As adults, we are less forgiving with ourselves. We start learning a language and want to speak it. We pick up a tennis racket and are surprised by how difficult it is to send the ball in the intended direction. We try to draw and decide, rather quickly, that we cannot draw.

And yet, think of the satisfaction of becoming good at something that was once difficult.

It takes time.

This is obvious, of course. But in the current technological era, time has become an interesting part of the equation.

We have spent much of modern human history trying to make things faster.

Few of us would want to return to searching through shelves of encyclopaedias to find one piece of information, waiting weeks for a letter to cross an ocean or learning everything through trial and error.

Today, if we want to know something, the distance between the question and an answer can be almost non-existent.

And artificial intelligence has shortened it further, even on the most complex topics.

Ask about an obscure historical event, a provision of law, a medical term, how a combustion engine works or why Brunelleschi’s dome did not collapse and an answer appears.

Often it looks like a very good answer.

But the speed with which we can now reach an answer sometimes creates another problem: the feeling that reaching the answer means we have reached understanding.

Imagine asking AI about a medical test result.

Within seconds, an unfamiliar term can become comprehensible. We may understand what is being measured, what the normal range usually is and some of the reasons why our result might fall outside it.

We know considerably more than we did five minutes earlier.

But do we understand it as a doctor does?

Of course not.

And not simply because the doctor has access to information we do not have. A doctor has spent years, if not decades, studying how different systems interact and then years seeing what happens when that knowledge meets actual human beings. The test result is not an isolated piece of information. It belongs to a person, a history, symptoms, medications, probabilities, other results that might make one possibility more important than another.

What the machine cannot give us together with that answer is the decades of practical knowledge accumulated by a person, both individually and as part of teams of colleagues, through thousands and thousands of patients.

Law offers a similar temptation.

A legal question can now receive a remarkably sophisticated answer almost instantly. Legislation can be found, cases summarised, arguments presented on both sides.

It can be enormously useful. It also makes the law look much more ‘black-or-white’ than it is.

An experienced lawyer may read the same provision and immediately research and consider all the reasons why the apparent answer may not be the answer: another rule, an updated piece of regulation, an exception, a judgment, the hierarchy between two sources, a procedural issue, a fact that initially seemed irrelevant.

Seldom is the answer really simple. Knowing when it is not, and understanding why, come only with expertise.

And this is difficult to capture in a summary because expertise is not a collection of information: it comes with decades of constant training, study, and practice, on thousands and thousands of pages and on thousands of client cases.

Image: A desk filled with books, a laptop, a notebook, a tennis racket, and objects representing different fields of knowledge, with the Brunelleschi’s dome in Florence in the background. Generated through AI.

The same thing happens in other fields.

Someone who has studied wine for twenty years does not merely know more facts about wine. They taste differently.

An architect sees things in a building that most of us walk past.

A craftsperson touches a material and notices something we would never think to look for.

The interesting part is that the years do not simply give an expert more answers.

They give them better questions.

This might be one of the things we risk forgetting when knowledge becomes so easy to access.

There is an enormous difference between I know nothing about this and I know something about this.

AI can help us cross that distance extraordinarily quickly.

The distance between I know something about this and I understand this deeply is another matter.

That second journey tends to be much less glamorous and there are no shortcuts to it.

The beginner might see the rule.

The expert has spent twenty years discovering all the circumstances in which the rule applies or not.

The interesting question is not whether AI makes us more superficial.

It may do precisely the opposite.

Imagine wanting to understand an unfamiliar subject twenty years ago. The first hours might have been spent simply working out where to begin. Today AI can explain the vocabulary, suggest what to read, show us competing positions and answer the embarrassing basic questions we might hesitate to ask an expert.

We can reach the interesting part much faster.

But then we have a choice.

We can take the explanation, feel that we understand, and move on.

Or we can become curious about what lies underneath it.

Perhaps the greatest opportunity AI gives us is exactly to gain time that we can spend going deeper into a topic after understanding it superficially.

And this brings us back to becoming good at something.

A piano teacher can explain exactly what our hands should do. Our hands still have to learn to do it, and our brain has to learn to coordinate them over hours of repetition.

Someone can explain the mechanics of a tennis serve. We still have to hit hundreds of bad ones before learning how to serve even one good one.

We can read something a lawyer wrote that looks ridiculously simple and discover, when we study and learn more about the theoretical and practical aspects of law, that there was a clear strategy behind it.

Time to really gain a skill remains irreducible.

It is the time in which information becomes experience.

That is also why there is such pleasure in going deeply into something.

The reward is not only that we become better at it. The topic itself becomes more interesting.

A building that once looked simply beautiful begins to reveal decisions about proportion, material and structure.

Music we had heard a hundred times contains something we had never noticed.

Two objects that once looked identical no longer do.

A sentence in another language carries a nuance we finally understand but cannot quite translate.

The more we know, the more there is to see.

That seems worth remembering at a time when we can know a little about almost anything.

There is nothing wrong with knowing a little. Curiosity often begins there.

The mistake may be thinking that because an initial answer came easily, the real answer must be equally simple - or even coincide with the initial answer.

Somebody may have spent thirty years learning what we have just read in thirty seconds.

Those thirty seconds are an extraordinary privilege.

But those thirty years carry a depth that only a person with that experience can fully navigate.

And not everything deserves that kind of investment from us.

As members of a society, we have the privilege to be able to rely on other people’s knowledge. On doctors, lawyers, engineers, historians, craftspeople, scientists, teachers and countless others who have chosen to spend years going somewhere we may have only briefly visited.

Perhaps choosing what we ourselves want to go deeply into is part of the pleasure.

A profession. A language. A craft. A sport. An obscure corner of history. How to make very good bread.

Something worth being a beginner at, then a little less of a beginner, and perhaps one day rather good.

AI can get us to the beginning faster than ever before.

It cannot make twenty years pass in twenty seconds.

And perhaps we should never want it to.

What is something you would still like to understand deeply?

We would be glad to read your thoughts.

Uncontrollable, even repetitive sometimes.

We all like to see such an uncomplicated version of happiness.

But we grew up and, along the way, some of us started looking for it constantly.

As children, we might have experienced our fair share of unhappiness, cries, and so on, but most of us rarely found ourselves asking whether we were happy.

And happiness sometimes was found in the smallest things, like an ice cream, a mushroom found in the forest, seeing a dolphin.

As adults, the conditions for happiness become considerably more elaborate and anchored to a target or a date in the calendar.

There is always another when that we condition our happiness on.

And perhaps one of the peculiarities of modern life is how extraordinarily good we have become at producing them.

Now, what about ambition? This is not an argument against ambition.

Our society has relieved many of the pressures that occupied previous generations - hunger, disease, physical danger, lack of education, limited freedom - which remain painfully real for millions of people, but have been dramatically reduced for many others.

And yet, having more possibilities has not necessarily made happiness simpler.

If anything, social comparison through social media has been affecting the contentment of many, showing us so many versions of living we could not have even imagined in the past.

This raises an uncomfortable question.

At what point did experiencing a good life become so entangled with evaluating whether our life is good enough?

Image: A joyful, spontaneous moment of childhood, image created through AI.

There is always another when that we condition our happiness on.

The Art of Happiness, the book based on conversations between the Dalai Lama and psychiatrist Howard C. Cutler, first published in the late 1990s, belongs to a very different technological moment, but its central question feels absolutely contemporary.

The book begins from the premise that happiness is not simply a fortunate circumstance that arrives when life finally gives us what we want. Our habits of mind, our relationships with others, our expectations and the way we respond to difficulty all have something to do with it.

This sounds simple.

Living accordingly is less so.

One of the ideas running through the Dalai Lama’s approach is the distinction between what we want and what we actually need.

And sometimes what modern consumer culture makes us want as an “improvement to ourselves” can genuinely improve our lives.

But if happiness is continually placed on the other side of that distance, reaching it becomes difficult by definition.

The destination moves with us.

There is another element in The Art of Happiness that feels particularly important now: the place given to other people.

Happiness, in this view, is not an entirely private achievement.

Human connection and the ability to look beyond ourselves matter.

We can work on ourselves endlessly, but there are forms of happiness that cannot be produced by looking inward.

Think of some of the moments when you have laughed hardest: there is a good chance somebody else was there.

Of course, returning to the happiness of childhood is neither possible nor necessarily desirable.

Growing up complicates happiness because growing up complicates life.

So perhaps the question is whether we can recover something children seem to possess without surrendering what adulthood has taught us.

Their ability to become absorbed in what is happening now.

Their indifference to whether an experience is productive.

Their capacity to laugh without wondering how they look while doing it.

Their willingness to find enormous pleasure in very small things.

Happiness does not always wait at the end of improvement.

Perhaps expecting to be happy is itself part of the problem.

The Dalai Lama’s perspective does not promise a life protected from suffering. Quite the opposite: suffering is treated as part of being human and something that can deepen our appreciation of happiness. Because only if we know what suffering does to us can we fully appreciate the uplifting force of happiness.

The interesting question becomes what we do with this truth.

There is a small experiment worth trying.

Think about something that made you genuinely happy recently, even for just a moment.

Perhaps someone made you laugh. The sun illuminated the clouds in a beautiful shade of orange. You cooked something good. A friend called unexpectedly. You heard a song you had forgotten.

How much did it cost?

How carefully had you planned it?

Did anyone else need to know?

Perhaps the modern world just directs our attention elsewhere.

And if so, finding our way back to happiness may require less searching than we imagine.

Not rejecting the desire to make our lives better, but simply remembering that happiness does not always wait at the end of improvement.

The question is whether we are there to notice that it is already happening.

What made you happy before you started thinking about happiness?

We would be glad to read your thoughts.

The toaster that stops working shortly after its warranty expires.
The sweater that looked beautiful in the shop and loses its shape after three washes.
The suitcase whose wheel cannot be replaced.
The chair that survives perfectly well - until it has to be moved.

None of these things were necessarily cheap.

None of them were necessarily advertised as disposable.

And yet, somehow, they were.

We have become accustomed to discussing disposability through its most obvious expressions, like single-use plastics, fast fashion, or products so inexpensive that repairing them would cost more than replacing them.

But disposability does not always look disposable.

Sometimes it comes beautifully packaged. Sometimes it carries an appealing story. Sometimes it is expensive. Sometimes it bears the name of a country with a centuries-old reputation for making that particular kind of object well.

And sometimes we discover only much later that what appeared to be made for years was really made for seasons, or even months.

For much of modern history, progress has given us a genuinely better life.

But somewhere along the way, perhaps we have become less accustomed to asking an important question: How much life is there in the things we buy?

Europe has begun asking a version of this question through legislation.

The European Union is extending the idea of ecodesign far beyond energy consumption, creating a framework that considers durability, reparability, reusability and maintenance. It is also strengthening the right to repair and addressing practices linked to the premature obsolescence of goods.

It is an interesting shift: from asking what happens after we throw something away to asking why we needed to throw it away so soon.

Read more about the European legislation:

EU Ecodesign Regulation

Right To Repair

Fashion offers an especially revealing example.

We know what fast fashion looks like, as its consequences have been extensively documented and are increasingly understood.

But what should we make of a beautifully presented product whose quality is difficult to assess?

“Made in Italy”, “Made in France” or “Swiss Made” can tell us something important about an object’s origin and the traditions surrounding its making.

Yet, origin alone cannot tell us how well something was made. A place renowned for excellence can produce different levels of quality, just as a high price can reflect many things besides the intrinsic quality of an object.

Perhaps we need to become interested in details again.

What exactly is this made from?

Not simply leather, but what kind and what quality?

Not simply wool, but what fibre, construction and finish?

What are the components involved?

How was the object assembled?

Was it designed to age - or merely to remain attractive long enough to be sold and survive a limited period of use?

These questions require more effort than recognising a logo or reading a country-of-origin label.

Image: A still life of everyday objects made to last, bearing the traces of time and use. Image created with AI.

And what happens to us when almost everything around us is designed to be replaced?

We replace objects when they break. Sometimes before they break.

We replace interiors because fashions change. We buy things for occasions rather than lives. We consume images for seconds before moving to the next. We swipe from one person to another.

Could a culture of replacement eventually shape the way we relate to people, too?

There is nothing inherently wrong with novelty and the question is not whether we should reject modernity.

It is whether replacement has become our default relationship with the world around us.

Perhaps saying no to a disposable life begins somewhere surprisingly modest.

With curiosity.

Not simply:

Do I like it? Or: Can I afford it?

But:

What is it made of? How was it made? Can it be cared for? Can it be repaired? What might it look like after years of use?

And, perhaps most importantly: Was this made to stay?

Choosing something that lasts will not always mean choosing the most expensive option or the most famous name.

And it certainly does not require surrounding ourselves only with precious objects.

What matters may simply be recovering the expectation that the things entering our lives should be worthy of remaining there, and worthy of the time we spent choosing them.

And perhaps choosing well sometimes means choosing what does not need to be next.

What is something you own that has become more valuable to you with time?

We would be glad to read your thoughts.

Others for the ideas they inspired.

Few places have shaped modern thought as profoundly as Vienna around 1900. It was a city where artists, scientists, architects and philosophers lived not only side by side, but often around the same café tables. The conversations that unfolded there would influence disciplines ranging from psychology and economics to music, architecture, and design.

Niklas Schmidt has developed a distinctive way of revisiting that remarkable period. Through a series of posts shared on LinkedIn, he explores the people, buildings and ideas that made Vienna one of history’s great intellectual crossroads. Interestingly, he does so by combining historical research with artificial intelligence - a tool to help bring stories back into public conversation.

We spoke with him about cities, memory, architecture, AI, and why curiosity remains one of civilisation’s greatest engines.

The Art of Choice: Niklas, some of your posts often begin with the same sentence: “I love my city. Vienna was the intellectual capital of the world around 1900.” What first drew you to this particular chapter of Vienna’s history?

Niklas Schmidt: Actually, I had recently done a visit to the Leopold Museum in Vienna, one of many incredible museums we have in this fabulous city. In one room, there was a wall with 100 or so famous people in Vienna around 1900. I loved going through their stories. Most of them were well-known to me, but a few were not. When I came back home, I thought it would be good to do a kind of series on Vienna around 1900 on LinkedIn – for my LinkedIn readers but also for myself. That was how I started this project.

“History should never become a museum piece.” - Niklas Schmidt

Looking at Vienna around 1900, one is struck not only by the brilliance of individual thinkers, but by the concentration of ideas in a single place. What do you think makes a city a cultural and intellectual incubator?

Vienna benefited from being the capital of a vast empire. It attracted scientists, artists, and entrepreneurs from across Europe. In the cafés, conversations often lasted for hours. Innovation often begins with curiosity, and curiosity flourishes where people meet other people with maybe strange ideas.

Niklas’ stories rarely focus on architecture alone. They are equally about what societies choose to remember - and how places can acquire new meaning over time.

Many of the stories you tell are not only stories of buildings, but stories of transformation: neglected places brought back to life, difficult memories transformed into part of a city’s identity. Why do you think societies need to transform their past rather than simply preserve it?

History should never become a museum piece. Every generation inherits buildings, institutions, and traditions, but also difficult chapters that cannot be ignored.

“Innovation often begins with curiosity, and curiosity flourishes where people meet other people with maybe strange ideas.” - Niklas Schmidt

Many of the buildings you write about are still beautiful today. What can architecture preserve that books and archives sometimes cannot?

Buildings connect us emotionally to history. They remind us that the people who lived hundreds of years ago were real people with ambitions, fears, and dreams.

If cities preserve ideas, technology changes how we rediscover and share them. Niklas has openly embraced artificial intelligence as part of his creative process, while remaining clear about where responsibility ultimately lies.

Image: The Vienna Giant Ferris Wheel, represented through AI in one of the suggestive LinkedIn posts of Niklas. Courtesy of Niklas Schmidt.

Interestingly, your stories about Vienna are researched and written with the support of artificial intelligence, and the accompanying images are AI-generated in a distinctive visual style. Do you see AI primarily as a productivity tool, or as a new way of engaging with cultural memory? And where, in your view, does human responsibility ultimately lie?

AI is an extraordinary productivity tool. But it is always my responsibility. Nothing is posted by me on LinkedIn that I would not defend.

Vienna around 1900 helped shape many ideas that still influence us today. Looking ahead, what ideas being developed today do you believe future generations may look back on as transformative?

I believe AI will define this era in much the same way electricity defined the nineteenth century or the internet defined the late twentieth. What excites me most is not simply automation. It is augmentation.

To know more about Niklas’ work, visit:

Niklas Profile on LinkedIn

After reflecting on history, technology and the future, we asked Niklas one final question: if a visitor had time for only one place in Vienna, where should they begin?

If you had to recommend a busy visitor only one must-see building in Vienna, which one would it be and why would you recommend it?

Without hesitation, St. Stephen’s Cathedral. It has stood at the heart of Vienna for centuries and has witnessed almost every defining moment in the city’s history: Romanesque foundations, Gothic architecture, Ottoman sieges, imperial ceremonies, wartime destruction, and post-war reconstruction.

And finally: what does it mean, for you, to choose well?

Making a decision which I will not regret 10 years from now.

History is often described as something we inherit. This conversation reminds us that we also inherit the responsibility to interpret it, question it, and pass it on.

Whether through architecture, conversation, or new technologies, cultural memory survives because each generation chooses to engage with it rather than simply preserve it.

Every city has its landmarks.

But its greatest legacy is often the curiosity it continues to inspire.

Technology may help us find information. Principles help us keep our compass. Curiosity helps us discover meaning.

What has curiosity led you to discover lately?

We would be glad to read your thoughts.

A wallet.

A photograph.

A handbag.

Sometimes what we lose is not merely the object itself.

It is the feeling attached to it.

Many years ago, Carla Braccialini, co-founder of the eponymous brand now celebrated for its whimsical creations, was walking through the streets of Florence when her handbag was stolen.

Later, recalling the experience, she said something remarkable.

“I felt lost, as though they had taken away my home.”

Not her bag. Her home.

Her words reveal something profoundly human.

We attach ourselves not only to objects, but to what they come to represent.

Security. Memory. A familiar routine.

A piece of ourselves carried into the world.

“I felt lost, as though they had taken away my home.”

Instead of remaining with the loss, Carla Braccialini transformed that feeling into an idea.

She designed a handbag shaped like a small house.

The Casina.

Originally, it was displayed at a trade fair almost as an ornament. Yet, visitors were captivated.

The little house attracted extraordinary attention and would go on to become one of the symbols that helped establish Braccialini as one of Italy’s most original leather goods houses.

Image: Braccialini’s Casina bag.

What makes this story so memorable is not the handbag itself. It is where it came from.

The event that inspired it was painful.

But the response to it became just extraordinary.

Perhaps resilience is often misunderstood.

We tend to imagine resilience as resistance, endurance, or the ability to withstand difficulty.

Sometimes, though, it is something much gentler.

The willingness to imagine something new from what has been broken.

To transform fear into curiosity.

Loss into creation.

This may be why inspiration does not belong only to history books.

We admire figures like Mahatma Gandhi or Mother Teresa because they remind us what human beings are capable of becoming.

But extraordinary forms of resilience also exist much closer to home.

The friend rebuilding life after illness.

The neighbour quietly caring for a family member.

The colleague who continues to smile while carrying burdens we know nothing about.

The artist transforming grief into beauty.

The designer turning loss into an object that makes millions of people smile.

Image: A variation on the Casina - the Braccialini’s Madagascar bag from the personal collection of Roberta Tondini.

Perhaps this is why one of yoga’s best-known postures is called Peaceful Warrior.

Perhaps it has little to do with fighting and, rather, it means remaining faithful to one’s values, even when life unexpectedly asks for courage.

Choosing creation over resignation.

Again and again.

What experience in your life unexpectedly became the beginning of something better?

We would be glad to read your thoughts.

A shoemaker’s mark.

A watchmaker’s signature.

A family name engraved on a storefront.

The promise was simple: “I made this. I stand behind it.”

A brand reduced uncertainty. It gave people confidence that an object would perform as expected and that its maker cared about its reputation.

In many ways, brands emerged because trust could not travel in person.

The brand travelled instead. In doing so, it became trust made visible.

Today, brands are everywhere.

We encounter hundreds of them each day.

They speak to us through our phones, our computers, our cities, our social media feeds.

They have become extraordinarily sophisticated storytellers.

And perhaps this is where an interesting question begins to emerge: Is a promise still a promise?

Modern consumers live in an age of unprecedented information.

Yet many of us have never felt less certain about what we are buying.

A cosmetic product may contain ingredients whose names we cannot pronounce.

A food item may display health claims we struggle to evaluate.

A garment may tell us a compelling story while revealing little about its actual making.

A product may be expensive without necessarily being valuable.

A name may be omnipresent without necessarily being trustworthy.

Visibility and value have become increasingly difficult to distinguish.

Image: An ancient object and modern products. Different eras, the same human desire: to know what - and whom - we can trust. Image generated through AI.

Perhaps this explains the success of platforms such as Yuka and other tools that seek to decode products for consumers.

Whether one agrees with every methodology these platforms employ is almost beside the point.

What they reveal is something fascinating: millions of people increasingly feel the need for interpreters, intermediaries, translators. People and technologies capable of helping them understand what lies behind complex labels, technical language, and carefully crafted narratives.

This is a remarkable inversion.

Historically, brands existed to simplify trust. Today, consumers often seek additional tools to verify it.

Of course, none of this means that branding is inherently misleading.

Many extraordinary brands continue to invest deeply in quality, knowledge, craftsmanship, innovation, and service.

Nor does it suggest that marketing is somehow opposed to substance.

The two can coexist beautifully.

The challenge is that modern systems have become exceptionally effective at manufacturing appearances.

The symbols of value are often easier to produce than value itself.

Beautiful packaging, compelling storytelling, omni-channel visibility, sophisticated messaging, cultural relevance.

All of these things can accompany exceptional products.

They can also exist independently from them.

Historically, brands existed to simplify trust. Today, consumers often seek additional tools to verify it.

This phenomenon extends far beyond fashion.

It touches food, beauty, consumer goods, hospitality, technology, and even health.

In many industries, consumers increasingly find themselves asking difficult questions:

Am I paying for quality? For advertising? For convenience? For aspiration? For an algorithm that succeeded in placing this object in front of me at precisely the right moment?

Perhaps this is why the notion of a brand as a promise still matters.

Not because promises have disappeared. Every brand still makes one.

The question is whether there remains a meaningful relationship between the promise and the product, service, or experience itself.

Because trust has always required alignment between words and actions.

Perhaps the modern consumer’s task is no longer simply choosing what to buy.

Perhaps it is learning how to recognise coherence and to ask what sits behind the narrative.

To ask whether the object, service, or the experience still carries traces of the care it promises.

Because a promise becomes meaningful only when someone intends to keep it.

When you encounter a brand today, what makes you trust it?

We would be glad to read your thoughts.

Or chosen a certain sweater on a difficult day.

Or returned, almost instinctively, to a familiar shade when seeking confidence, comfort, or energy.

We often assume we choose colours because we like them.

But perhaps the relationship runs deeper than preference alone.

Perhaps colours become part of the way we navigate ourselves.

Choosing a colour may be less about appearance than about intention.

For centuries, artists, philosophers, designers, and psychologists have wondered whether colour influences the way we think and feel.

The answer, according to contemporary research, is both yes and no.

Colours appear to affect perception, attention, and emotion. Yet their meaning is rarely universal. Context matters. Culture matters. Personal experience matters.

A colour that signals celebration in one culture may evoke mourning in another. A colour associated with confidence for one individual may carry entirely different associations for someone else.

As researcher Andrew J. Elliot notes, colour psychology is not a simple catalogue of fixed meanings, but a complex interaction between perception, experience, and context.

Read more - Andrew J. Elliot's research

This may explain why our relationship with colour often feels deeply personal.

The colours we choose are rarely only colours.

They are memories.

Associations.

Stories.

A navy coat that recalls a parent.

A bright yellow dress worn during a particularly happy summer.

A shade of green that feels reassuring without us fully understanding why.

Over time, colours accumulate meaning in much the same way places, objects, and songs do.

Image: A woman choosing a bright green dress from her wardrobe. Image generated through AI.

There is another fascinating concept explored by researchers Hajo Adam and Adam D. Galinsky: enclothed cognition.

Their work suggests that clothing may influence not only how others perceive us, but how we perceive ourselves.

One possible explanation is that we attach symbolic meaning to what we wear.

In other words, what may matter is not only the garment itself, but what that garment represents in our mind.

Perhaps colours function similarly.

A colour may become a reminder of a version of ourselves we value…

…capable.

…creative.

…optimistic.

Read more - Adam-Galinsky's research

The colours we choose are rarely only colours.

They are memories.

Associations.

Stories.

This does not mean that wearing blue will automatically make us calm, or that yellow guarantees happiness.

Yet it may explain why certain colours feel surprisingly difficult to replace.

They have become part of our internal landscape.

In this sense, choosing a colour may be less about appearance than about intention.

A small, often unconscious act of self-definition.

Just like choosing a book, a city, a piece of music, or an object we wish to keep close.

What may be true for many of us is that certain colours become linked to experiences we wish to revisit, or experiences we hope to create.

A familiar colour may bring us back to a meaningful chapter of our lives.

An unfamiliar one may accompany a new chapter we are about to begin.

Perhaps, therefore, the right question is: “What does this colour mean to me?”

Because the colours we return to, again and again, may reveal something about the person we have been, the person we are, or the person we hope to become.

Which colour has accompanied the most important chapters of your life?

We would be glad to read your thoughts.

Made in Italy, everybody knows the expression.

It appears on labels, magazines, export reports, airport advertisements.

It is recognised in Tokyo.

Desired in New York.

Celebrated in Dubai.

And yet, despite being something so universally known, it is surprisingly difficult to define.

What exactly is Made in Italy?

In recalling the TV show “Caro Marziano” (“Dear Martian”), created by journalist Pierfrancesco Diliberto (aka Pif), Roberta imagined a scene.

An alien lands in Rome.

He steps out of his spacecraft, looks at the Trevi Fountain, looks at Palazzo Poli, looks at the people passing by and asks a simple question:

“Excuse me. This Made in Italy you keep talking about... what is it, exactly?”

It is a more difficult question than it first appears.

Because Made in Italy is not a product category.

It is not fashion.

It is not food.

It is not furniture.

It is not automotive engineering.

Or rather: it is all of these things, but none of them fully explain it.

Image: An imaginary Alien at Trevi Fountain in Rome. Image generated through AI.

Perhaps the simplest answer is this:

Made in Italy - the real Made in Italy - is a way of approaching life.

A particular relationship with work, beauty, and care.

It is the tendency to fall deeply in love with what one does.

And then to do it again the next day with the same care.

Regardless of whether one is making food, making fashion, building a company, or welcoming a guest.

It is choosing the better ingredient, even when it costs more.

It is remaking a detail ten times.

It is refusing to cut corners and refusing to give less than one’s best.

It is putting generosity into things.

Made in Italy - the real Made in Italy - is a way of approaching life.

The most interesting aspect of Made in Italy is perhaps that it rarely begins with industry.

Rather, it begins with people.

With individuals who place part of their identity into what they make.

A cheesemaker.

A tailor.

A cook.

A designer.

A craftsperson.

An entrepreneur.

Different professions, yet often driven by the same impulse: to leave behind something greater than what was expected.

It is refusing to cut corners and refusing to give less than one’s best.

This may explain why authentic Made in Italy often feels recognisable even when the observer cannot immediately explain why.

The object may be beautiful.

But beauty alone is rarely enough.

What people perceive is something less visible: an unparalleled degree of care.

Care in the material.

Care in the detail.

Care in the gesture.

Made in Italy begins with people. With individuals who place part of their identity into what they make.

Of course, Italy did not invent excellence.

Every culture possesses its own forms of mastery.

But Italians developed a particular habit of seeking beauty.

The true Made in Italy has been built on time.

And today, Made in Italy faces the same pressures affecting much of modern life:

speed,

uniformity,

standardisation,

the temptation to optimise everything.

Yet its greatest strength has never been speed.

Its strength has always been sensitivity: the ability to notice, to refine, to care, and to recognise that some things become valuable precisely because they take time.

Perhaps this is why Made in Italy continues to resonate far beyond Italy itself.

Because people are responding to a philosophy.

A belief that how something is made matters.

A belief that work can be an act of respect.

A belief that care leaves traces.

Today, speaking about Made in Italy also means speaking about stewardship.

About protecting knowledge.

About transmitting skills.

About ensuring that what has been inherited is not lost.

Because the strength the world admires is not permanent by nature.

It must be preserved, taught, and defended.

And if our alien had one final question:

“What is the true superpower of Italians?”

Perhaps the answer would be simple.

To transform care into wonder.

And wonder into something that lasts.

What does Made in Italy mean to you?

We would be glad to read your thoughts.

Before Studio Tondini existed, before bags became objects to study and design, there was an image fixed in Roberta Tondini’s memory: her older sister Daniela picking her up at elementary school after getting her driving licence.

One hand carrying her favourite Moschino bag.
The other, the car radio she had just removed from the dashboard.

To a child, this looked like absolute freedom.

“As children, we often observe adulthood through objects before we understand it through words.”

The bag belonged to Moschino’s I Believe in Punk-Chic collection: tartan cotton, bold proportions, unexpected metallic details, a deliberately irreverent spirit typical of the fashion language of Franco Moschino.

In the 1980s and 1990s especially, tartan became associated with rebellion, individuality, and self-expression - qualities that Moschino translated into fashion with irony and confidence.

And Daniela wore it effortlessly.

Image: Moschino I Believe in Punk-Chic Bag from the personal collection of Roberta Tondini.

The Art of Choice: What do you remember most vividly about Daniela carrying that bag?

Roberta Tondini: “The sense of movement around her. She was always going somewhere. Her life revolved around university, friends, music. To me, that bag became associated with independence before I even fully understood what independence meant.

I also remember how naturally she wore it. Nothing looked studied. It simply belonged to her way of being.”

Do you remember what she would wear with it?

“Very effortless combinations. Denim, oversized sweaters, sharp coats, sometimes very simple pieces balanced by stronger details. That bag somehow worked with everything she touched.

Looking back, I think what impressed me most was not the bag itself, but the confidence behind it.”

And what did that object represent to you as a child?

“Freedom. Strength.

But also womanhood, certainly. To me, my sister became a woman carrying that bag.

As children, we often observe adulthood through objects before we understand it through words. That bag became one of those symbols for me.”

“To me, my sister became a woman carrying that bag.”

Looking back today, it is perhaps unsurprising that certain ideas later found their way into Studio Tondini’s philosophy.

The belief that objects accompany identity.
That strong style does not need to overpower individuality.

That craftsmanship belongs most meaningfully to everyday life.

Even today, the idea of effortless modern craft for the everyday remains deeply connected to that early fascination: objects with personality, designed not to overpower the individual, but to move naturally with them.

Perhaps this is also why some bags remain with us long after trends disappear.

Because what we remember is rarely only the object itself.

It is who we became while looking at it.

What is the first bag - or object - that shaped your idea of adulthood, style, or freedom?

We would be glad to read your thoughts.

Never before have we had access to so much information about health, nutrition, and longevity.

And yet, never before have modern societies seemed so disconnected from many of the principles that once allowed human beings to live longer, stronger, and more balanced lives.

Somewhere along the way, abundance replaced discernment.
Convenience replaced rhythm.
And nourishment became increasingly confused with consumption.

For centuries, food cultures evolved through observation, repetition, and trial-and-error across generations.

Long before scientific journals or nutritional labels existed, populations slowly discovered what sustained the body best: seasonal ingredients, moderation, fasting periods, legumes, grains, vegetables, fermentation, slow preparation.

These traditions were built around continuity between human beings and nature.

“Somewhere along the way, nourishment became increasingly confused with consumption.”

It is perhaps unsurprising, then, that many contemporary researchers looking toward the future of health have found themselves studying the past.

Among them is Professor Valter Longo, researcher and author of The Longevity Diet, whose work bridges biology, ageing, and nutrition. Through decades of scientific research, Prof. Longo has explored how certain nutritional patterns - many of them deeply rooted in traditional Mediterranean and ancestral dietary habits - may help support long-term health and reduce the risk of modern chronic diseases.

Beyond research itself, Prof. Longo’s work also carries a broader mission: making the science of longevity accessible beyond laboratories and academic circles. Through his studies, public initiatives, and educational efforts, he has consistently argued that living longer should not simply mean extending lifespan, but extending healthy lifespan - what researchers often define as “healthspan”.

In this sense, his work is not only about nutrition. It is about responsibility toward the future self.

Those interested in exploring Longo’s research further can find more through his books, scientific publications, and public initiatives:

valterlongo.com

What makes Prof. Longo’s work particularly interesting is not only the science itself, but the rediscovery embedded within it: the idea that longevity may depend less on constant optimisation, and more on returning to rhythms the human body has long understood.

“Prof. Longo’s work is about responsibility toward the future self.”

To nourish oneself well requires something increasingly rare: attention.

Time to select ingredients carefully.
Time to cook.
Time to sit down without distraction.
Time to understand what the body responds to, and what it rejects.

In this sense, nourishment becomes more than health.
It becomes a relationship with oneself.

And perhaps this is where the conversation connects back to choice.

Because every form of care ultimately demands selection:
what we consume, what we repeat, what we normalize, what we refuse.

Image: A conscious woman selecting greens for her nourishment. Image generated through AI.

Today, speed shapes much of our relationship with food.

Ultra-processed meals. Constant availability. Eating while scrolling, moving, replying.

And yet, the human body remains remarkably ancient.

It still responds to rest, to balance, to quality over quantity, to consistency over excess.

Perhaps living well begins there.

We also live in an era increasingly shaped by the search for acceleration.

Faster results. Faster transformations. Faster solutions.

And while scientific progress has brought extraordinary advances, modern culture often seems less interested in building health slowly than in finding shortcuts to it.

Perhaps this is where nourishment offers a different lesson.

Longevity is rarely built through sudden correction. More often, it resembles a form of accumulation: habits, rhythms, choices repeated consistently over time.

Not unlike investing.

The body, too, appears to remember what it has been given - slowly, attentively, over years.

“Modern culture often seems less interested in building health slowly than in finding shortcuts to it.”

This is not an argument for perfection, nor a substitute for medical guidance.

Every body is different, and health decisions should always be discussed with qualified medical professionals. This reflection is not intended as medical advice, but as an invitation to think more consciously about the role that nourishment, rhythm, and care may play in how we live.

To choose well is also to nourish well.

And to nourish well often requires reclaiming something modern life continuously pressures us to abandon: time.

What rituals of nourishment help you feel most connected to yourself?

We would be glad to read your thoughts.

And others that unfold along parallel lines - in a fine balance.

Ayed Tadros belongs to the latter.

A lawyer by profession and a photographer by practice, his path does not fit into a conventional narrative. And yet, it is precisely in this apparent duality that something more deliberate emerges: a way of living shaped not by a single identity, but by the conscious decision to cultivate more than one.

In a world that often rewards linearity, choosing to dedicate time and attention to something that does not “need” to exist may appear secondary. And yet, it is often exactly there - in that voluntary space, ungoverned by obligation - that meaning begins to take form.

Ayed moves between legal structures and photographic frames with the same underlying discipline: the capacity to observe, to select, to commit. His images carry the quality of considered decisions. Nothing forced. Nothing incidental.

What follows is a reflection on time, attention, discipline, and the quiet architecture of a life shaped with intention.

Image: Ayed Tadros captured behind the camera. Courtesy of Ayed Tadros Photography.

The Art of Choice: Ayed, you are both a lawyer and a photographer - a path that may not appear linear to most. At what point did photography become more than an interest, and turn into a deliberate life choice?

Ayed Tadros: Photography was always present, but for a long time it lived quietly in the background. Something instinctive rather than intentional. The shift happened gradually, not as a single decision, but as a realization.

There comes a point where you notice that what you return to, consistently, is not accidental. Despite a demanding legal career, I kept finding myself behind the camera - early mornings, late evenings, across different countries, in wild moments where most people would choose rest. That repetition revealed something deeper: photography was not an escape from my profession, as I once believed; it was a necessary counterpart to it.

Photography became a deliberate choice when I stopped treating it as something secondary. Not in the sense of replacing my career, but in giving it equal seriousness. Investing in it, refining it, building a body of work. At that point, it was no longer a hobby. It became part of how I as a person is defined, and how I define a meaningful life.

In a life already shaped by a demanding profession, how do you think about time - and what it means to invest it in something that does not “need” to exist?

I think the things that “do not need to exist” are often the only things that truly matter.

My profession is structured around necessity: transactions, regulations, outcomes. Photography exists outside of that framework. It has no obligation to solve anything, and precisely for that reason, it creates space for something else: reflection, emotion, perspective.

Time, for me, is not only about productivity. It is about allocation of attention. And attention is finite. Where you choose to place it ultimately defines the texture of your life.

So I don’t see photography as time taken away from something more important. I see it as what prevents life from becoming purely functional. Without it, everything risks becoming efficient, but empty.

Do you believe that a life can be consciously designed?

To a certain extent, yes - but not in a rigid or overly controlled way.

You cannot design outcomes, but you can design direction. You can decide what you value, what you return to, and what you are willing to invest in consistently over time.

For me, photography is one of those anchors. It introduces a different rhythm into a life that would otherwise be dominated by urgency and structure. It forces me to slow down, to observe, to be present in places and moments I might otherwise pass through without noticing.

In that sense, it is not separate from how I shape my life. It is one of the tools through which I do it. It keeps the balance. It keeps things human.

“The things that do not need to exist are often the only things that truly matter.” - Ayed Tadros

Every art and craft requires repetition - often invisible, often solitary. What has the practice of photography taught you about patience, attention, or even restraint?

More than anything, it has taught me that not everything needs to be taken.

In the beginning, like many people, you feel the urge to capture everything, to respond immediately to what is in front of you. Over time, you realize that the discipline is not in taking more images, but in taking fewer, better ones.

Patience becomes less about waiting, and more about understanding timing. When to press the shutter and when not to. Attention becomes more selective. You start seeing layers: light, movement, emotion, context.

Also, restraint becomes essential. The strongest images are often the result of what you chose to leave out, not what you included.

Photography, in that sense, is a continuous exercise in editing. Not just of images, but of perception and how you view the world around you.

Image: Namib-Naukluft Park, Deadvlei, Namibia. Courtesy of Ayed Tadros Photography.

Photography is, in essence, an act of selection. What guides your eye when you choose what is worth capturing - and what is not?

It’s rarely a rational process. There is usually a moment, a very brief one, where something aligns. Light, subject, emotion, composition. You feel it before you fully understand it.

Over time, you learn to trust that instinct. But it is not purely intuitive. It is informed by experience. By thousands of frames that did not work. By being in different environments, cultures, and situations.

What I tend to respond to most is honesty. Whether it is a landscape, a city, or a person, there has to be something real in it. Not staged, not forced. Something I felt.

If an image feels like it is trying too hard, I usually step away from it. If it feels quiet but genuine, that is often where I stay.

To know more about Ayed’s art, visit:

Ayed Tadros Photography

Instagram Profile

If you had to define it simply: what does it mean, for you, to choose well?

I have to say I am not sure I have fully arrived at that yet.

I tend to be a perfectionist. I revisit decisions, question them, and sometimes look at what I didn’t choose. So, for me, choosing well is less a fixed state and more something I am learning.

What I have come to understand is that choosing well requires a certain level of acceptance. Not every decision will be perfect, and clarity often comes after, not before.

In photography, that might mean staying with one frame and letting go of the others. In life, it means committing to a direction without needing to constantly validate it against alternatives. It can also mean trying to build something meaningful and with depth rather than spreading yourself too thin.

I am still working on that balance between being thoughtful and being at peace with a decision. But perhaps choosing well is exactly that: knowing when to stop searching and start standing behind what you have chosen.

There is a clear honesty in not claiming certainty.

In a world that often equates decisiveness with clarity, this perspective suggests something else: that choosing well may not be about eliminating doubt, but about learning to live with it.

As in photography, it is not the number of possibilities that defines the outcome, but the ability to stay with one frame long enough for it to reveal its depth.

“Perhaps choosing well is knowing when to stop searching and start standing behind what you have chosen.” - Ayed Tadros

What does it mean, for you, to choose well?

We would be glad to read your thoughts.

Image: A gesture of care for nature. Image generated through AI.

Why did we need ESG?

It is a question that belongs to the present.

But perhaps the answer belongs to the past.

Our work is deeply connected to Italy - and with it, to stories.

Stories of entrepreneurs who built businesses in the years following the Second World War. Through proximity, through relationship.

They worked with nature, and understood that to use it meant also to preserve it.

They collected what others discarded - scraps, remnants, overlooked materials - and transformed them into objects of unexpected beauty.

They did not speak of sustainability.

They practiced it.

There were also stories of people.

Of employers who discovered that an employee had stolen - not out of greed, but because there was not enough food at home.

And instead of punishment, they offered a second chance. Sometimes even a raise, without ever exposing the dignity of the person involved.

Of businesses working with perishable goods, who quietly told their most vulnerable clients that certain items were “about to expire” - even when they were still perfectly good - so they could offer them for free without making anyone feel like they were receiving charity.

Not generosity as performance.

But as protection.

And there were those who grew.

Entrepreneurs who built larger ventures and chose - long before any regulation required it - to offer what today we would call “benefits”:

nurseries, books, training, places to rest, even moments of leisure.

Not as an incentive.

But as a way of sharing profit while recognising the human life behind the work.

They did more than the right thing.

They did the most human thing.

Even when nothing could be given back in return.

And then, over time, something began to shift.

A different model of entrepreneurship emerged - not everywhere, not always - but enough to reshape a part of the landscape.

One less rooted in proximity.

More distant, more fragmented.

A way of operating that, at times, began to exploit rather than to care.

Nature, people, attention.

Sometimes invisibly.

Sometimes in plain sight.

Doing the wrong thing - and trusting that time, scale, or resources would eventually dilute its consequences.

We now live in a world where information moves fast - and fades just as quickly.

Where perception can be managed.

Where reputation can, at times, be restored.

And perhaps, in this context, something that was once instinctive needed to be formalised.

This is where ESG enters the conversation.

A framework developed to guide environmental, social, and governance practices.

A language that seeks to define responsibility at scale.

Learn more about the UN Sustainable Development Goals:

Learn more

And in many ways, it is necessary.

Because when responsibility is no longer embedded in proximity, it must be structured elsewhere.

But a question remains.

Can ethical behaviour be enforced?

Perhaps - to a certain extent.

If rules are shared, applied, and upheld consistently.

But regulation alone cannot replace intention.

What may be missing is not another framework, but a shift in how we define value.

Not only corporate profit.

But what might be called ESG profit: a measure that considers what a business gives back, protects, and sustains.

To look back is not to idealise.

But it may help us remember that responsibility was once not a strategy.

It was a way of being.

What would change if doing the right thing no longer required a framework?

We would be glad to read your thoughts.

Leave a comment

Image: Hands of a craftswoman working on a Studio Tondini item.

There was a time when making something required waiting.

Today, we live in an era in which speed has become our default language.

And in many ways, it is extraordinary. It allows us to connect across continents, to access knowledge instantly, to compress distances that once defined our lives.

But something else has quietly shifted.

When everything becomes immediate, our relationship with time begins to flatten.

And with it, our relationship with effort, with patience, and perhaps even with meaning.

There is a word that carries a different rhythm: craft.

It is almost onomatopoeic.

You can hear it.

The friction of materials.

The measured repetition of a gesture.

The sound of something taking shape, slowly.

Craft, crafting, craftsmanship: they all point to a way of doing that resists urgency.

In craftsmanship, time is not something to optimise.

It is something to honour.

Think, for a moment, of the last time you made something with your hands.

Perhaps as a child: assembling, drawing, building without knowing the outcome.

Or later, trying to translate an idea into something real.

There is always a moment in that process where things do not work.

Where the material resists.

Where the idea feels slightly out of reach.

And yet, that is precisely where something happens.

A form of attention that cannot be rushed.

A quiet satisfaction that does not come from completion alone, but from engagement.

Objects created slowly carry this memory within them - perceptibly so.

You feel it in the balance of proportions.

In the way something ages without losing its integrity.

In the absence of excess.

These are objects that teach us how to remain still.

The tradition of craftsmanship - particularly within the heritage of Made in Italy, a tradition we feel deeply connected to - is built on this relationship with time.

Skills passed through generations.

Gestures refined, rarely reinvented.

An understanding that excellence is not an outcome, but a practice.

This kind of knowledge cannot be accelerated.

It can only be transmitted, observed, repeated.

And perhaps that is why it feels increasingly rare, and increasingly necessary.

To return to slow objects is not to reject modern life.

It is to rebalance it.

To allow certain things to take the time they require.

To recognise that not everything meaningful can - or should - be immediate.

Perhaps, in the coming days, there is a small gesture worth revisiting.

An object you once made.

A tool you once used.

A material you once shaped.

To pick it up again. To craft.

What have your hands learned that speed has made you forget?

We would be glad to read your thoughts.

Leave a comment

A detail on a clasp.

A color combination that feels strangely confident.

Or simply a letter - repeated often enough to remain in memory.

For Roberta Tondini, founder of Studio Tondini, one of those early encounters came through a handbag her mother carried with particular affection.

The letter R.

Not just any R - but the one belonging to Roberta di Camerino, the Venetian fashion house founded by Giuliana Coen in the late 1940s.

Today, Roberta di Camerino is often remembered by collectors and historians rather than by the broader fashion public. Yet, Giuliana Coen revolutionised the language of the handbag long before the modern era of luxury branding.

Her designs were bold, theatrical, unmistakably Venetian. Velvet - a fabric rarely used in leather goods at the time - became one of her signatures. Her bags played with geometry and color in ways that felt closer to stage design than traditional accessory making.

And women noticed.

Among her admirers was Grace Kelly, who famously carried the sculptural Bagonghi bag, one of Roberta di Camerino’s most iconic creations.

We asked Roberta Tondini about the first time she remembers seeing those bags.

The Art of Choice: Do you remember when Roberta di Camerino first entered your world?

Roberta Tondini: “Yes - through my Mother, I was a small child. She had some of her bags, and she carried them with such pleasure. As a child, I was fascinated by the letter R in the hardware of one of them. It felt unusual. In fashion, you rarely saw that name or that initial.”

The attraction was almost instinctive.

The bags themselves felt confident, expressive, unmistakably personal.

Years later, Roberta would learn more about the woman behind them.

Giuliana Coen was not only a designer but also an entrepreneur navigating a fashion world that was rapidly changing in post-war Italy. She was known to be acquainted with Gabrielle Chanel, who reportedly reassured her when imitation inevitably followed success.

The advice was simple: if your designs are copied, it means you have created something worth copying.

Looking back today, that early fascination feels like a soft prelude.

Roberta Tondini herself has become an avid collector of handbags - more than 100 pieces spanning some of the most influential maisons in fashion. Among them sits a Bagonghi bag by Roberta di Camerino, part of her personal archive.

When asked whether that childhood encounter shaped Studio Tondini, Roberta pauses.

“I would never say it consciously inspired the brand. But certain things stay with you. Color, proportion, the courage to experiment with materials.”

The parallels are subtle but visible.

Roberta di Camerino was known for bold color combinations - often structured around four dominant tones.

Studio Tondini’s first line, the Livia Collection, also works through a dialogue of four leather colours, carefully balanced in composition.

Material exploration is another shared thread.

Where Giuliana Coen famously introduced Venetian velvet into handbag design, Studio Tondini explores contemporary alternatives - including innovative vegan materials - always searching for new expressions of craftsmanship.

And then there is Venice itself.

The city that shaped Roberta di Camerino also left its mark on Studio Tondini: the brand’s logo is inspired by an architectural detail found in the historic fabric of La Serenissima.

A quiet lineage, perhaps.

Sometimes, the beginning of a story is not a business plan.

Sometimes it is simply a letter.

Or a bag carried by someone you love.

Image:

Roberta di Camerino Bagonghi bag from the personal collection of Roberta Tondini.

What object first shaped the way you choose?

We welcome your thoughts.

Leave a comment

Luxury was something one felt, not something one performed.

In recent years, the fashion conversation has been dominated by the rise of Quiet Luxury: a return to muted tones, impeccable tailoring, and the absence of logos. It emerged almost as a cultural antidote to the saturation of streetwear and visible branding.

For a moment, it felt like a collective exhale.

And yet, as with every aesthetic movement, the risk lies in reduction.

When “quiet” becomes merely another marketing device, it can drift into what might be called plain luxury: visually restrained, yes, but still engineered for margin rather than meaning.

The problem is not the absence of logos, rather, the absence of intention.

In parts of the Middle East, the idea of modest luxury has quietly shaped contemporary fashion conversations. Here, modesty does not mean austerity. It means garments and objects that honor cultural codes while embracing exquisite craftsmanship and material richness.

Luxury, in this context, becomes an inward satisfaction rather than an outward declaration. It respects the social fabric as much as the physical one.

And perhaps this is what feels increasingly relevant.

Because the opposite of ostentation is not minimalism.

It is consideration.

Reasonable luxury asks a simple, almost disarming question:

Who is this for?

If the answer is “for others to see,” something essential may already be missing.

If the answer is “for the personal pleasure of living well,” the gesture changes entirely.

Historically, what made Made in Italy revered was not excess. It was craft that privileged material integrity over spectacle. Objects designed to age beautifully, not to dominate a room.

That was luxury as social intelligence.

To enter a space without overwhelming it.

To choose quality without turning it into a performance.

In an era of awareness, the most radical choice may be respect.

Respect for the artisans behind the object.

Respect for oneself - choosing durability over impulse.

Respect for others - refusing to reduce value to visibility.

Reasonable luxury does not reject success. It refines its expression.

It asks us to consider whether elegance might once again be measured not by what we display, but by what we quietly sustain.

Perhaps the real return is not to “quiet luxury,” but to considered luxury.

The kind that simply endures, for the pleasure of it.

What does luxury mean when no one is watching?

We welcome your thoughts.

Leave a comment

Image: An elegant woman in a fine museum. Image generated with AI.

Our call is not to resist modernity, but to refine our relationship with it.

To choose with clarity, rather than compulsion.

Perhaps that is why choosing well feels increasingly so rare - and precious.

Because it asks us not only to determine what we want, but what that choice will make of us.

Will it undermine our values? What will it say about us? Can we live with it?

We often associate choice with freedom. A personal declaration.

And yet, as the world accelerates - offering too much choice or endlessly recycling the same choice options -, that freedom sometimes begins to feel like fatigue. Or even paralysis.

In her influential TED Talk, Sheena Iyengar, Professor at Columbia Business School, distills years of research into the hidden architecture of choice. Her work reveals that choice is, in fact, not a fixed paradigm: it is a lens shaped by context, culture, and expectation.

Watch the TED Talk

She shares a personal anecdote: requesting sugar for green tea in Japan - a gesture acceptable in one culture, dissonant in another - triggered not just surprise, but a cultural negotiation.

Her insight, beyond a layer of light irony, is clear: choice is not universal. And the same may be true across eras. What once felt liberating may, over time, begin to feel empty. Or irrelevant.

Moreover, a study co-authored by the same Iyengar, published in the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, shows that when we are faced with too many similar options, our ability to choose declines - and so does our satisfaction.

This phenomenon, known as choice overload, suggests that more is not always better.

Beyond the Surface

To choose well, then, is not about maximizing possibilities.

It is about aligning decisions with what holds meaning.

And meaning is rarely immediate.

It reveals itself through:

• Attention - the ability to investigate nuance;

• Care - the strength to resist the automatic;

• Durability - the instinct to choose what endures: in quality, form, or feeling.

A well-chosen object, path, or relationship does not unravel immediate applause. Rather, it unfolds itself over time - through a resonance echoing in the long run.

Ultimately, choosing well shall not be made of checklist, or borrowed tastes.

It shall be a way of living.

And it is the Studio Tondini way of living.

What if every choice you made today was the one you would carry with you for life?

What would you let go of?

What would you choose differently?

Leave a comment

We welcome your thoughts.

They move through it with elegance, but without noise.

They speak many languages - even when they stay silent.

They love art and architecture, train journeys and slow breakfasts;

the freedom of cities that never sleep, and the stillness of early mornings.

Studio Tondini is for them.

For those who know how to choose with grace, with courage, with intention.

For those who don’t need to be recognised by a logo, but by a glance.

For those who see savoir vivre not as a pose, but as a responsibility.

For those who know that true luxury means never compromising -

not on beauty, not on ethics.

This is the spirit behind The Art of Choice.

We live in a hyperconnected age, and yet we feel increasingly disconnected:

from real relationships, from tangible beauty, from the experience of truly living.

This journal exists to bring attention back to what matters -

to what it means to truly live.

Through the art of making - material, craft, and the inherent slowness of creation -

we rediscover the value of time, the quality of gesture, the depth of beauty.

And finally, the art of choosing:

because to choose well is not just an aesthetic act,

but a principle that leads to lasting satisfaction.

A fulfilling choice makes life more fulfilled.

We don’t belong to any one city - we inhabit them all.

We walk through them, in their details, their objects, their gestures that speak louder than words.

Milan, Paris, Tokyo, New York, London, Zurich, Madrid, Los Angeles, Riyadh, Seoul...

every place is inspiration, every encounter a point of departure.

Studio Tondini is not a trend - it is a place of soul.

A multifaceted, refined, thinking community.

An invitation to live with intensity and discretion.

To choose with attention, to dwell with style.

To cultivate rare relationships, authentic beauty, and independent thought.

Yes, we are made of craftsmanship -

but above all, we are urban.

And we believe that those who see the world with new eyes

have both the duty - and the pleasure - to choose what truly speaks of them.

Welcome to the world of Studio Tondini.

A world for connoisseurs of luxury,

in the quest for excellence.

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