Culture & Society

Art enriches the workplace and can be a useful investment for employers Author: Fabienne Nicholas, Head of Consultancy, Contemporary Art Society   Art collecting is no longer just for individuals – it can set a company apart,...

Europe’s abandoned mansions will take your breath away Author: Harriet King   Increasing numbers of Europeans are fleeing the country life to earn a living in towns and cities, leaving opulent properties empty to decay. With time...

Vinyl is back as a popular and profitable music medium Analogue formats were once thought dead, replaced by physical digital storage mechanisms that have themselves been usurped by online streaming services. Vinyl, however, is now...

International appetite for Turkish baklava grows Melis Alemdar   Baklava, the other Turkish delight, has enjoyed steadily increasing sales over the past decade. Experts say demand outweighs supply, and baklava masters are hard to come by. They...

Traditional watchmakers have a secret weapon to use against smartwatches Interview with: Soren J Petersen, CEO, Urban Jürgensen   High-tech features will always challenge traditional craftsmanship, but they can never replace it. The smartwatch is the latest hurdle...

Becoming a master sommelier might be the hardest thing in the world Earning the accolade of Master Sommelier and winning the right to wear the coveted red pin is no easy task. Aaran Fronda looks...

The house that Tateh built ... out of sand-filled plastic bottles Pablo Mediavilla Costa in Tindouf, Algeria   In the Sahrawi refugee camps in the Algerian desert, Tateh Lehbib Braica – aka ‘the crazy bottle guy’ –...

Chinese man wins forced gay conversion therapy lawsuit   Court in Henan province orders a psychiatric hospital to apologise to man and pay £570 in compensation. A gay man in central China has successfully sued a psychiatric...

Indian women wear cow masks to ask: are sacred cattle safer than us? Michael Safi   Kolkata artist Sujatro Ghosh’s latest project points to country’s veneration of cows to highlight rising violence against women. Indian women are...

Women are the power at Zan TV in Afghanistan   Women appear on screens across Afghanistan reading news. But at Zan TV, launched earlier this year, they are the decision makers driving its content. It's been more...