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How Broadsheet founder Nick Shelton is bringing his Australian city-guide formula to London

2025-12-23 19:57:18 By Jennifer Williams

Like many Australians, Nick Shelton worked as a barista in London in his early twenties and found the UK capital to be “a dynamic, cosmopolitan metropolis”. In 2009, after returning to his home country, he founded the city-guide company Broadsheet. It initially focused on highlighting what to eat, see and do in Melbourne, then expanded to Sydney, Brisbane, Adelaide, Perth and, in 2022, New Zealand. Now, Shelton is back in London and bringing his discerning eye to the city that sparked that sense of possibility.

(Image: Evening Standard/Hulton Archive via Getty Images)

“We focus on reportage and questioning why something is worth knowing about,” says Shelton. “It’s not about churning out bits of ‘news’.” He also believes in print, which is “where we can control who we are as a brand and as a publisher”.Broadsheet London’s first paper edition is out now, available for free in cafés, hotels and other businesses.

Broadsheet isn’t the only organisation newly attempting to document London. In the past year, several digital newsletters have appeared, including London Centric, which is among the UK’s top local news products in terms of subscribers. The site, which began as a one-man operation run by formerGuardianmedia editor Jim Waterson, has 30,000 subscribers, 3,500 of whom pay a monthly fee for exclusive investigations, event invites and access to the editor.

It relies on shoe-leather journalism: being out and about and talking to people. “This is a brilliant city,” says Waterson. “That’s the voice I want London Centric to have – laughing at the preposterous nature of the city, rather than despairing that it’s beyond saving.”

Five outlets reportingreputably on London:

1.
Broadsheet
Aussie Nick Shelton’s new launch covers hospitality and leisure.

2.
London Centric
Ex-Guardianjournalist Jim Waterson’s deep-dive newsletter publishes agenda-setting investigations.

3.
The Londoner
Manchester-based Mill Media moved south to start this promising capital-focused website.

4.
The Fence
A London-based magazine packed with satire, fiction and proper reporting on the capital.

5.
The Slice
News and culture across the borough of Tower Hamlets in east London, founded by Tabitha Stapely and dedicated to community journalism.

To read Monocle’s excellent city guide to London, taphere.

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Culture

Editor’s letter: The power of determination

2025-12-23 19:57:18

There are a lot of themes threaded through this issue – the potency of good design, legacy, our shifting perceptions of health and ageing – but when I looked at the final proofs, one word seemed to link many of the narratives that run across its pages: determination. This November outing of Monocle reads like a playbook on how to follow your own path, fight for your independence and ignore the naysayers.Let’s start with the Expo. A few months ago I went to an exhibition at the Saatchi Yates gallery in London. It was the opening night and the space was rammed, guests spilling out onto the street to smoke and talk art. It was a cool crowd and, inside the gallery, the punchy, political canvases on show were being scrutinised by lots of twenty and thirtysomethings. These new works were not the creation of some fresh-faced enfant terrible but Peter Saul, an American artist who is still at the top of his game at 91. Later I spoke about the show with Sophie Monaghan-Coombs, who runs our culture pages. She pointed out that there is a whole host of artists in their eighties and nineties being championed by galleries and museums – many are women who are only now getting the recognition that they deserve. So Sophie put together a feature on seven in-demand senior artists who continue to push boundaries; who live through their work. It’s an inspiring tale of artistic determination.Giorgio Armani, who died in September, ran an extraordinary business, not least because in an era when key luxury groups have come to control many of the most potent and important labels, he stayed independent – the sole owner of his empire. This allowed him to do things his way, whether that was telling models to smile and look happy or being the only spokesperson for the company. Our fashion director, Natalie Theodosi, was granted backstage access to report on the runway show for his final collection to see how his determination will live on. Her report is combined with the glorious photography of Andy Massaccesi.A cultural shift is shaking up the health-and-fitness industry. Younger folk – well, a lot of them – see going to the gym less as a necessary evil to combat their daily excesses of food and booze, and more as a way of life. This cohort of clean-living Gen Z consumers will happily spend all day tending to their body’s needs. Enter the “super-boutique” gym, a place not just for taking a class but also for health tests, spa treatments, dining on virtuous meals and hanging out. For this issue, writer Grace Cook travelled to Brussels to meet entrepreneurs (and health advocates) Alexandre de Vaucleroy and Antoine Derom at their recently launched Animo Studios, a space designed to be the backbone of members’ fitness, social and even work lives.Political, military and diplomatic determination also makes an appearance in this issue. In our Affairs pages, we head to Poland to see how the country is preparing to defend itself should Russia attack. We also sit down with former Estonian prime minister Kaja Kallas, who now, as vice-president of the European Commission, is in charge of the EU’s foreign policy (even if member states are hard to align). In an interview with our foreign editor, Alexis Self, she explains why she is determined to stand up to threats from the East and unwanted challenges from Washington.You will also read about the doggedness of art sleuths, the firm focus of three Pritzker Architecture Prize-winners and how Noura bint Mohammed Al Kaabi, minister of state for the UAE, is unwavering in her belief that we need to listen to everyone, while maintaining red lines. I hope that this issue will harden your resolve, as you look ahead. It’s an issue that shows you how you can stick to your principles and do good too.

Culture

The art of ageing: Inside the studios of seven in-demand artists in their eighties and nineties

2025-12-23 19:57:18

Though crafts that rely on the dexterity of your hands become more difficult as you age, your decades of learning and life experience can imbue what you create with depth and unique perspectives. Here, we visit the studios of seven artists who continue to paint in their eighties or nineties, still staging big exhibitions, selling work and finding inspiration.Isabella DucrotRome, Italy(Images: Laura Sciacovelli)Isabella Ducrot’s craft is something of a patchwork. It incorporates textiles procured on her travels in Russia, Turkey, China, India and Tibet, and stories from her voracious imagination – Ducrot has been writing for far longer than she has been painting.Born in Naples, Ducrot moved to Rome in her thirties, lured by the promise of freedom and anonymity. “Romans are indifferent,” she says. “They’re not particularly interested in each other. That’s a good quality.” In the Italian capital, Ducrot surrounded herself with intellectuals, including novelist Alberto Moravia and filmmaker Pier Paolo Pasolini.She picked up a paintbrush in her fifties and now, in her studio in the 16th-century Palazzo Doria Pamphilj, she paints on Japanesegampi, a fine, fibrous paper with a satin-like sheen and a fine weft. Made for etching, inking and painting, the delicate material is as recognisable a part of Ducrot’s output as her ochre, green and rust flower motifs, which are achieved with a brush tied to a stick.Ducrot says that she came to painting so late because of an early education that instructed her to respect tradition and not make changes to the world around her. “It took many years for me to dare to begin this unusual adventure,” she says. Today, at the age of 94, her adventure continues.Born:1931Career highlight:Designing the scenography for Dior’s haute-couture show at Paris’s Musée Rodin in 2024Exhibitions in 2026:A retrospective at Museo Madre in NaplesPeter SaulGermantown,USA(Image: Stefan Ruiz)“Except for occasionally talking about modern art to college students, I haven’t done anything but paint pictures since 1959,” says Peter Saul. Those pictures are hard to forget. Saul’s subjects bend, distend, wriggle and writhe across the canvas, transforming into colourful, twisted monstrosities along the way.Those subjects have changed with the times too: the Vietnam War, Ronald Reagan, Donald Trump. American life – its vividness and its vulgarity – is a loose theme. That and, as Saul puts it, “bad guys”. “I have more freedom to distort, invent motivation or do anything I want to bad guys,” he says. “Whereas with ‘good guys’, the artist is supposed to follow the rules.”Saul works from preliminary sketches that have a sense of “freshness”, which can be developed as he paints. As he adds his cacophony of colours, he thinks about how to make the painting interesting to the highest number of people. “The picture has to live in the world,” he says. Saul’s work has done just that for a long time but the critical response to it has become far warmer in recent years. While he is appreciative, the change has had little effect on his practice. “Unlike most artists I know, I don’t seem to respond much to encouragement,” he says. “As long as I’ve got the art supplies, I’m going to paint a picture.”Born:1934Elected to the American Academy of Arts and Letters:2010Current exhibition:Group showSixties Surrealat the Whitney Museum until 19 JanuaryRose WylieKent, UK(Images: Elena Heatherwick)When a particularly big globule of paint falls off Rose Wylie’s brush, she’ll simply cover it with a sheet of newspaper to stop it getting on her shoes. “I’m not a precious worker,” she says as we stand in her studio. A soft layer of newspaper carpets the floor, paintbrushes stick out of cans stacked on chairs and colourful splatters obscure the skirting board. Wylie’s unruly garden has crept up the side of the house and into this first-floor room – a jasmine plant pushes through a window in one corner. “Mostly you’re criticised if you don’t tidy up,” she says. “But if you get through a certain threshold, it becomes iconic.”Wylie’s artistic training went unused for years while she raised her family but, since returning to painting in her forties, she has become a critical and commercial darling of the art world. She is currently working on a painting that features a large, “nonchalant” skeleton. It will appear in her upcoming exhibition at London’s Royal Academy in early 2026, her biggest show to date.Wylie’s bold canvases often combine text and figures from history, mythology or contemporary pop culture. And while Wylie’s process can be messy, she is exacting about her practice, regularly working late into the night wrestling with a painting. “Often it’s horrible, slimy, trite, pedestrian,” she says. “There are 100 things that can go wrong, particularly with faces, and then, for some odd reason, suddenly it’s alright.”Born:1934Breakthrough moment:Women to Watchexhibition in Washington (2010)Elected to the Royal Academy:2014Martial RaysseBouniagues, France(Image: Léon Prost)When Monocle meets Martial Raysse at his home in Dordogne, southwest France, the chill of autumn is creeping in, giving the light a quality that we can’t quite put our finger on. “In Paris, the shadows are blue but here they are pink,” says Raysse. “That’s what seduced me.” Though at 89 he is focused on painting “in strict obedience to the great masters”, the multidisciplinary artist can look back on a remarkably diverse body of work.Raysse is cryptic about his artistic awakening but, according to his gallerists, he was already painting and writing poetry at the age of 12. By the time the Centre Pompidou put on a retrospective of more than 200 of his works in 2014, Raysse’s artistic expression had taken on dozens of forms, from poetry and painting to neon sculptures and cinema. “The interaction of these different forms enriched my artistic practice,” he says. “But I haven’t adopted any digital tools. I prefer pencil, which I think gets much closer to rendering emotions faithfully.”Raysse is considered one of the earliest French champions of pop art. In 2011 his 1962 painting “L’année dernière à Capri (titre exotique)” fetched €4.8m at auction, for a time making him the highest-valued living French artist. But as a testament to his constant evolution, today he describes his association with the movement that made his fame as “a youthful error”, denouncing it as an “avatar of ready-made culture”.Is creativity linked to longevity, we ask? “Unfortunately, creativity doesn’t extend your life,” says Raysse. “But with experience, what you do gain is progress.”Born:1936First retrospective:Amsterdam’s Stedelijk Museum in 1965Notable public sculpture:Crocodile fountain in Place du Marché, Nîmes (1987)Frank BowlingLondon, UK(Images: Kalpesh Lathigra)At 91, Frank Bowling is still searching for new ways to let paint speak for itself. “I’m always following my instincts,” says Bowling, who has painted, poured, sprayed, stained and stitched vivid colours onto unprimed canvases for more than 70 years. “There was a time when I didn’t have a dealer and museums weren’t buying,” he says. “Now, my paintings are in more than 70 museums around the world.” His work is currently on show at the Bienal de São Paulo 2025 – a full-circle moment for the South America-born artist in the bright throes of his twilight years.A Bowling artwork begins on the floor. Every cotton-duck canvas receives its first colours in the form of drips of paint that fall from an earlier in-progress painting hanging above – a sort of artistic assembly line. “Then my assistant fills a bucket with paint and water and pours it down the canvas while I direct the flood,” he says.When Monocle visits his studio in South London, Bowling is directing his son, Ben – who’s armed with silver glitter-laced spray paint – from a wheelchair. “Brighter,” says Bowling of a long white streak that cuts down the canvas like a coastline, “all the way.” When Ben reaches a patch of empty space, Bowling reacts instinctively. “Put red in it,” he says. But the painting is still not finished. Later, it will appear “on the ceiling of my room”. Bowling’s imagination never rests. “I’m preoccupied with the search for something new in painting so I’m always working in different ways.”Born:1934Career highlight:Tate Britain retrospective, 2019Post-studio ritual:Straight to the pub for a “half pint of bitter and jolt of whiskey”Inson WongsamLamphun,Thailand(Image: Duangsuda Kittivattananon)Inson Wongsam is a key figure in the history of Thai modern art and the scene’s evolution from staid and traditional to colourful and contemporary. The son of a temple goldsmith, he studied under influential Italian sculptor Corrado Feroci, who changed his name to Silpa Bhirasri.“Professor Silpa once told me: ‘Inson, if you wish to be an artist, you must sketch and work every day,’” says Wongsam from his studio and private museum in Lamphun, a small city near Chiang Mai. Wongsam has been an artist his entire adult life, creating metal sculptures and wood carvings in the 20th century and, in recent decades, wood block prints and paintings. His days begin at about 04.00, drawing in bed with watercolours or red and green pens or pencils. This is followed by some stretching, breakfast and more drawing in his studio. “When I cannot work, such as on days when I must visit the doctor, I feel uneasy,” he says.Wongsam celebrated his 91st birthday in September with an exhibition at Bangkok’s Nova Contemporary. “Age has never affected my determination because I believe that the spirit is more important than the body,” he says. “As I grow older, I aim to make my work even more vibrant – never dim or lifeless.” Wongsam is currently working on an exhibition that is planned for next year. “I have reached a point in my life where everything feels clear,” he says. “I don’t need to look elsewhere for inspiration. Ideas come from me, pushing my work forward.”Born:1934Major exhibition:A retrospective of more than 100 works at the Bangkok Art&Culture Centre, which coincided with his 80th birthdayAppointed a National Artist of Thailand:1999Martha JungwirthVienna, Austria(Image: Yannick Schuette)At 85, Martha Jungwirth remains as industrious as she was when she first appeared on the art scene in the early 1960s. Her belated recognition (she only began attracting serious attention and staging large solo exhibitions in the 2010s) and the attendant title of grande dame of Austrian art have not made her aloof. Instead, she is kind and inquisitive, asking as many questions as she answers. Jungwirth works in watercolour or oil on paper rather than canvas and her style is marked by colourful abstraction, with pinks and reds at the fore.Jungwirth’s wanderlust has taken her across the world, though in recent years she has favoured Greece, which she first visited with her late husband, art historian Alfred Schmeller. “When you travel, you meet people, you eat differently and you feel that you don’t understand anything,” she says as she shows Monocle a series of watercolours from Bali, comprising her impressions of the custom of placing small, stylised houses outside homes. “That activates you again.”In Jungwirth’s large, light-filled studio, pride of place is shared equally between her current works and her sources of inspiration: reproductions of baroque paintings (classical art has always moved her), alongside newspaper clippings and photographs scattered among countless paint tubes. “I don’t even know what colours are in them,” she says. It is this disorder that drives her to keep working and exploring.“I always try to surprise myself. Otherwise, you stiffen up and get stuck.”Born:1940Breakthrough series:Indesit, her impressions of household appliances, exhibited at Documenta 6 in Kassel, Germany in 1977Record sum for a painting at auction:€520,000

Culture

Museums should ask questions. But does Cairo’s new Grand Egyptian project provoke too many?

2025-12-23 19:57:18

There are few cultural projects that have so perfectly captured both a nation’s ambition and its inertia as the Grand Egyptian Museum (GEM). Two decades in the making, more than $1bn (€870m) spent and several false starts later, the colossal complex at Giza has finally opened its doors, a stone’s throw from the pyramids and the Cairo ring road. The story, like the building, is monumental. Yet, as the first visitors wander through its marble-bright atriums and past the 3,200-year-old Ramses II statue, it’s worth asking: what does Egypt really want this museum to say? From its conception in the early 1990s, the GEM was always about more than archaeology. It was a gesture of modern nationhood, Egypt announcing itself as a cultural superpower with institutions capable of rivalling the Louvre, the British Museum or the Smithsonian. But the museum’s journey tells a more complicated story. Construction began in 2005, stalled after the Arab Spring, was revived with loans from Japan, then delayed again by the coronavirus pandemic. In many ways, the museum became a metaphor for modern Egypt: heavy with history, halted by politics and ultimately propelled forward by the stubborn belief that grandeur can substitute for good governance.Grand designs: Cairo’s new museum has spectacular sights inside and out(Image: Mohamed Elshahed/Anadolu via Getty Images)Designed by Dublin-based Heneghan Peng Architects, the building is suitably theatrical. Its vast triangular façade of alabaster and glass tilts toward the pyramids in a silent architectural dialogue with the ancient world. Inside, a grand staircase ascends through a procession of statues, sarcophagi and stelae. There is a sense of awe leading up to the full Tutankhamun collection (shown together for the first time). Though breathtaking, it also feels carefully stage-managed. Is this a museum or a national theatre? The guest list for the grand opening this weekend underscored this point. Egypt invited presidents, kings and crown princes from Europe and the Arab world. There were red carpets, drone shows and speeches about civilisation’s cradle reawakening. The message was not subtle: Egypt is back on the global stage. Yet such pageantry hints at a quiet insecurity. After all, Cairo’s other great museum, the dusty, beloved Tahrir building, told its story without ceremony or LED screens. This new iteration feels like it’s trying to prove something. Beyond the symbolism, the GEM forms part of a vast redevelopment of the Giza plateau with new roads, hotels, a planned airport and even manicured parks where there were once chaotic streets. Tourism accounts for about 12 per cent of Egypt’s GDP and the government hopes that the museum will boost arrivals by up to 20 per cent. It’s a tall order in a global economy that’s wobbling, with Egypt grappling with debt, inflation and youth unemployment. But the museum offers a different kind of investment: narrative. It allows Cairo to reframe the conversation from crisis to civilisation, from IMF loans to the legacy of the pharaohs. Indeed, who is this museum for? The ticket prices will certainly deter many Egyptians and the scale of the site feels designed for international tour groups rather than locals on an afternoon outing. This is spectacle as soft power. In a country where history is counted in millennia, the opening of a new museum should perhaps be taken with a pinch of desert salt. The GEM is an extraordinary achievement, yes, but it’s also a reminder that modern Egypt is still negotiating its relationship with the recent past. Whether it becomes a living cultural institution or another monument to ambition will depend on what happens when the world’s cameras leave and the red carpets are rolled away. Until then, Egypt’s newest wonder will have to wait to see if the 20-year process was worth it. Inzamam Rashid is Monocle’s Gulf correspondent. For more opinion, analysis and insight, subscribe to Monocle today.Further reading? We caught up with Shirin Frangoul-Brückner, the CEO of Stuttgart-based design studio Atelier Brückner, who designed the galleries, Grand Staircase and atrium for the Grand Egyptian Museum. Read our conversation here.

Culture

Paris radio darling La Patate Douce turns up the volume with a new café in Le Marais

2025-12-23 19:57:18

If you have eaten in a decent Paris restaurant lately, you might well be familiar with La Patate Douce radio station – perhaps its lively, on-the-hour jingle or its upbeat playlist that keeps your toes tapping, whether you’re a pot-washer, a chef or a diner. “I once recognised our playlist in a restaurant by the beach in Biarritz,” says Jules Effantin, the station’s founder. “That made me smile.”Jules Effantin, founder and DJTapas at La Patate DouceTo mark the fifth anniversary of La Patate Douce (which means “The Sweet Potato”), Effantin, a former DJ, has combined his penchant for music with his other love, hospitality. He has created a physical space for fans of the station: a café and listening bar in Le Marais. Furnished with his own objets d’art sourced from flea markets, the 1970s-style interior invites the station’s 200,000 monthly listeners – and those yet to discover its eclectic mélange of disco-funk, jazz, Afro-soul and house music – to gather in the company of its creators.A listening bar by nightThe bar keeps things lively well into the eveningIf Effantin’s name sounds familiar, it’s because he’s the brother of Victoria Effantin, one of the co-founders of Parisian boulangerie Mamiche. By day, customers can enjoy the music with one of her pastries in hand. “This is the only other coffee shop in the capital where you’ll find Mamiche’s treats,” says Effantin. By night, there are musical soirées, DJ sets and concerts.The radio station and café’s enthusiasm for the humblepatateof their name makes itself known on the menu, which tries not to take itself too seriously. Wash down the ceviche with the cocktail à la Patate Douce: tequila, lime juice and, you guessed it, a little sweet-potato juice.lapatatedouceradio.comUp in smokeLa Patate Douce live on airOut on the café’s terrace

Culture

The forgotten underpass of Tokyo’s Skwat Kameari has become a creative, cultural hotspot

2025-12-23 19:57:18

Until recently, east Tokyo’s Kameari neighbourhood was perhaps best known as the setting forKochiKame, a popular manga about a hapless policeman that ran for 40 years before bowing out in 2016. These days, however, there’s a new crowd coming to this far-ﬂung corner of the city – and they’re here to visit a bookshop under the railway tracks of the Joban Line, along with a record store, an exhibition space and a coffee shop.The tracks that snake out from Kameari Station run high overhead, cutting through a residential area with a narrow road on either side. Underneath this is mostly blank space; there’s some bicycle parking here and there, as well as a small supermarket, but the railway line’s underbelly was otherwise left unused – until now. Stroll 10 minutes along the railway line from the station and you’ll ﬁnd Skwat Kameari Art Centre (SKAC).This unconventional cultural outpost is a quiet presence with no splashy signs or bright colours. Instead, big windows and wooden benches encourage passersby to engage with this fresh addition to their neighbourhood. Peer through and you’ll see people rifling through crates of vinyl or scanning bookshelves. A café, Tawks, is also inviting, while a battered but coolly retro sofa sits outside.Twelvebooks inventory on open metal shelvesInside is one of the most unconventional bookshops in Tokyo, a hybrid shop-warehouse for art-book distributor Twelvebooks, founded in 2010 by Atsushi Hamanaka. The company’s inventory of 80,000 volumes is stacked here on open metal shelves. Record shop Vinyl Delivery Service (VDS) sells mostly second-hand titles, while the exhibition space is currently showing a video of a collaboration between upcycling brand Format and artist Seongil Choi.How did this project come to be here, in an area that’s generally considered unfashionable? SKAC is the work of designer Keisuke Nakamura and his ﬁrm Daikei Mills. Until 2019, Nakamura ran his office and an events space known as Vacant in Harajuku, one of Tokyo’s buzziest neighbourhoods. For about 10 years, it was a magnet for a cross-section of cultural scenes; but as that era began to draw to a close, Nakamura tentatively launched Skwat to explore his interest in Tokyo’s overlooked places. In a city that’s teeming with construction sites and epic mixed-use developments, he was curious about the possibilities of buildings or, in this case, voids, that ostensibly had no commercial value.From the outset, there was a strong cultural element to Skwat. Nakamura made his ﬁrst stab at the project six years ago. It involved taking over a small house and former dry cleaners in Harajuku – a compact building that was painted in a vibrant blue and ﬁlled with art books supplied by Twelvebooks. In this cobalt building, they launched Thousandbooks, where every book was priced at ¥1,000 (€5). Nakamura later opened another Skwat pop-up, again with Twelvebooks, in the glitzy Minami-Aoyama district.The term squatting – Nakamura became familiar with it as a student in London – implies illegal occupation but this was never Skwat’s intention. “Our concept is to ﬂexibly reimagine spaces,” says Daikei Mills’ Masaki Jo. “We’re trying to ﬁnd value in places that don’t ﬁt within the existing framework.” Nakamura seeks out places that others might not notice. “When it was decided that we would leave Minami-Aoyama and we were searching for our next location, this underpass caught our attention,” says Jo. After a few conversations with the Japan Railway East Urban Development Corporation, the Daikei Mills team saw potential in what was effectively an empty space.Titles on displayTakaya Suzuki, who looks after printed ephemeraA design for lifeKeisuke Nakamura founded Tokyo design studio Daikei Mills in 2011 and has worked on projects for the likes of Issey Miyake, Not a Hotel and Auralee. He has long been interested in ﬁnding ways of opening empty spaces to the public. “Tokyo exhibits an excessively timid character, permeated by conservative thinking,” he says. “I have felt the need to break through this, aspiring to guide the city’s potential from a more artistic perspective”. Daikei Mills is now based in Skwat’s Kameari project.Twelvebooks is bringing the same kind of thinking to the rareﬁed world of art books. “We want to popularise them,” says Yoko Nakayama, one of Twelvebooks’ staff. “We seek to provide opportunities for people to pick up and browse photo books, and art books published overseas that are often difﬁcult to ﬁnd in Japan.” The advantage here is that they can also buy them.Twelvebooks is an organiser of the annual Tokyo Art Book Fair, the largest event of its kind in Asia. Unsurprisingly, the company doesn’t focus on obvious blockbusters. Its most mainstream offerings are a selection of Phaidon titles but otherwise it stocks an eclectic selection of obscure exhibition catalogues, photography books and hard-to-ﬁnd editions, mostly from overseas. They choose books, mostly from small publishers, that are desirable as objects. Customers might not come with speciﬁc titles in mind but they will leave with a slim volume on a house by Balkrishna Doshi, say, or a cookbook from Apartamento.Event and art spaceRecords at Vinyl Delivery ServiceSKAC’s architecture is determinedly industrial. “From the start, we had a deliberate intention to try to ‘reveal’ the raw materials and structure,” says Jo. “We felt that there is a unique beauty to be found in places that seem forgotten within the city or in spaces left unﬁnished. So, rather than over-decorating, we intentionally left space and openness.” The result is a bracing palate cleanser after the deluge of crafted good taste that’s on offer elsewhere in the city.The irony is that Skwat’s radical rejection of retail and property norms has made this place a hit. The SKAC project was originally intended to have a limited run but, at least for now, it continues. “I think that it’s because the way we frame our perspective is a little different,” says Jo. “At SKAC, it’s not just about viewing an exhibition. You can pick up a book, listen to music and spend time over a drink. It serves as a place where people relate to their environment through real experiences.”Toko Nomura (left) and Yoko Nakayama from TwelvebooksSkwat’s success has inevitably attracted interest within Japan and further aﬁeld. And while Twelvebooks and VDS are core collaborators here, the next outing could look very different. “Each Skwat project is operated by a changing team with a different composition,” says Jo. “Likewise, SKAC is not a ﬁxed team but rather structured according to the goals and content of each project.”An outing to SKAC should be on the list of any curious traveller in Japan. It will take visitors to a pocket of Shitamachi (downtown Tokyo) that they almost certainly wouldn’t see otherwise – and they can also stop in at the new museum forKochiKame, which opened earlier this year. The project is a radical reimagining of the conventional bookshop format and offers a thought-provoking perspective on what to do with the overlooked pockets of our cities. If you do make it here, come with an open mind, not a shopping list.twelve-books.com

Culture

After seven decades of creativity, David Gentleman shares advice for aspiring artists

2025-12-23 19:57:18

In an era when the online world offers an endless spew of just-minted hacks, short cuts and “12 Reasons Why…”, just who is 95-year-old David Gentleman to be offering lessons for young artists? Well, for a start, he’s the maestro behind some of the most longstanding, recognisable and beloved works of art and graphic design made in the UK since the 1950s – work also acknowledged and cherished worldwide. So it’s quite right that you sit up and take notice of Gentleman’s golden rules. After studying at London’s Royal College of Art under Edward Bawden and John Nash, Gentleman chipped and then rocketed away to become a garlanded public success who’s still at it: making work and publishing books, the latest of which isLessons for Young Artists.“Do it every day, even on holiday,” says Gentleman of making creativity a habit. It’s a statement that he has lived up to, spending five decades of a 70-year career in the top-floor studio of his Camden home, daily adding to a dizzying body of work: watercolour landscapes and corporate logos, charming illustrations and era-defining book covers, collections of celebrated postage stamps and righteously angry protest placards. It’s this broad swath of work – as engaging as it is engaged – and a lifetime of learning that are at the heart ofLessons for Young Artists.Enlightenment is offered in short chapters with deceptively simple headings, accompanied by Gentleman’s beguiling images: “Start small”, “Travel light”, “There are no rules”. These draw on deep knowledge wrought plainly to remind artists young and old to think about simplicity, to be nimble and ready, fearless and bold. The first chapter is accompanied by a pencil sketch of Suffolk trees from 2024 and a painting of some toys executed by Gentleman in 1936, when he was just six. It’s lovely to witness the work of an artist’s hand across an almost 90-year span. And that’s a vital lesson in itself: keep on keeping on.In a chapter headed, “Say ‘yes’ to the unexpected invitation”, we see his designs for Royal Mail stamps after their decades of dullness. Then logos for British Steel and the National Trust and a groundbreaking relationship with Penguin books, for which his best-known work is the re-presenting of Shakespeare’s plays for mid-1970s paperbacks that mixed playful, organic woodcuts with the clean modernity of the Helvetica typeface. Gentleman’s work has enchanted millions of people, yet his selfless style has never wrestled a commission into becoming “a Gentleman”. With winning magnanimity he confesses, “I’ve never had any interest in consciously trying to develop a style.”While Gentleman’s tone of voice is pleasantly fatherly (“Tidying the studio is a cheerful way of coping if a piece seems to be going wrong”), he’s also cut from a similar cloth to the great William Faulkner, who said, “I write when the spirit moves me – and the spirit moves me every day.” Indeed, the book’s final chapter is titled “The only way to become an artist is to do it”. No pop-ups, no hacks, just a beautifully designed, wellbound little hardback. It is, of course, not really a book about art but about living life, and to a ripe old age. A lesson, then, for everyone.Want more stories like these in your inbox?Sign up to Monocle’s email newsletters to stay on top of news and opinion, plus the latest from the magazine, radio, film and shop.Your EmailSubscribe

Culture

In a digital world, reading printed media has become more important than ever

2025-12-23 19:57:18

There is little that has shaped the West more than popular literacy. The fall in reading skills poses no less of a threat than the decline of our knowledge-based civilisation. Studies have long shown that reading activity, especially among younger people, is steadily decreasing. According to a recent report inThe Guardian, children’s enthusiasm for reading has sunk to an all-time low in the UK. There has been plenty of discussion on social media and in other publications – including Switzerland’sNZZnewspaper – about how dire this ﬁnding really is. But there have also been prominent intellectuals attempting to counter the alarmism. Among them is UK zoologist and author Matt Ridley, who argues that writing is simply being replaced by audio and video, and other skills are being developed.Are audio and video equivalent to the written word – and, if so, in what way? You can listen to a crime novel as an audiobook; a physics textbook, however, is a different proposition. But why learn physics at all these days, when you can simply ask artiﬁcial intelligence for answers? Is the acquisition of in-depth and comprehensive knowledge – the main purpose of reading – still necessary? Why bother trying to hold in your mind what you already have in your hand on a digital silver platter? Well, to rely solely on such devices would be a mistake that couldn’t be more fundamental.Use your brainIf we want to evolve as intellectual and cultural beings – and retain autonomy and control – we must have knowledge in our heads, not least to be able to properly question, evaluate and regulate what AI provides. Johann Wolfgang von Goethe gave us the decisive argument long ago: “One only sees what one knows.” And you can only enjoy what you see or sense. While the wine novice can discern just a few aspects of taste, the sommelier has hundreds of terms at their disposal and their instruction will help the novice to perceive more about what’s in their glass.Perception and knowledge always develop in interaction. The abstract knowledge that we acquire can shorten our path to an enriched experience, diversifying and intensifying our engagement with the sensory world. The apparent richness of the external world is in reality the richness of our inner world. Think of an exhibition: only those with knowledge of cultural history can fully comprehend the wealth of associations that it offers.The reliability of printed informationFulﬁlment and happiness in life have a lot to do with knowledge. One thing is essential for humans as spiritual beings: the acquisition of information and ideas, and their internal organisation into conceptual models of the world. This process can be broken down into two steps. First, we must memorise the building blocks of knowledge. Second, we must internally organise these into complex and coherent models. The first step requires effective ways to “imprint” it all in our minds, including repetition; the second requires time for processing and leisure for playful reﬂection.The best way to acquire such inner wealth is to read paper books. Their stable form makes it simpler to learn things. You’ll always ﬁnd a certain piece of information in the same place, instead of in a variety of locations, depending on format and advertising; you might remember that what you are looking for is at the top of the right-hand page near the end of the book. And there you will spot it, especially if it has been underlined. All of this is considerably more difficult with digital books.Our understanding of a text is enhanced by making handwritten notes, underlining important sections and so on. Studies have shown that multisensory learning that incorporates handwriting is particularly effective and also has advantages over typing. Digital devices offer a host of distractions, while analogue reading helps us to get a ﬁrmer hold on a text’s content. Even the mere presence of an inactive digital device has been found to reduce students’ concentration.Video and audio formats can be valuable additions to knowledge transfer in terms of multi-sensory learning. But they are unsuitable on their own when it comes to tackling demanding content. First, the ﬂeeting nature of these formats reduces how memorable their message is. Above all, it’s the temporal control over the ﬂow of information that gets in the way. When we are reading, we can pause at any time, reﬂect and reread a sentence or paragraph. This is essential for the internal organisation of complex knowledge. Pausing and replaying videos or podcasts, on the other hand, is so ﬁddly that it is not done nearly as often as necessary. That’s why reading remains essential for education.Intelligence is already in declineEven the educated middle class today is little aware of the revolutionary impact that reading has had on cultural and social development. Harvard anthropologist Joseph Henrich explores these themes in his important 2020 book,The Weirdest People in the World.Here, he shows that widespread literacy was the decisive factor that led to the development of a special set of psychological abilities. These include abstract-analytical thinking, increased self-discipline, the desire to understand yourself as an individual and the impulse to further develop your personal skills, as well as the ability to become part of institutions that function according to abstract, impersonal rules. This was the breeding ground on which the scientiﬁc and industrial revolution began to ﬂourish, from which our modern, liberal-democratic and affluent societies grew.Just as intensive bodybuilding visibly changes the physique and makes it more efficient, intensive reading strengthens the mind and demonstrably alters the brain. Among other things, it leads to changes in the prefrontal cortex, particularly in the area of the language centres, and to a thickening of thecorpus callosum, which connects both hemispheres of the brain. It’s probably more than a matter of correlation if, in parallel to a drop in quantitative reading activity, the ability to understand the content of complex texts declines. Contrary to the trend of previous decades, the IQ of the average population is now beginning to stagnate or even fall – the inverse of the long-celebrated Flynn effect.Reading culture is the pillar of Western civilisation. Do we really want to test how stable our way of life will remain once it has been removed? Humans are analogue creatures. We can neither digitise our reproduction nor the core processes of our self-education. It’s important to preserve reading culture and limit digitalisation in schools. We must continue to teach in the old-fashioned way: with paper and pen.About the writer:Dietmar Hansch is a physician, psychotherapist and publicist. A version of this article was originally published in German-language newspaperNZZ.Translation by Monocle.Read next:Space devoted to print media continues to vanish. We should be nourishing people on page – not just on screen

Culture

Radio Shinyabin has found the secret to connecting ever more isolated young people: Late-night broadcasts

2025-12-23 19:57:18

It’s 23.00 in Shibuya. Inside a radio control room, a studio engineer is preparing to take one of Japan’s most popular late-night stations on the air. A cornerstone of the country’s media, it runs to the early hours of the morning, bringing its audience along on a six-hour odyssey. Pushing the faders up, the studio manager engages the mics: this isRadio Shinyabin(“Midnight Mail”).“It’s not a traditional show where users tune in from start to finish,” says Tomoki Sakuma,Radio Shinyabin’s senior producer. Hosted on Japan’s public-service media, Nippon Hoso Kyokai (NHK), this eclectic programme has been running since 1990 and is just one of the country’s many late-night radio shows. “For long-time listeners, the broadcast has become as habitual as eating breakfast,” says Sakuma. “Every hourly time slot has its own fans.” Honed over years on Japanese airwaves,Radio Shinyabinkeeps a consistent tone with subtle changes in rhythm and content as the audience rotates through the night. News stories accompany tales of travel; music melts away into reflective discussion.Across a broadcast, the show can attract three million individuals, with about 600,000 listening at a time. In 2024, Radiko, the Japanese radio streaming app used to access shows from across the country, published a list of its most-listened-to programmes among 10- to 40-year-olds. Late-night shows formed the majority.It is telling that they thrive in Japan. With rises in loneliness linked to dwindling birthrates, small living spaces and a demanding work culture, growing numbers are flocking to radio in the wee hours to enjoyRadio Shinyabin’s sense of intimacy. “I always imagine that I’m speaking to a specific person,” says Akira Tokuda, who has been one of the show’s anchors for 11 years. “It isn’t one-way; it’s like a conversation.” Sometimes a human voice, wherever they are, can make all the difference.CommentFeeling part of a community is more important – and comforting – than ever for young Japanese people, whether they’re night-shift workers or lonely insomniacs.

Culture

Contrary to what you might have heard, Europe is a 21st-century success story

2025-12-23 19:57:18

Listen to the critics and you would think Europe was finished. Too bureaucratic, they say. Cannot agree on migration. Moving at glacial pace while Silicon Valley races ahead. It has become such a tired narrative that we have almost started believing it ourselves.But here is what the doom-mongers miss: Europe has quietly become one of history’s most remarkable success stories. We are talking about a continent that has created unprecedented prosperity while maintaining social cohesion and projecting influence. This transformation represents a fundamental shift in how we should understand European power and potential.Consider what Europe has survived over just the past decade and a half. The eurozone nearly collapsed under sovereign debt. Britain walked away. A pandemic shut down the global economy. War returned to European soil for the first time in generations. Each crisis was supposed to be the final nail in the coffin. Yet here we are: institutions intact and co-operation deeper than ever, constantly adapting and finding pragmatic solutions. Not bad for a region that supposedly can’t get its act together.True colours: Copenhagen shows Europe at its best(Image: Hilary Swift/Bloomberg via Getty Images)Walk through Copenhagen, Vienna or Zürich and try to argue this is a continent in decline. European cities dominate every quality-of-life survey worth its salt (read Monocle’s here). The trains run on time. You can get decent healthcare without going bankrupt. A bright kid from a working-class family can still make it to university. These are not small things – they are the stuff that determines whether ordinary people can live decent lives.Innovation? Please. We are not trying to be Silicon Valley – and that is exactly the point. While others chase the latest app or cryptocurrency bubble, European companies are solving real problems. BioNTech helped to save the world during the coronavirus pandemic. Novo Nordisk is tackling diabetes and obesity. ASML builds the machines that make computer chips possible. Airbus keeps people flying. Our renewable-energy sector is reshaping how the world powers itself. This is not flashy disruption – it is the kind of deep, patient innovation that moves civilisation forward.Even our supposed weakness – all that regulation – has become a superpower. General data protection regulation (GDPR) did not just protect European privacy; it forced tech giants everywhere to change how they handle data. Our environmental standards, consumer protections and competition rules get copied around the world. Europe is second only to the US in economic clout and miles ahead of China in per-capita wealth. Ten of the world’s 20 most competitive economies are European. Luxembourg, Norway and Switzerland all outproduce US workers per hour, while still taking proper lunch breaks and holidays.Sure, we have problems. Our capital markets are a mess of national silos. The birth rate is falling. Getting 27 countries to agree on anything can feel like herding cats. But these are fixable problems, not existential threats. Integrate financial markets, get smarter about attracting talent from abroad and commit properly to green investment. None of this is rocket science.The real problem is in our heads. We have internalised the decline narrative so completely that we cannot see our own success. Meanwhile, the world is shifting around us. The US is tearing itself apart over culture wars and conspiracy theories. China is staring down a demographic cliff and drowning in debt. Against this backdrop, Europe’s combination of prosperity, stability and openness starts to look pretty attractive.The 21st century will not belong to whoever has the loudest voice or builds the biggest military. It will belong to whoever can integrate diverse societies, create sustainable prosperity and maintain democratic institutions under pressure. Europe has been quietly mastering these skills for decades. The only thing missing is the confidence to recognise what it has accomplished.Professor Arturo Bris is a Monocle contributor and director of Switzerland’s World Competitiveness Center. He is the author of ‘SuperEurope: The Unexpected Hero of the 21st Century’. Want more on Europe’s potential? Read how the continent could gain from a US brain drain. This story originally appeared in The Monocle Minute…Monocle’s free-to-read daily newsletter. Sign up to get insight from Monocle in your inbox every day.Your EmailSubscribe

Culture

Five must-see shows during Frieze London 2025

2025-12-23 19:57:18

The art crowd will congregate in Regent’s Park this week for the 23rd edition of Frieze London. While there is plenty to experience under the cover of the tents – and in the surrounding sculpture park – this is also the time of year when museums host some of their best shows. Here are five Monocle recommendations for while you’re in town. ‘Kerry James Marshall: The Histories’, Royal Academy of ArtsOften claimed to be the US’s greatest living painter, Kerry James Marshall had a lot to live up to with his largest-ever European retrospective. Thankfully, he delivers with large bold works that centre black figures and riff on art history, civil rights and science fiction. Ensure that you have plenty of time to get lost in the work, which is sometimes poignant, often humorous, always complex and beautifully, originally rendered. There is something unexpected in every room, plenty of which will stay with you long after leaving the Royal Academy. ‘Kerry James Marshall: The Histories’ runs until 18 January 2026 True colours: Kerry James Marshall, ‘School of Beauty, School of Culture’, 2012(Image: Sean Pathasema)‘Wayne Thiebaud: American Still Life’, The Courtauld Though many people will easily be able to recall a Wayne Thiebaud painting – of gumball machines, or slices of cake or pie – this is surprisingly his first-ever exhibition in the UK. As well as bringing together some of his most recognisable works, the showcase explores Thiebaud’s journey as an artist. Don’t miss “Delights” on the first floor, which includes 17 etchings and some endearing masking-tape-bound tools that offer further insight into Thiebaud’s practice. Don’t be surprised if you come away from The Courtauld on the hunt for your own sweet treat. ‘Wayne Thiebaud: American Still Life’ runs until 18 January 2026 Slice of the action: Wayne Thiebaud, ‘Pie Rows’, 1961(Image: Wayne Thiebaud Foundation)‘Nigerian Modernism’, Tate Modern There are more than 250 works in this ambitious new show at Tate Modern, which charts 50 years of Nigerian art history. Each room is dedicated to a different artist or movement and the country’s rich cultural heritage quickly comes to the fore as you walk through them. Well-known artists are featured alongside those who haven’t yet had their dues. The multitude of mediums includes sculpture, painting, textiles and beadwork. “There are artists looking at daily life and thinking about their own personal histories, alongside big ideas of nationhood, belonging and community,” Tate assistant curator of international art Bilal Akkouche tells Monocle. “The exhibition does a lot and says a lot.”  ‘Nigerian Modernism’ runs until 10 May 2026 Uche Okeke, ‘Fantasy and Masks c.1960’(Image: Courtesy of Research and Cultural Collections University of Birmingham)‘Peter Doig: House of Music’, Serpentine South A world away from the pin drop quiet of many art galleries, Peter Doig’s new show at Serpentine South adds a soundtrack to his paintings. Gigantic pump out music of the artist’s choosing throughout the exhibition rooms. This soundtrack creates a unique viewing experience and seems to bring out new elements from the colourful paintings, which feature everything from musicians and instruments to lions and lakesides. If you are trying to find a break from the busyness of Frieze, you would do well to take a seat in one of the recliners here and let the sights and the sounds wash over you.  ‘Peter Doig: House of Music’ runs until 8 February 2026 ‘Peter Doig: House of Music’(Image: Prudence Cuming Associates)‘Zofia Rydet: Sociological Record’, The Photographers’ Gallery At the age of 67, the 20th century photographer Zofia Rydet set herself the task of documenting “every” type of Polish household. She roamed towns, cities and the countryside, knocking on doors and photographing the interiors and inhabitants of those houses. This exhibition brings together more than 100 prints from the project and opens a unique window into the lives of ordinary people at a certain moment in time. While you’re at The Photographers’ Gallery, be sure to visitBoris Mikhailov: Ukrainian Diaryand stop by the small tribute marking 100 years of the photobooth too.  ‘Zofia Rydet: Sociological Record’ runs until 22 February 2026.From ‘Zofia Rydet: Sociological Record’(Image: Zofia Rydet)