MUSIC : Garota de Ipanema

Helo

  

The men sat in the Bar Veloso listening to the football match on the radio, sipping their whiskey and watching the women walk past. One girl held their attention like a siren, her long black hair, bright eyes, tan skin, and carefree-sway as she walked, enchanted them. She would pass the bar on her way to school or to the beach, sometimes stopping in to buy cigarettes for her mother. Some of the men would call after her, or whistle, while others were more eloquent and civilized in expressing their approval… Vincius de Maraes wrote of her, "the paradigm of the young Carioca: a golden teenage girl, a mixture of flower and mermaid, full of light and grace, the sight of whom is also sad, in that she carries with her, on her route to the sea, the feeling of youth that fades, of the beauty that is not ours alone—it is a gift of life in its beautiful and melancholic constant ebb and flow."

CULTURE: Hunter S. Thompson - "The Kentucky Derby is Decadent & Depraved"

Hunter S. Thompson premiered his "GONZO" journalism style with this piece on the Kentucky Derby for Scanlan's Monthly, vol. 1, no.4, June 1970...

GEAR : New West Knife Works - Fusionwood 2.0 Chef's Knife

From the plows we used to put grain in the silo to the knives we used to prepare our food for the table, I was raised with a great reverence for the implements that make life livable. We bought the best we could afford, and cared for them as if our livelihood depended upon it…and it often did.

INTERVIEW : Susan Carter Hall - Painter

I met Susan a lifetime ago at a party in the Hollywood Hills.  She was the first peer I'd met in my "adult" life that when asked what they do, replied "I am a painter."  There was no wavering,  no feeble attempts at justification, no dancing around it.  It was a declaration that stuck in my head and inspired me.  She knew what she was and was brave enough to announce it to the world long before I could.  

Fifteen years later she walked into church.  She didn't remember me, but I knew her in an instant.  We've since become friends, and she continues to inspire me.  She was kind enough to share a glimpse of her Sporting Life with us...

EXPEDITION: "In Search of the Mai Tai" | Part-1

Cocktails are a vacation in a glass, able to transport you across the globe in the moment it takes your mind to register the delicious flavors floating across your tongue.  A good cocktail is like a five star resort on a powder-white sandy beach, overflowing with beautiful women in string bikinis that think you’re handsome and charming.  A bad cocktail is akin to a roadside motel with a chain-link fenced pool beside the highway with a dead cat floating in it....

INTERVIEW : Peter Beard on House Of Style

Get More: 'House Of Style' Collection at MTV Style

EXPEDITION: Camel Trophy-Land Rover Years

...and speaking of great expeditions...