Monthly Archives: May 2012

By huffingtonpost.com

Ah, prom. The corsages, the awkward photos, the begging to stay out past curfew, the $14,000 dress.

Hold up. The $14,000 dress? That’s right, mom and dad. Racked has drawn our attention to “The $13,997 Prom Dress” (okay, we rounded up) by DressGoddess made “with an assortment of genuine diamonds valued at more than $13,000 and hand sewn throughout the bodice of the dress.” It also “epitomizes striking Hollywood glamour” and “ensures a memorable entrance and exit at any prom.”

For those girls who think The $13,997 Prom Dress is a bit much, there’s also a $398 “La Femme 15987″ version. Downgrade!

Take a look and tell us what you think.

By macan-porsche.com

No more renderings, no more speculative reports (for now), this is the real Porsche Macan, a brand new SUV from the German automaker, which is supposed to have sporty valences and a coupe-ish body style.

Porsche is moving ahead at blistering speed with development of the Macan, and in typical German fashion they look set to bring the goods to market on schedule.

The platform for the Macan is basically borrowed from the Audi Q5 and upcoming Q6, a fact that is clearly demonstrated by the very Audi-like wheels on this test vehicle. The differences will obviously come in the luxury department, and in the fact that the Macan will come with the sporty feel the Q5 obviously lacks.

But since we’ve got the fist spy photos of the car, let’s talk about the design of the SUV. The headlights, taillights and that fake chrome strip towards the rear of the doors are actually stickers meant to fool you into thinking it’s actually a Cayenne.
However, the differences aren’t actually that big when you look at a picture of Porsche’s best selling SUV. The Macan has a bigger center grille, no creases on the bonnet, a sloped back and longer overhangs. But you’d be forgiven for thinking they’re the same vehicle if you’re not an aficionado.

The overall impression we got is that the Macan and Cayenne will be differentiated by the price, with the former offering more mainstream powetrains borrowed from Audi than tuned to Porsche levels, culminating with a 375 PS V6 for the Macan Turbo. This would make the top Macan some 80 hp more powerful than the Cayenne base model. Think of it as the Cayman sitting underneath the 911 in the range.

The Macan will also reportedly be powered by the first Porsche four-cylinder engine since the 968 was phased out in 1995.

Sports SUV to end all? No, more like a market stop-gap!

bonus video: AutoweekUSA

by YachtsXL

Moonen Yachts is one of the world’s foremost builders of motoryachts between 65 and 150 ft. Located in the medieval Dutch town of Den Bosch (‘s-Hertogenbosch), the first yacht to be built by what is today called the Moonen yard was launched in 1963. Gaining a reputation for quality and service, Moonen soon grew in sophistication and expanded its client base first across continental Europe and then much further afield – in fact to wherever connoisseurs of fine yachting reside. Covering every option Moonen has now delivered a global fleet of yachts to major critical acclaim, winning many prestigious awards.

Moonen can offer a fully customised superyacht, a custom series displacement yacht, an explorer vessel or a fast displacement all-aluminium powerboat. This diversity of talent is unique in the upper echelons of the superyacht industry. Opening a second yard Responding to a growing demand for increasingly large yachts, in December 2008 Moonen opened a second yard in Groot-Ammers, some 50 km from the ‘home-base’ in Den Bosch (‘s-Hertogenbosch). A state-of-the-art 60-metre hall is used to build yachts up to 45 metres (150 feet). The existing facility in Den Bosch continues to build yachts under 35 metres (115 feet) and perform design, engineering and interior joinery for the full Moonen line.

at France24 .com

By William News Wires REUTERS

Edward Munch’s famous painting “The Scream” fetched $120 million at Sotheby’s in New York Wednesday, making it the most expensive piece of art ever sold at auction. The bidder was not identified. – Edvard Munch’s masterpiece “The Scream,” one of the world’s most recognizable works of art, sold for $120 million at Sotheby’s on Wednesday, setting a new record as the most expensive piece of art ever sold at auction.

Sotheby’s Impressionist and Modern art auction featured top works by Picasso, Dali and Miro, but Munch’s vibrant work from 1895 was the star attraction in a salesroom packed with art collectors, dealers and media.

The vibrant pastel was conservatively estimated to sell for about $80 million, but two determined bidders competing via telephone emerged from an initial group of seven, driving the final price to $107 million, or $119,922,500 including commission, over the course of a nearly 15-minute bidding war.

The winning bid was taken by a Sotheby’s executive, and the bidder was not identified.

One of four versions by the Scandinavian painter, sold by Norwegian businessman Petter Olsen, “The Scream” easily eclipsed the old auction record held by Picasso’s “Nude, green leaves and bust,” which sold for $106.5 million at Christie’s two years ago. The sales room at Sotheby’s erupted in applause and cheering when the hammer came down. Several Sotheby’s officials said the sale marked the high point of their careers.

“It’s worth every penny that the collector paid,” said Tobias Meyer, who served as auctioneer and called it “one of the great icons” of fine art.

In recent decades “The Scream,” which depicts a figure with hands pressed to head against a backdrop of swirling colors, has become a ubiquitous image, appropriated for everything from coffee mugs to editorial cartoons. For many mainstream art lovers, it is perhaps second in familiarity only to the “Mona Lisa,” and is among the best-known works of art still in private hands.

Sotheby’s New York head of Impressionist and Modern art Simon Shaw called it “one of the visual keys to modern consciousness,” adding that it was “perhaps the greatest single draw I’ve seen in my career” at the auction house.

80 percent of lots find buyers

Three other images of “The Scream,” including two which were stolen and later recovered, are in museums in Norway.

Overall, the sale brought in $330.6 million, against an estimate of about $245 million to $325 million, and 80 percent of the 76 lots on offer found buyers.

The total was Sotheby’s highest-ever for an Impressionist and Modern auction, beating the old mark of $286 million, which had stood since 1990. It was also the auction house’s second-best evening in its history.

Other highlights included Picasso’s “Femme assise dans un fauteuil,” which sold for $29.2 million; Miro’s “Tete humaine” went for $14.86 million; and Dali’s “Printemps necrophilique,” which fetched $16.3 million, or about 50 percent more than the pre-sale estimate.

Works by Max Ernst, Tamara de Lempicka, Constantin Brancusi and Paul Gauguin all achieved strong prices, many far exceeding their high estimates.

The collection of financier Ted Forstmann took in $83 million, meeting expectations, although works by Chaim Soutine that were considered highlights failed to make their estimates.

But in the end it was all about the Munch. Olsen, who attended the sale, said afterward he hoped the stunning results would help drive interest in Munch’s work, and added that the artist “will be a continuing force in my life.”

Speaking to its enduring topical nature and present-day relevance, Olsen said “The image of ‘The Scream’ could make more of us fathom the magnitude of the consequences of our continuing emissions of greenhouse gases.”

“For me, (it) shows the horrifying moment when man realizes his impact on nature and the irreversible changes that he has initiated, making the planet increasingly uninhabitable.”

bonus video : by BBC

MOONMACHINE by Finnish watchmaker Stepan Sarpaneva is both the first of the MB&F Performance Art pieces by a watchmaker and the first to endow a Machine with a new complication. With MOONMACHINE, Stepan has taken a specially configured HM3 Frog and transformed it with his iconic moon-face moon-phase indicator set in a scintillating firmament of northern stars.

The MOON: Around 4.5 billion years ago when the young Earth was still forming, Theia, a proto-planet the size of Mars, is thought to have struck our planet and disintegrated in a ‘Giant Impact’. Some of the debris was attracted by the Earth’s gravity and the rest – consisting of material from both Earth and Theia – went into orbit around the Earth. Within 12 months this orbiting debris coalesced to form the Moon.

Over the next 4.4 billion years, the Earth’s tilt in relation to the sun was stabilised by the gravitational pull of the Moon, which provided regular relatively mild seasons over much of the planet’s surface – ideal conditions for life to form and evolve.

Without that cataclysmic event, we would not be here. You might say we are all Children of the Moon.

And no sooner did modern man start walking the earth than he stared up at the night sky in wonder and awe at the biggest and brightest orb in the heavens. Perhaps none more so than the inhabitants of Finland – including Stepan Sarpaneva – because the less romantic and less well-known counterpoise to the summertime Land of the Midnight Sun are extremely long nights in winter, which gives the population more time than most to study the moon and stars.

MOONMACHINE: While considerably less cataclysmic than the formation of our Moon, MOONMACHINE was also forged from the creative collision of two worlds: MB&F’s HM3 Frog and independent watchmaker Stepan Sarpaneva.

Before launching his own brand Sarpaneva Watches in 2003, Stepan Sarpaneva worked with some of the most prestigious Swiss brands including Piaget, Parmigiani – where he worked alongside Kari Voutilainen – Vianney Halter and Christophe Claret.

“Stepan has an incredible sense of design and a real sense of detail. His work and everything he surrounds himself with is extremely coherent.” Maximilian Büsser

Stepan Sarpaneva: Stepan’s three signature themes are all celestial: his very distinctive moon face; the northern stars and constellations; and the crenellated form of his Korona case – the korona/corona is the plasma atmosphere of the Sun – and all three have been incorporated in MOONMACHINE. Sarpaneva’s two moon faces indicate the phase of the moon through a Korona shaped aperture, while the mystery winding rotor is actually steel and 22k gold disc with laser-pierced stars forming stars and constellations visible in the northern sky.

“The visible movement at the top of HM3 Frog added a technical aspect that provided a serious counterpoint to the playfulness of the bulging frog-eyed indications. In covering the movement, the moon phase and sky hides this and makes the timepiece more poetic. With MOONMACHINE, HM3 is transformed into a fairy tale.” Stepan Sarpaneva