The 8 best places in Panarea, Isole Eolie, Sicily

I was in doubt if I should make this newsletter or keep it to myself. Because I love the fact that Panarea is so unspoiled and I have had it to myself for so long,... but here I go. Panarea is for me the absolute best place in Europe to stay for the summer. It´s one of 8 tiny islands called ´Isole Eolie´, on the north side of Sicily and we have been coming here for the past 9 years. Here you find the clearest waters and will go by boat all day long to visit other islands (preferably with the cutest captain you can find ),  best restaurants, great nature, volcanoes, kind and beautiful people, super hotels and great bars. A mix of Ibiza, Portofino, Capri and St.tropez, but much more low key. No gold and diamonds. Everything here is magical. And you will be hooked for life.

PANAREA

 

LISCA BIANCA

Lisca Bianca is a beautiful little hotel down at the port, owned by one of the 3 sisters who basically own the whole island. The hotel is with sweet small rooms and amazing interior. A great bar for Aperitivo and lounge music and even DJ and dancing during week-ends. Everything is kept in blue, turquoise and white which makes it a joy for the eye.

THE BRIDGE         

Right across from Lisca Bianca you find The Bridge, a super nice and trendy sushi place which have been lucky to attract one of the best original sushi chefs to the island. Everybody meet up here after a long day on the boats and get a few aperitivi before going home to change into something more sexy for the evening. Great music and great atmosphere in relaxed surroundings where you can keep an eye on whats going on on the pier from the balcony, at the same time. 

HYCESIA                

If you are interested in Michelin restaurants in a truly beautiful,  balanced and harmonic setting with a hostess who are so delicious and "in gamba" that you can't take you eyes off of her, then you must try Hycesia. In this place you eat the most amazing and delicate plates and have a wine list bigger than The Bible. The owner also has a cute little hotel next to the restaurant which is lovely and simple.

RAYA         

The Crown Jewel of the island is Raya. Raya is situated at the highest point of the island and seems the have the power on Panarea. It´s an ecological hotel, with an enormous pure saltwater pool. The rooms are decorated with delicacy and the whole hotel througout is made in a style of a mix of Bali, Italy and luxury hippy. Down at the port Raya has one of my favourite shops with clothes made by hand in the most delicious materials, pattens and colours. Beach/sailing/party wear in a very luxury hippy way. At Raya you usually arrive barefood. To top it all off, Raya has the best Aperitivo place on top of the roof of their restaurant in the port. From here you see the sun going down on LiscaBianca, the magic cliff in the water just infront of Panarea. After your aperitivo, you go to the restaurant downstairs where later there will be music and dancing till the early morning.

HOTEL SIRENA         

Hotel and restaurant Sirena is actually situated on Filicudi, the island on the right of Panarea. This great little colourful place is yet another must see in the seas of The Eolie. Great food in another lovely island with black amazing volcanic beaches. 

QUARTARA

Quartara is another small lux hotel on the Panarea, definitely a place for couples. High in the mountain and romantic, with a great restaurant. From up here you have a very nice view of the island and the ocean and are able to stay a little apart from the rest of the crowd.

DA PINA

You want authentic Sicilian, you have to visit Da Pina where you will dine on original Sicilian ceramic and eat original Sicilian food. Some heavy.... some light. But lots of fresh fish, wine and melanzane will be on the menu. 

BANACALII SUSHI

If you are at Banacal Sushi you will dine right under the stars. You are basically on top of the roof of Lisca Bianca and across from Bridge and seldom have I seen something so amazing. You eat the best sushi which is served in a lovely way and enjoy the atmosphere from all sides. It´s just great to sit with great food, great wine and great family and live life to the fullest in these surroundings.

I must go back as soon as possible, Christina

12 amazing pool´s I would love to swim in some day. Even better if it´s in my own front yard.

I can´t help but day dream, when looking at these amazing pools. One day, if lucky, I dream to design, build and swim in one similar to these in front of my wonderful home, Casa Christina, in Sicily which I designed and build 10 years ago.
I crave light and clear waters, and will for sure choose a white based or very light green coloured stone to have the effect of sand-layered crystal clear waters.

One day very soon I hope to swim in a beautiful pool designed and build by me in front of this great home of mine in Sicily.







DENVER UNION STATION.

If you need a great reason to go to Denver, here is one. DENVER UNION STATION. If you’ve ever stood inside an Avroko-designed space, then you are fully aware of the visual feast of trinkets, vintage one-offs and authentic storytelling that ensues. The firm's principal designers, Greg Bradshaw, Adam Farmerie, Kristina O'Neal, and William Harris have an enticing way of transporting you into their world in a meals time.

It only makes sense that the New York based design firm would be selected to restore Denver Union Station, one of the city’s oldest establishments. The relic originally opened it’s doors back in the summer of 1881 and underwent a series of renovations over the following century. Fast forward 134 years, the 22-gate underground bus facility and light rail station is now a multi-functional space, that includes a hotel, several restaurants and shops — many of which, designed by Avroko.

Inspired by the idea of luxury train travel and the American industrial era, the designers created an eclectic social hub and two bars in this one of a kind historical preservation project. Beige and brown architectural elements and original textures were enhanced by painting everything white and focus was placed on custom lighting and furniture to bring life and a richness to each space. 

The wooden benches, free standing lamp posts and shuffleboard tables create a fun-loving spirit in the Great Hall, the drinks menu in the Terminal Bar harken back to nostalgic days of train travel in the style of an old departure board, and the lush fabrics found through The Cooper Lounge are reminiscent of Pullman car drinking booths. Here's to the next 100 years.

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Create your own fantasy.

Without changing too much you can create you own, wish and fantasy, in your home. Whatever type you are, you will be able to find just the theme you love and need, and make you home or just a corner of it into your own little paradise, with these kind of amazing wall papers which you can find among others in stores like TAPET CAFE,  THE PAPER WALL, SANDERSON  etc.

Wall-paper for ´The nature lover´

Wall-paper for ´The reader´

Wall-paper for ´The luxury lover´

Wall-paper for ´The Queen and The King´

Turn up the volume in your bathroom.

Bathrooms are often overlooked in homes. But still each person uses 1-2 hours a day in there, wouldn't it be nice to be surrounded by something lovely. Have some fun re-doing you bathroom by filing it with colours, wall-paper, candlelights, lacquer, chandeliers, paintings, gold, fat cotton, lights and much more. 

Enjoy, Christina

The effect of light is amazing.

Spice up a smaller and dull room with wall-paper and give it character.

Have fun with colours and create something completely different. 

Make a "Wall of Fame" to spice things up.

Make a fantastic floor with lacquer and keep it clean and graphic at the same time.

Refine your bathroom with a chandelier and get that hotel mood.

Do it ALL wall-paper, gold, chandelier, stripes, paintings, lights .....go crazy. 

Use candles to get the cozy and romantic feeling even in a very minimalistic styled bathroom.

Let´s go to bed.

Linens has always be a great deal in Denmark. We properly have the biggest export of feather duvets in the world,..... or at least used to. Where you usually sleep with blankets in other countrys, here we only use duvets, which are warm, light and comfortable. I love entering in a clean and crispy bed with soft coloured bedding. Since forever, I bought nice linens, which has always been put on my bed cleaned and ironed, .........usually by me ;-) . I believe you mentally relax and sleep better in white or soft coloured and crisp sheets. But obviously its a matter of taste.

Sleep well, Christina

El chiringuito, it´s a family affair.

The summer has come and finally it´s time for me to visit some of my favorite places in the South of Europe. Ibiza has a speciel place in my heart. I have been coming there since forever. First time more than 30 years ago with my parents and brothers, since with uncles and cousins and now with husband ( who I met there 21 years ago ! ) and kid. Ibiza has something for all. The island has been and is, misunderstood by many, because of its bad rep from bad TV-shows and charter-tours. But it doesn't matter whether you are young, old, single, have kids, green or red, the island has a great spot for all kind. You just have to know the places which suits you the best. Luca, Oliver and I usually stay with one of my two cousins who moved there 22 years ago. We love to stay with them to make up for lost time away from each other. We always start with a wonderful day in Es Cavallet and a visit to el Chiringuito, one of my favorite lunch restaurants at the beach. Its a nice and relaxed way to start you holiday in Ibiza, not too much and not too little. Great food, chilled music and chic people. 

Es Cavallet , the beach where you can relax without too much action going on.

 el Chiringuito,  as you can see we enjoy "muchos" with family and friends.

Valentino 4 Cash&Rocket.

Valentino has in cooperation with Cash&Rocket designed a collection of shoes, clothes and bags with 20% going directly to charity. You can still make a different and help to donate money to 1 of the 3 charities chosen by Cash&Rocket, by purchasing some of the amazing things seen below. Cash & Rocket raised $1.7 so fare on C&Rtour2015 this year, well done Julie. xxx Stina

Julie Brangstrup and co-creative director of Valentino Pierpaolo Picciolo 

Bring back wood inside.

A perfect way to give warmth to a home, is to decorate wall´s and other surface´s with wood panels. Use wood as the organic contrast to soften up a modern concrete house.  The choises are many now, fortunately not only pine and birch like in the ´70. I remember some horrific examples from back then. Stickwood has a great variety of planks made from natural wood which can easily be attached to your wall´s.

MS-Navigator a luxury ship at the doorstep of The queen.

I was invited to a meeting with Kim Sørensen, the owner of the great MS-Navigator. An amazing ship in front of The Queens Castle in Copenhagen. Kim Sørensen rebuild the ship into a luxury hotel on the water some 5 years ago and she is now available for dinner, meetings, cruises or as a hotel. Kim Sørensen has keep 95% of the original ship and spared no cost to create his beautiful hotel on water. I was loving going around seeing the very stylish interior, the super shiny brass every where and specially the engine room down below, full of engines, instruments and cables from the 1940´s still intact. One person I would have loved to show this, is my late father, who would have appreciated such an experience a 100%. Most of my memories of him has to do with the sea. We would sail, waterski, swim, dive for mussels, go out early in the morning to watch the sun come up from the boat and enjoy lunch or dinner in harbours all over Denmark. Anything to do with the sea was our thing, basically. You should go and see for yourself and be impressed.

No sugar, No coffee, No meat, No wine, it´s a new type of day for me.

There is no way around it, and I have tried to avoid it for tooooooo long !!! 

In general I am fairly healthy, with a few bad habits. But since today I will try to do the right thing and quit some of the bad and introduce the good. A good friend of mine introduced me to "Sundhedsvaerkstedet" . Camilla the owner, takes care of everything, and delivers 2-day boxes strait to your doorstep. It´s so me to do it in this way. All you need to do is to keep away from everything else, and enjoy the amazing juices, smoothies and soups Camilla has prepared for you. It´s my first day, and I miss my coffee a lot. I even had a bad headache, but apart from this I feel absolutely fine. And the thought of what this detox will do for me makes it all much easier. I can´t wait to see how great I feel in a couples of day´s. Maybe it will make me do even healthier choices in the future. We will see.

Lamps I would love to use in interior decoration one day.

Lamps has always been a big favourite of mine. Since I was guite young I would often wish lamps as gifts even the more expensive designer ones. Like I have said before, I think light has a major effect on any interior. Being brought up in Copenhagen with the many months of short day´s of natural light, I have the habit of using the electrical light all day long, even if there is light outside. I need that warm light and will often let lamps turned on in rooms I am not even sitting in because I love the feeling of passing by a room and see the beauty of it and have the cozy warm  feeling the light gives. Apart of the actual feeling the light gives, they are like sculptures and are great objects to use for decorations in a room. 

Atomic by Delightful

Tigermoth Lighting 

Arne Jacobsen, a true pride for Denmark.

Arguably Denmark’s most famous 20thcentury furniture designer, Arne Jacobsen was also a highly accomplished architect. Shortly after graduating in 1927 he opened his own design office, which he ran with driven determination until his death in 1971. Through his long and productive career, Jacobsen worked in architecture, furniture, product and textile design, and was a professor of architecture at the Royal Academy of Arts in Copenhagen for many years.

AJ himself

Being a Dane in Italy obviously I had to have as many danish icons in my house as possible, when I designed and build it 10 years ago. It´s a great mix of Arne Jacobsen, Verner Panton, George Jensen, PH and Luis Poulsen, when it comes to chairs and light. Børsen Pleasure made a very nice article about me when the house was ready back then. Now it´s time for a change, after more than 300-400 lunches with a minimum of 18 people at the time, I am going to reupholster all my beautiful, but much worn chairs, and I am thinking to go for leather this time.

Brighten up you bathroom.

For me, light in a room is the most important thing. You can have any house or any furniture,.... if the lighting is wrong, everything is wrong. Light have to be practical and give character at the same time. It´s important with lots of lightpoint through a house to create the cozy feeling, and as a practical use you must put general light with a regulater to get more light when needed. In bathrooms a lot of general light is needed to shave or put on make-up, because you need light from all sides of the face. If you think about how make-up mirrors in theatres are made with 8-10 lightbulbs all around a mirror, it give you an idea of what kind of light works best in you bathroom. 

In my own bathroom I have put in very bright general light from the ceiling and a long row of light over my mirror. Ideally I should have devided my long mirror in 2 and placed light vertical on each side to get the full light from all sides. In design you always have to compromise but I would say it works 95%.

The darker a room, the more light you will need. Here you see an example of very bright light coming from above and from below to give enough light for what you need.

If lamps are not your thing, just make sure to place a few extreme bright light where it´s needed.

Lighter rooms makes it easier with fewer lights places in the right places. This would be perfect.

The light in this room I would say is perfect, it comes from all sides and because of this, it will be really useful.

I hope these advices can be useful for you. Otherwise contact me and I will assist.

Christina

An Apple a day keeps the doctor away.

Apples or pears, I choose Apple any day. They do it again and again, the newly launched, Apple watch  , is on the street and there is no way around it. Even though everybody is talking about families breaking down because of too much technology and media around the dinner table, this one will be a hit anyway. All you info on your wrist to go.                   

Apple watch makes all the ways you’re used to communicating more convenient. And because it sits right on your wrist, it can add a physical dimension to alerts and notifications. For example, you’ll feel a gentle tap with each incoming message. Apple Watch also lets you connect with your favorite people in fun, spontaneous ways — like sending a tap, a sketch, or even your heartbeat.

I just bought a new Mac, mine died over night after 5-6 years of hard work, so I guess it´s reasonable. As usual they come up with something nicer, thinner and cooler just weeks after and I unfortunately could not wait for it to be launched. But here it is .... Lovely :-)

It´s a family affair.

Yet again Julie Brangstrup made it happen. Cash&Rocket is on the road to raise money for charity. I think by now The Ladies must be driving into Milan the last stop before the finale. 

Through a unique online fundraising platform, Cash & Rocket has been able to raise in excess of $1,850,000 over 2012, 2013 and 2014. Cash & Rocket are incredibly proud that 100% of donations go directly to our charity partners.

Each year 70 tour ladies form 35 individual online teams to create friendly competition amongst their ladies and brands. Their teams and brands report back to fans about their fundraising success via Facebook, Instagram and Twitter, as well as encouraging support and donations from friends and followers.

In addition to online and individual team fundraising, Cash & Rocket also holds an annual Charity Auction Gala Dinner as part of each tour. The Gala Dinner enables the charities to raise an incredible amount of funding through the sale of unique, limited edition items, donated by partners and friends of Cash & Rocket . The Auction Gala Dinner always attracts many high-profile, charitable celebrity figures. Past attendees have included Princess Reema Bint Bander Al Saud, Selita Ebanks, Lady Christina Green, Jasmine Guiness, Daisy Lowe, Yasmin le Bon and Franca Sozzani, to name but a few.

C&R´s three charity partners – OAfrica, Shine on Sierra Leone and Sumbandila – provide life-changing support to women and children in Africa, through education and through healthcare. They were chosen as organisations where we can play a hands-on role in their development and witness real change. Through the vital work of our charity partners, we are making a huge difference to the lives of hundreds of women and children in Africa.

When Julie makes it happen and Cash & Rocket is on the road our whole family supports her charity. If we are not able to do the tour we will make sure to be a the Galla Dinner for the auction. Luca and I flew to London Thursday night and took part in the amazing event at The Dorchester together with the 300 other people invited.

I drove 2012 and it was an amazing experience that I will never forget. All the Great Ladies and cars and a great teamwork to raise as much money as possible for the much needed charities. 2012 we raised money for ´ AIDS free Africa 2015´ Miss Lily and I had 4 amazing days together 24 hours a day. Absolutely the best co-driver I could have dreamt for. Lily speaks and I drive :-)))

Julie is really good in finding the right group of interesting girls to do the tour. Everybody has a common interest in doing good and having a fun trip at the same time. Follow them on @cash_and_rocket You will find all the greatest bloggers, models, fashion people, CEO´s, artist, mothers and many many more.

Temptation & Downfall.

I am a fan of most sweets, and danish pastries and cakes are AMAZING! Since I have come back to Copenhagen, I must admit I perhaps have exaggerated just a tiny bit with my consumption of pastries and cakes.................. Basically I have not been able to pass a bakery without going inside, for the first year I has up here again :-/      It has now started to show and I have to pay for it, but it has been all worth it :-)  Just look below. Admit it, you would be tempted too !   

You have got to try. Visit La Glace, Bøjes Brød, Ole&Steen LAGKAGEHUSET, Meyers Bageri og Bertels Salon Kompagnistræde when visiting Copenhagen.

Its all about gold and marble at Saint Laurent´s, Paris.

Something great to see next time you are in Paris. Saint Laurent reopens in Paris. In years past, everybody fell in love with the sharp and sleek design of Saint Laurent’s pace on rue du Faubourg Saint-Honore in Paris. Outfitted in marble, complemented with mirror walls and glossy black interior accents, the space was a visual feast. Today, the fashion label has re-opened the 390-square-meter retail charm with the addition of tribal sculptures, gold coffee tables and creamy velvet loungers.

Designed by Hedi Slimane, French photographer, fashion designer and current creative director for Saint Laurent, the boutique features pieces by Jacques Adnet, Jean Besnard, Edith Borger, Théo Ruth, Jacques-Emile Ruhlmann by Alfred Porteneuve and André Sornay.

This time around, the space is so much more than a visual feast. It’s a museum of sculpture and fashion, a true reflection of the brand’s timeless presence in the ever-changing fashion realm.

Getting older sucks sometimes.

I am usually not the type to freak out about getting older. But last year I was shocked to realise that there are some physical obstacles you can´t fight. I have always been super proud of my mega super great sight. But after having visited the doctor 3-4 times last year, convinced I had an eye-infection,  I had to give in,  and accept that what I needed was glasses :-/   

In Copenhagen I am a big fan of Poul Stig, Brilleskrædderiet and Alle´Optik 

Tom Ford

Mikli

Brilleskrædderiet

Mikli

Alexander McQueen