintage-boat owners have inherited their vessels. Two Minnesota neighbors are among those who seek out old beauties instead—and who have amassed staggering collections of classics. When Lee Anderson bought his first antique boat, a 1938 Chris-Craft Resorter, in 1985, he named it after his wife, Katharine. “When I was a boy, my dad had a wooden boat on the lake in northern Minnesota where we spent the summers,” says Anderson, 82. “I always wanted one. After Katharine, I kind of got the bug.” Forty-five boats later, Anderson still owns the 19-footer—which he describes as “not terribly valuable” but one he’ll never sell—as well as the definitive collection of vintage North American boats, with many valued in the millions. Anderson is now focusing on pre–World War II one-off race…

CONSIDER THIS: The shirt commonly known as a polo is, in fact, a tennis shirt. Today’s polos have little to do with the horseback sport, but that’s largely irrelevant—show anyone from Milwaukee to Manila a combination of short sleeves, rib-knit collar and buttoned placket and the first thing that comes to mind likely won’t be a game, but a man: Ralph Lauren. He may not have invented the polo, but he’s the reason why the term “tennis shirt” is seldom heard. Fifty years ago, the designer—who, despite having never stomped a divot in his life, had named his brand Polo—emblazoned a two-button cotton-interlock shirt with a galloping jockey, transforming an athletic anachronism into a sartorial touchstone. To commemorate the design’s semicentennial, Ralph Lauren’s Polo Shirt, out this month from Rizzoli…

THE UNITED STATES Pavilion in the Giardini di Castello, home of the Venice Biennale, was erected in 1930, as fascism was rising in Europe and Jim Crow laws codified white supremacy across much of the US. When the 59th edition of the preeminent international art exhibition opens this month, Simone Leigh will be the first Black woman commissioned for a solo presentation in that space, built to showcase the best America has to offer. The art world can’t wait. Leigh is acclaimed for her towering figures of Black women, typically sculpted in ceramic and enveloped by voluminous skirts of raffia, with references ranging from Velásquez’s Las Meninas to traditional African dwellings and Mammy’s Cupboard, a Mississippi restaurant that could be described as blackface architecture: Patrons eat inside the giant “Aunt…

Becoming the author of a book can be incredibly rewarding. It can open doors to all kinds of opportunities and it’s a great way to cement one’s legacy. But even for those with valuable expertise to offer and great stories to share, writing a book has historically been complicated, time-consuming and painful—and getting a book published has been equally challenging. Traditional publishers only produce a small number of books each year, keeping ownership, creative control and freedom from authors. Although the self-publishing industry offers creative control, there are many dishonest parties, who often produce cheap, low-quality work. Professional publishing with Scribe Media is the ideal hybrid for authors. They receive the same high-quality expertise as traditional publishers, with the freedom and ownership rights of self-publishing. In addition to full creative…

BLENDING HIGH-LEVEL technical expertise with a poetic rendering of timekeeping, Van Cleef & Arpels is known for creating theaters for the wrist. Lovers meeting for a kiss on a bridge, dancing ballerinas and orbiting planets have been utilized to mark time at the French maison. But its latest, the 38 mm Lady Arpels Heures Florales and Lady Arpels Heures Florales Cerisier (prices upon request), stage a horological first with its most complicated dials to date. The watches show the passing of time via the opening and closing of flowers. Instead of operating around the circumference of the dial, they bloom in a seemingly random pattern in a series of three different cycles. The hours are counted by the number of flowers that unfurl at each hour, while the minutes are…

Developing a new business jet takes years—up to 16 in the case of the recently unveiled (though not yet customer-ready) Gulfstream G400, and only if everything goes smoothly from here on out. Part of that has to do with timing and market positioning—the G400’s larger G500 and G600 siblings, with which the latest plane shares roughly 80 percent common parts, were also conceived in 2009 but certified and delivered in 2018 and 2019, respectively—but it’s a hell of a long runway, regardless. If you’ve never considered what goes into creating the best and brightest new business jet, here’s the timeline for a much-awaited upcoming model. 2009 Concept Gulfstream begins planning a new aircraft family by first assessing what the market needs, then polling its clients about the best way to…

EVEN TWO YEARS AGO, the idea of electric-powered watercraft was confined mostly to cool-looking sketches. The notion didn’t carry much credibility in the boating world, since water’s high drag caused batteries to deplete quickly and severely limited range. And who wants to be stuck offshore with dead batteries? Technology may have finally caught up to the concept, with more than a dozen builders (and counting) having recently launched new EV runabouts. Range remains the restricting factor, but these inshore craft now make sense to four-wheeled EV owners who understand the charging routine. In return: no emissions, instant acceleration and silent running, likely acceptable tradeoffs for boaters who typically use their vessels for only limited periods, anyway. Which means right now we’re watching electric boats come of age in real time.…

Sun, sea spray and salty air create the perfect environment for sailing enthusiasts but not so much for priceless works of art. Still, that’s not stopping serious collectors from bringing Banksys and Basquiats aboard their yachts. According to one art adviser who specializes in safeguarding art at sea, the works might even be better off on the water than on land in certain cases. “Some museums would kill for the climatic conditions you can create onboard a superyacht,” claims Pandora Mather-Lees. A yacht’s advanced AC system can easily maintain the recommended 50 percent humidity and temperature of 64 to 72 degrees Fahrenheit for fine art. Many superyachts also have state-of-the-art security systems to protect not only passengers but also their possessions. But creating a hospitable environment takes work. It’s not…

In 2011, when designer Zaniz Jakubowski decided to add a giant, interactive rain-forest wall to the interior of the 353-foot Luminosity, her imagination was years ahead of available technology. “I’d wanted to use OLED panels, but nobody had them in that scale,” she says. “I’d also planned to use holograms, but at that point they were fairly crude. Had the technology been around, I could’ve enhanced the experience.” Jakubowski persevered, and eventually the multi-walled design—where sensors prompt butterflies to follow guests as they move along uncannily realistic screens—came to life. It’s a technical marvel, at one point rising 60 feet to the ceiling, while elsewhere it runs on both sides of the hallway, providing a 52-foot-long walk through a rain forest. “The owner wanted a wow factor,” says Jakubowski. “My…

The term “tender” can mean different things to different yacht owners. For some, it’s a 42-foot chase boat outfitted with fishing or scuba gear, sporting five 600 hp outboards that can blast through big water at 65 mph. Others may turn to a 10-foot-long rigid inflatable boat, or RIB, that gets lashed to the swim platform. Purists think of classic wooden runabouts or limo-style launches, transporting guests to and from the yacht. But regardless of size or materials, one thing the new class of tenders has in common is a higher level of sophistication. “Tenders used to be commodities that were only about utility,” says Giovanni De Bonis, CEO of SACS-Tecnorib, one of the world’s largest RIB manufacturers. “Now there’s a level of performance, attention to detail and design that’s…

Canouan is at its busiest over the winter holidays, but locals say that the best time to come is spring, between March and June. Winds are calmer, keeping waters less choppy, and the seaweed that tends to clog beaches early in the year has faded away. TRANSIT Charter is the best option, but you can also fly commercial to a nearby hub and connect there. Book the Mandarin Oriental’s own six-seater jet for the 25-minute hop ($4,500 round-trip) from St. Lucia, Barbados, St. Vincent or Grenada. Grenadine Air offers commercial service, though that hopscotches to several other islands en route. ACCOMMODATIONS Soho Beach House (rooms from $265) is set on a charming bay, with numerous chalet-style buildings scattered on its own beach. Rooms are small, and you need to be…

On Switzerland’s banana-shaped Lake Zurich, two coasts gaze across the placid water at each another. The international, sunset-dappled eastern shore is famed for its terraced vineyards laced with walking trails, splashy swimming badis and celebrity residents, including Tina Turner and Roger Federer. Aptly called the Goldküste, or Gold Coast, it’s a prime spot to dip your Vilebrequins into the lake while charging your Tesla, dozens of which line the residential streets. (It’s Switzerland’s number-one selling car, after all, beloved locally for its engineering, not its status.) The opposite, western coast is decidedly more Swiss, with modernist 1950s Reform churches, a chocolate factory and old mills converted into art spaces. It’s enveloped by the shade of its own mountain a few hours earlier than its neighbor each evening, earning it the…

Few hotels in the world can say they’ve been operating since Ulysses S. Grant was president, so a sesquicentennial milestone deserves celebration. But when that hotel is Villa d’Este, a standard birthday party simply won’t do. Instead, in March the famous retreat on Italy’s Lake Como kicked off a year of special events, menus, programming and more, all culminating in another rare occasion: The hotel will remain open until January to host Christmas and New Year’s Eve festivities. Cue a mad scramble for bookings. It’s a fittingly grand roster of tributes to a hotel that has inspired such lasting devotion over 15 decades. There have been the VIP fans, of course, from royals, heads of state and world-class athletes to celebrities from Gable and Garbo to George Clooney, who often…

BUTTON-DOWN Historical polo shirts were closer to what we know as a button-down oxford. (Brooks Brothers’ John Brooks created the OCBD after attending a polo match in the UK.) Rendered in classic cotton piqué, consider it the traditionalist’s choice; we particularly like the version from the Armoury by Ascot Chang. $275 OPEN NECK Most often seen in knits and constructed like a sweater, the buttonless open neck is a decidedly breezy selection. While elegant when worn solo, it can also add some Riviera-ready languor to tailoring, especially Loro Piana’s luxe cotton number. $825 ONE-PIECE Crafted from a single strip of cloth that extends into the placket, the one-piece collar is distinguished by a generous roll. The construction also serves to reinforce it against collapsing, making it ideal for layering beneath…

Audemars Piguet’s crown jewel is celebrating its golden jubilee with an impressive procession of dozens of new variations across different Royal Oak models, as well as an all-new Flying Tourbillon Openworked, with more to follow in the year. The Royal Oak has long reigned as the company’s most desirable watch—just try getting one at retail—so a full reinvention was out of the question. Instead, the Swiss watchmaker chose to make mostly small changes, focusing on design tweaks such as ergonomics, logo execution and dial colors, to name a few. The biggest headline, though, is the announcement that the Swiss watchmaker plans to reserve a “big chunk” of Royal Oaks for new clients. The exact number wasn’t disclosed, but global CEO François-Henry Bennahmias invited newcomers to “create and develop a relationship”…

At New York’s Michelin three-star Le Bernardin, that lone lobster claw sitting in a lime-green remoulade upon a sea of porcelain might seem the essence of simplicity, but because chef Eric Ripert is behind it, you know better. Its minimal presentation belies the intricacies that that went into its creation. No surprise then that the celebrated chef would apply the same spare aesthetic to the renovation of his personal kitchen. Sleek efficiency was what he craved. “It looks like nothing,” he says, “like a table and a wall.” But that sparseness is all about performance. “It’s the Formula 1 of kitchens. I can cook for 20 people by myself.” Ripert likes the clean look of a wall of cabinets concealing dishes, spices and cutlery but with plenty of space for…

The machine you see here is a 1,073 hp, four-wheel-drive, electric Porsche race car. It’s not a 911, the ’60s-born teardrop that everyone knows, but it might be more important. The 2021 Porsche Mission R isn’t even a real production car: Only one has been built to date, costing around $10 million, and it’s not for sale even if you have the money and the personal phone numbers of Porsche’s entire executive board. The Mission R is a concept, unveiled at last year’s Munich auto show, built to gauge public interest in electric motorsport and, more consequentially, to hint at the next version of Porsche’s entry-level sports car, the 718 Cayman. It’s also a driveline testbed, since the next 718 will reportedly be EV-only, with no hybrid or gas model…

SHARING A RIDE on a private jet might seem counterintuitive during a pandemic, but of the handful of companies involved in single-seat charter sales, most report their business as having grown since the Covid-19 outbreak. Yet a schism remains between the young fliers targeted by these new business models and more established private-jet clients. Wheels Up, which launched in 2013, originated the single-seat charter concept by offering shared flights on its original fleet of King Air 350i turboprops, before extending the program to larger business jets. Its Shared Flight program involves Core members looking to fill empty seats by posting upcoming flights on its app; depending on the number of travelers who hitch a ride, that could result in savings of 50 percent or more. Wheels Up president Vinayak Hegde…

Thirty years after Neal Stephenson’s novel Snow Crash introduced the term “metaverse,” it’s fast becoming reality. With rapid advances in technology, the tools needed to explore virtual or augmented reality are now better, faster and more lifelike than ever. The virtual elephant in the room, though, remains Apple, with persistent rumors that it will release its own AR/VR headset either late this year or early next. Meanwhile, here’s a look at top contenders currently (or soon to be) scrambling for market share while it’s still there for the taking. It might be VR, but the stakes are real, and very high. META QUEST 2 Developed by Oculus and since rebranded under Facebook’s new Meta umbrella and its Reality Labs subdivision, the Quest 2 is the best-selling headset on the market…

U-Boat Worx Nemo You used to need a gigayacht to house a personal submarine. But the new Nemo has about the same footprint as two Jet Skis, so it can fit into the smaller tender garage of a 90-footer, or even on an extended swim platform. The compact sub comes in one- and two-person configurations, with a large acrylic sphere for a full view of your surroundings. U-Boat Worx expects most to be owner-operated (a two-week certification course is included in the price tag), so the navigation system is simple and intuitive. But the interior is suitably luxe, with black leather seats, heating, AC and a small helm area. Nemo can descend to 330 feet and has roughly eight hours of charge on a normal dive. The standard package includes…

“Fine, then. Who needs Mustique? I can do better,” he said—or something close. The Italian businessman flounced out of a meeting on the Caribbean’s most exclusive island after its management company nixed plans for a five-bedroom mansion he wanted to build. Undeterred by the denial, he resolved he would out-Mustique Mustique. As a canvas, he turned to Canouan, a tiny nearby island that is part of the same nation, St. Vincent and the Grenadines. Canouan is around 15 miles south, and at that time—the early 1990s—it was inhabited by fewer than a thousand people, mostly subsistence fishermen. It had no running water, paved roads or cars. But the Italian believed he could change that, thanks to a vast fortune he accrued in banking; he would go on to sink a…

Marina Garghetti recalls many idyllic summer days aboard her family’s Baglietto, Solimar, but one in particular from the early 1970s stands out. “The sea of Tigullio was teeming with tuna,” she says. “My sporty mom had equipped the boat for deep-sea fishing, even though it wasn’t a fishing boat.” Garghetti, then in her early teens, and her two younger sisters headed out with their mom and the boat’s captain, while her father, Franco, was stuck in the office in Milan. The captain piloted toward an offshore fishing hole, so active the ocean’s surface boiled with the tunas’ feeding frenzy. “We caught fish after fish,” Garghetti says. “The tuna leaped out of the water when they took the bait, and we fought and fought to pull them in. It was such…