Jurgen Lijcops, author of the bestseller 150 Bars You Need to Visit Before You Die, selected the 150 wine bars you must visit, from Bordeaux to Cape Town, from Bangkok to Sydney. Some are unique because of their exquisite decor, others for their breathtaking views or their exceptional service. All of them have a unique wine list that will surprise even the most demanding connoisseurs.
“Reflecting the international food scene, this book presents a bucket list showing today’s most inspiring gourmet experiences.” – Amélie Vincent – The Foodalist
Chefs, gastronomy and lifestyle are hot topics. However, finding the ultimate dining experience around the world might be challenging and can be disappointing.
From Paris (Plaza Athénée, Septime) and Mexico City (Quintonil, Lorea) to Tokyo (Den, Florilège, Sushi Saito), Amélie Vincent, also known as The Foodalist, selects 150 must-visit restaurants around the world in her latest book 150 Restaurants You Need to Visit before You Die. These culinary hotspots promise a unique experience to the diners, through exquisite menus, original designs and creative chefs.
Founder of The Foodalist Communication Agency (www.thefoodalist.com), Amélie Vincent, is an expert in revealing culinary trends worldwide. She has the world’s best chefs in her network, and works with the most influential media around the world.
Thanks to her photographer’s eye and her experience as a culinary journalist, 150 Restaurants You Need to Visit before You Die is the ultimate bucket list for every single foodie and gourmet traveller and the sequel to the equally standout book 150 Bars You Need to Visit Before You Die ISBN: 9789401449120.
This book highlights and explores some of the world’s most extraordinary and luxurious spa destinations. It offers readers a curated list of 150 exceptional spas across various countries and regions, each renowned for its unique treatments, breathtaking locations, and exceptional wellness experiences. Includes detailed insights into each featured spa, its amenities, signature treatments, wellness philosophies, and the overall ambiance. Readers can expect to find a combination of destination spas, resort spas, urban retreats, and wellness centres that offer a diverse range of holistic therapies, relaxation techniques, and rejuvenating experiences. It could serve as both a practical travel guide for spa enthusiasts and a source of inspiration for those seeking ultimate relaxation and self-care experiences. A bucket-list reference for spa enthusiasts, travellers, and wellness seekers, providing a curated selection of some of the world’s most indulgent and transformative spa experiences.
Hotels continue to appeal to the imagination. The sector re-invents itself time and time again and sets the limits for the ultimate overnight stay. But which hotels offer you a once in a lifetime experience? This book lists the ultimate top 150 hotels, compiled by travel and lifestyle journalist Debbie Pappyn. All hotels guarantee a unique experience: a unique view or location, the incredible luxury or inimitable charm, the sophisticated design, the service or simply manta rays and sea turtles swimming under your bed… Debbie Pappyn visited more than 1000 hotels. She draws from her own experience, adds her ultimate wish list and gives you the reason why you have to stay there. This is a revised and updated version of the ultimate ‘bucket list hotel guide’ and one of the 10 books in the highly successful 150 series.
This book explores all continents and countries in search of the most extraordinary national parks around the world. Well-known and lesser-known parks are featured, but they are all special because of breathtaking views, a unique atmosphere, or exceptional fauna and flora. In these parks you will experience unforgettable treks and adventures and enjoy magnificent views. From desert parks to safari parks, from jungle areas to the highest mountains; each park has its unique story to tell. This book can serve as a practical travel guide but also as inspiration for those looking for the ultimate next travel destination. A traveller’s bucket list with a selection of the world’s most incredible natural parks.
“… With enticing descriptions and exquisite photography, the book is perfect for travelers to leaf through for destination inspiration. Here is a preview of six of the most tempting tea houses you should put on your 2026 bucket list.” — Forbes
Discover the most enchanting tea houses around the world in 150 Tea Houses You Need to Visit Before You Die. This book takes you on a fascinating journey through 150 unique tea houses across all continents. Whether you are a seasoned tea enthusiast or seeking new travel destinations, this richly illustrated book serves as an inspiring travel guide. From traditional Japanese tea houses to modern, trendy hot spots in global cities, each tea house has its own story, ambiance, and unique tea experience. Immerse yourself in the art of tea drinking and uncover must-visit locations.
“… Use it for inspiration before ~booking~ your next trip.”— Buzzfeed
Discover the most enchanting libraries around the world in 150 Libraries You Need to Visit Before You Die. This book will take you on a fascinating journey through 150 unique libraries across all continents. Whether you are an avid reader or architecture lover, this richly illustrated book serves as an inspiring travel guide and is the perfect reference for those in search of quiet yet endlessly interesting spaces. From opulent Baroque monasteries to sleek contemporary cultural hubs, each library has its own story – and an engrossing selection of books and media to browse through, of course.
“Golf, more than any other sport, is inextricably tied to the landscape. Mother Nature herself could be considered a golfer’s opponent; her rolling hills, sea breezes, and atmospheric pressure challenge all who face her. This is why golf courses are found in some of the world’s most scenic locations.” — author Stefanie Waldek
This book is a gift for every golfer – expert or novice – who dreams of travelling the world to the most beautiful golf courses. Even non-golfers will enjoy this collection of exceptional courses across the globe. Whereas the original 150 Golf Courses You Need to Visit Before You Die book fits into any golf bag, this updated version is an eye-catching book suited for any coffee table or desk. From the luxurious cover to the decorative world map poster on which you can flag your top courses with the supplied set of sticker tags, this book is a true collector’s item. Picking 150 top courses was no easy task. Author Stefanie Waldek carefully selected and described an array of courses that can be found along coastlines, in the mountains, in deserts, and along lakes. All accessible to and playable by the public.
The newest addition to the elegant 150 series of themed travel guides, this book will submerge you in coffee culture. Discover the most exquisite coffee shops around the world in 150 Coffee shops You Need to Visit Before You Die. This book will take you on a fascinating journey through 150 unique coffee shops across all continents. This richly illustrated book serves as an inspiring travel guide and is the perfect reference for those in search of the ultimate sip of coffee. From opulent century-old coffee houses to artisan coffee roasteries, each coffee shop has its own story – one of passion, craft and exceptional taste.
Discover the grandest opera houses around the world in 150 Opera Houses You Need to Visit Before You Die. This book will take you on a fascinating journey through 150 unique opera houses across all continents. Whether you are an opera-goer or architecture lover, this richly illustrated book serves as an inspiring travel guide and is the perfect reference for those passionate about the performing arts. From opulent Baroque theatres in Germany to sleek contemporary performing arts centres in China, each opera house has its own story – full of drama of course, and worth exploring both on stage and backstage.
While most books on architecture focus on the architectural outcome itself, Architects on Dwelling takes a close look at how that outcome is created. To design any kind of dwelling, architects draw on both their reservoir of ideas as well as their own experiences as fellow inhabitants of such structures. This book explores how architects design the places we inhabit and how those places in turn inform the manner in which we live, in ways beyond lifestyle and personal taste.
Through contributions by Stephen Hoey, Henry McKeown & Ian Alexander, James Mitchell, Stacey Philips, Christopher Platt, Adrian Stewart, and Miranda Webster—most of whom are Scotland-based practitioners as well as teachers in The Glasgow School of Art—it reveals the unique values and qualities that inform their design processes.In their essays, they focus mostly on one exemplary building, explaining how and why they design the way they do. Dick van Gameren, Simon Henley, and Graeme Hutton, distinguished experts and themselves architect-educators, place this work within an international context and provide insightful comment about what these design approaches inform us about contemporary design in Scotland. Complemented with a wide range of images, these essays both illuminate the architects’ motivations and inspirations and celebrate their featured works.
Taken as a whole, Architects on Dwelling reminds us how profoundly the place we live in matters to our wellbeing, and of the social responsibility architects have in creating the built environment in general and dwellings in particular.
Using descriptions from stories about early Scottish and Celtic saints, photographer Thomas Joshua Cooper and Catherine Mooney made pilgrimages to the birth sites, death sites and places of significance to the early Scottish Christian pioneers. The beautiful, often ethereal, photographs they made once they’d arrived in these places are reproduced in a format reminiscent of a Calendar of Saints, in which saints’ days were honoured – here illuminated by 79 of Thomas’ arresting black and white images. Locations depicted include Lothian, Scotland and Donegal, Ireland, mimicking journeys made first by St Enoch, her son St Mungo and his contemporary St Columba, among others, such as sites relating to St Ninian, St Constantine, St Serf, St Mirren and St Kessog; the latter was evangelised in Loch Lomond, Lennox and Perthshire and a number of views relate to his journey.
The stories of these early Celtic saints are fascinating and the corresponding landscape views by Cooper are transportive in evoking an earlier age, where the trappings of modern society are largely absent, and one can very easily imagine the paths, routes and journeys – or ‘desire lines’ – taken by these inspiring people.
Pio Abad’s artistic practice is concerned with the personal and political entanglements of objects. His wide-ranging body of work, encompassing drawing, painting, textiles, installation and text, mines alternative or repressed historical events and offers counternarratives that draw out threads of complicity between incidents, ideologies and people. Deeply informed by unfolding events in the Philippines, where the artist was born and raised, his work emanates from a family narrative woven into the nation’s story. Abad’s parents were at the forefront of the anti-dictatorship struggle in the Philippines during the 1970s and 80s and it is the need to remember this history that has shaped the foundations of his work.
This beautifully designed book accompanies the Ashmolean Museum’s second exhibition of its new Ashmolean NOW series, featuring the work of Pio Abad. Abad’s artistic practice is concerned with the personal and political entanglements of objects. His wide-ranging body of work, which includes drawing, painting, installation, textiles and text, mines alternative or repressed historical events, offering counternarratives. Abad’s new works link narratives found in the Museum’s collections and Oxford with his personal life in the UK and Philippines, where the artist was born and raised. The book features a new text by Abad and contributions by art historical experts including Dan Hicks.
“Haunting photographs” – The Wall Street Journal. “Henk van Rensbergen is a hero for urban explorers around the world” – Flanders Today. “As an airline pilot, Belgian-born Henk Van Rensbergen was used to travelling the world. But he found a great way to supersize that passion: hunting for the most wonderful, secret, haunting abandoned places” – CNN. While his crew is resting at the pool, pilot and photographer Henk van Rensbergen explores deserted city palaces, overgrown factories or desolate areas of nature, finding beauty in the decay. This engaging book of photographs, a revised edition with new material, lets us wander through abandoned places, including Abkhazia, a break-away region bordering Georgia and Russia and the newest must-visit for every urban explorer.
One of the first Swiss performance artists, Manon has fashioned a career for herself out of the identities of others. Whether exploring the limits of gender or the beauty of decay, Manon continually foregrounds the instability of place and self. Her project She Was Once MISS RIMINI is one of her most brutal and touching. Here she literally depicts imagined futures for an aging beauty queen. Each exquisite image in this pictorial essay teases out the possible paths Miss Rimini – an alter-ego for Manon who “happened” upon a beauty pageant in the early 1970s and walked away with the crown – could have taken. A small-town diva? A hypersensitive viola player? Perhaps even a psychiatric patient?
One of the first people in Europe to consider the gifts which the Aztec ruler Montezuma gave to Hérnan Cortés as works of art was Albrecht Dürer: ‘Nothing I have yet seen has given me such joy as the objects brought to the king from the new gold countries […] Some pieces display an extraordinary skill; I have been astonished by the ingenuity of the inhabitants of those far distant lands,’ he wrote. It was 1520 and those works had been sent to Brussels.
The five centuries that have passed since the beauty of these objects was first noticed seem not to have been enough for the ancient cultures of Latin America to be fully understood. This catalogue of pre-Columbian art is a fresh attempt to examine and come to terms with artworks produced by a section of mankind that came to the attention of Europeans only after the voyages of Columbus and other explorers. It illustrates the collection of pre-Columbian art of Giancarlo and Inti Ligabue, one of the few collections of its kind in Italian hands: over 150 pieces from Mesoamerica and South America, an extraordinary corpus of objects which give testament to the excellence achieved by ancient artists. But it also tells the story of certain rare objects which belonged to the Medici Collection, one of Europe’s greatest treasures. Among these are two atlatls, spear-throwers covered in gold-leaf from the Aztec or Mixtec cultures, a Taíno necklace dating from the fourteenth or fifteenth century, and a Teotihuacan stone mask. These objects are accompanied by pieces from private European collections and a number of significant artworks from the Quai Branly Museum in Paris.
Essays by leading scholars and archaeologists, such as C. Phillips, C.F. Baudez, J.M. Hoppan, J.J. Leyenard, F. Kauffmann Doig, C. Cavatrunci, D. Domenica, and M. Polia, weave both scientific and humanistic interpretations of Amerindian thought. The Giancarlo and Inti Ligabue Collection of masterpieces of ancient Latin American cultures is part of a huge and broad-ranging hoard of objects gathered over a period of almost fifty years.
At the peak of the 1968/69 students’ riots at American Universities, Robert Venturi and Denise Scott Brown, together with Steven Izenour, pursued their Design and Research Studio on the topic of Las Vegas at Yale School of Architecture. The results of this were condensed into the book Learning from Las Vegas that became a classic almost instantly upon its first publication in 1972. The treatise excited the 1970s architecture world and has remained influential to architects, teachers and theoreticians to the present day. Some forty years later, Eyes that Saw: Architecture after Las Vegas offers a richly illustrated collection of essays by renowned scholars of art and architectural history, eminent architects, and artists, investigating Learning from Las Vegas and its heritage from various perspectives. Each chapter builds on the knowledge of the radical influence it had on architecture and urban design, visual art, and even on history more generally. Published alongside are documents from the Venturi, Scott Brown & Associates Archive at the University of Pennsylvania, as well as an illustrated chronology of the resonance in international media following the publication of Learning from Las Vegas in 1972. Contributors include: Stan Allen, Eve Blau, Beatriz Colomina, Valéry Didelon, Elizabeth Diller, Peter Fischli, Dan Graham, Neil Levine, Mary McLeod, Rafael Moneo, Stanislaus von Moos, Katherine Smith, Martino Stierli, Karin Theunissen, Robert Venturi, and Denise Scott Brown.
India, Jewels that Enchanted the World presents for the first time the remarkable history and unique legacy of 500 years of Indian jewellery, from the 17th century to the present. The essays, all written by leading international scholars, explore the rich, distinctive, and unique heritage of Indian jewellery; the striking boldness of South Indian ornaments; the delicate refinement of the Mughal period; the dazzling jewels of the post-Mughal maharajas; the cross-cultural influences between Europe and India in the 19th and early 20th centuries; and the creations of leading contemporary designers whose jewels display the enduring beauty of Indian design and craftsmanship.
Published to accompany a major exhibition at the State Museums of the Moscow Kremlin organised jointly with the Indo-Russian Jewellery Foundation, this lavishly illustrated catalogue brings together royal, ceremonial, and personal Indian jewels to showcase the entire range and variety of the jeweller’s art in India.
Wood is an ideal building material for sustainable architecture. It grows back and absorbs large quantities of CO2. But where does it actually come from in each case, and how will we make forestry and wood processing fit for the future? In what ways are conventional notions of professions and qualifications in architecture, engineering, and construction tested by using wood as building material?
French journalist Michèle Leloup together with architect François Leclercq — a pioneer of timber construction in France — have for a long time explored the ecological, economic, industrial, and technical challenges of using timber for major structures and urban architecture. This book summarises their findings using examples from the French forestry and construction industry. It also takes a look at Austria and the innovative work by Hermann Kaufmann, an internationally revered leader in the further development of traditional timber architecture. In addition, the book features five projects by Leclercq Associés.
Richly and attractively illustrated with new images by French architecture photographer Cyrille Weiner, The Wood That Makes Our Cities offers a concise survey of topical questions and findings in contemporary timber construction.
Maps that Made History is like a 1000-year-long journey around the world; every one of the carefully selected maps featured here has influenced the course of history in some way. This beautifully illustrated book gathers 100 marvellous old maps, each with a fascinating story to tell, from a 12th century Persian world atlas to a Soviet spy map. These maps were used to resolve conflicts, situate battles, construct a road or a canal, establish important shipping routes, even as propaganda tools. All the maps are reproduced in an oversized format, while accompanying text from an experienced team of historians explains the importance of each one.
“In a visually arresting book titled Houses That Sugar Built, authors Gina Consing McAdam and Siobhán Doran tell the tales behind the historic homes that proliferated during the sugar boom in the Philippines.” — Tatler
Houses that Sugar Built – An Intimate Portrait of Philippine Ancestral Homes explores the largely unknown architectural legacy to be found in the ancestral houses of Iloilo, Negros Occidental and Pampanga – the three main sugar-producing provinces of the Philippines. These grand residences have yet to receive international exposure.
Nonetheless, they are important in two ways. Firstly, although easily classifiable in terms of architectural style, upon experiencing the buildings themselves there are almost always layers of additional influence. Secondly, this assured blending of styles reveals what we might call a ‘Critical Ambition’ – a desire on the part of the patrons who commissioned these residences to participate in an international architectural culture. Their relatively overlooked location did not stop the sugar barons responsible for these houses from undertaking a 20th-century form of the Grand Tour of European capitals, returning with a desire to bring the latest trends from Paris or Vienna to the provincial Philippines, or from partaking of the latest streamlined Moderne style from the US.
Beautifully photographed with over 200 pages of interiors that have rarely been seen by the public, Houses that Sugar Built- An Intimate Portrait of Philippine Ancestral Homes is layered with intimate stories and individual house texts that transport us back to a time when these residences were in their heyday.
In times of global crises, architecture must also seek new sustainable approaches to climatic and social challenges. Designed by Kashef Chowdhury / Urbana, the Friendship Hospital in southern Bangladesh can be regarded as pioneering in this respect. The hospital, which was awarded the 2022 RIBA International Prize, provides life-saving healthcare, as well as enhancing the identity of a coastal region that has been devastated by cyclones and soil salinisation as a result of rising sea levels.
Constructed in local brickwork, the architecture collects the valuable rainwater and uses the wind for natural cooling, while subtly interacting with specific characteristics of the world’s largest river delta. It also applies universal architectural means such as space, light and proportions to ensure the well-being of patients and the people close to them.
A profound architectural stance developed out of the geography and history of the local context makes this work globally relevant. This book, which includes a photo essay by Hélène Binet, presents plans, diagrams and model photos that offer insight into the design and construction process in one of the world’s most climate-affected regions.
What would life be like without cars, television, the Internet and computers, or the omnipresent smartphone? Setting aside the question of whether things would be better or worse, what we do know for sure is that today there are some inventions that we just can’t do without. And yet some of them are very recent, in their infancy we might say, while others are a little over a century old, which in any case is but a blip if compared to the history of humanity. They all have changed the existence of a considerable number of people, their advent has been such a breakthrough that it has always marked a “before” and “after”. The result of the brilliant intuition of exceptional men and women, of the perseverance and tenacity of great entrepreneurs or ingenious ideas of common people, these inventions have influenced and changed medicine, society, economics, culture, and history itself.
This book full of curiosities and explanations will guide readers to the discovery of the most important inventions that have influenced the contemporary world, from the end of the 19th century to our own time, revealing the secrets and events that led to their creation and introducing the exceptional figures who conceived them.
Some events more than others have changed the pace and determined the direction that history has taken along its rugged path. Inconsistencies that are not always clearly evident occur much more frequently when the events of humanity speed up. Such was the case in the mid-20th century. In fact, after World War II, several historical events overlapped; new political and military balances, decolonisation, revolutionary technological advances, racial tensions, changes in the geographical economy, cultural and religious conflicts and unrelenting mass migrations. This book is dedicated to precisely those key events in our time; it uses a rich array of iconography to retrace what were to be the points of no return, the developments that would suddenly change the lives of many human beings. This book revisits the greatest events in recent history – from the Korean War that marked the beginning of the Cold War to the various revolutions of 1968, from conquering the moon to the birth of the internet, from the introduction of the Euro to the meeting for denuclearisation between President Trump and the North Korean leader, Kim Jong-un. Reliving the events makes it easier to understand the reasons and the origins of many of the milestones of contemporary history.