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Category / People / Icons / Muses

Virtually Unknown in the West, But She’s an Icon of the Arab World

The best way to make fast friends with a taxi driver in the Middle East? Ask them a simple question: “Fairuz or Umm Kulthum?” Sensational diva, singer, songwriter and actress, affectionately called ‘Egypt’s fourth pyramid’ and ‘mother of the Arabs’, Rolling Stones magazine ranked Umm Kulthum at number 61 of the 200 greatest singers of…

The Puerto Rican Playboy who Ruled Fashion in the Decades of Decadence

To be one of “Antonio’s Girls”, as they were known, meant you were going places. You had “it”. Grace Jones, Jerry Hall, Tina Chow, Pate Cleveland and Jessica Lange are names that are much better known today than Antonio Lopez, but they were all key members of his unofficial talent school whose careers he launched…

Meet the Paper Bag Baron of East London

Paul Gardner; the man, the myth, the London legend. If you ever have the pleasure of purchasing a paper bag from Paul, count yourself lucky. Like his shop, Paul and his family of ‘market sundriesmen’ are a longstanding East End institution. For over four generations, the Gardner’s have been servicing scales, stocking bags of all…

The Beauty Who Created the Beast

Of the six original Universal Monsters, none is so ubiquitous and iconic as the Creature from the Black Lagoon. The film, released in 1954, still screens regularly at theatres dedicated to classic cinema. What few knew until recently however, is that the credit for the Creature’s iconic design was cruelly stolen from one of the…

Poke around the Psychedelic Fortress of a Self-Made Saint

Venturing down an unassuming gravel road grown over with grass in rural Marion County, Georgia, you’re met by a huge pair of piercing blue eyes. Look around, and you’re met by many more sets of eyes staring out from intense faces emblazoned with vivid reds, greens and yellows, adorned in geometric patterns and spiritual symbols.…

Before the music died, he recorded and rescued it for the ages

Perhaps you remember the feeling of unearthing a really great gem at the record store – a forgotten band from another time with an original sound that sends those feel-good electric impulses to your brain. Imagine making it your lifelong mission to find that feeling; following it far past the local record store, to the…

Life Lessons with Momofuku: Patron Saint of Instant Noodles and Late Bloomers

Have you ever felt like you’ve started late in life? Have you ever experienced an epic failure in your professional career and felt like giving up? That you’re “past it” and it’s “too late” to make something of yourself? Meet Momofuku Ando, none other than the eccentric character who invented instant ramen with the lofty…

The Unsung Queen of Folk, Not Just Bob Dylan’s Girlfriend

The perfectly angelic voice of Joan Baez weaves through our guard to remind us of what has been lost or perhaps what should have been found. Laments for worlds lost or yet to come, Joan will forever remind us of our common humanity. Perhaps most poignant, her haunting rendition of The Night They Drove Old…

Movie Pitches for Women the World Forgot

Their stories have been buried in the past, eclipsed by others who perhaps achieved more or possessed qualities the world deemed more important. But today, we’re meeting a few muses that fell down the back of the history’s sofa. I’m filing the result of today’s internet finds under “women to make movies about”. Princess Amélie…

Who Was the Love Doctor of Belle Epoque Paris?

Dr. Samuel Pozzi may be a father of modern gynaecology, whose name is still tied to a pair of surgical scissors used to operate on fallopian tubes around the world today (the pozzi forceps), but his story would be much better placed in a steamy romance novel than a medical textbook. The “disgustingly handsome” celebrity…

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