Commentary

The Genteel editors on what we're seeing, doing, reading and anticipating for the week ahead.

EVENTS

LONDON - Heatherwick Studio: Designing the Extraordinary. Victoria and Albert Museum hosts the first ever major retrospective on the work of Thomas Heatherwick, one of the most inventive and  creative practitioners working in the UK today. Heatherwick's design studio is responsible for some of contemporary architecture's most innovative and iconic public sculptures and monuments. His career also includes redesigning the iconic London Routemaster bus. Victoria and Albert Museum (until September 30, 2012).

Scarlett Utzmann Huynh in CHANEL's Little Black Jacket. Source: thelittleblackjacket.chanel.com.

LONDON - London Collections: Men. This June will mark the first ever London Collections: Men during which over 60 menswear designers will show off what they do best in showrooms across London. Find out who's involved and what the event might mean for the future of menswear. Can independent designers sustain the same audience as major labels? Read The Genteel's commentary on London Collections: Men. Various locations (June 14-17).

LONDON - The Noble Art of the Sword: Fashion and Fencing in Renaissance Europe. This exhibition tells the untold story of this fascinating and little known area of Renaissance art: revealing the fantastically skilled artistry behind the rapier; at once a weapon, fashion item, and rich jewellery object; representing the rise of a new and upwardly mobile middle class, sixteenth-century concepts of masculinity and the emergence of the duel of honour. Wallace Collection (until September 16).

NEW YORK - The Little Black Jacket. CHANEL celebrated the New York exhibition opening The Little Black Jacket with Karl Lagerfeld and Carine Roitfeld on Wednesday. The exhibit hosts 113 black and white photographs of celebrities adapting the unisex jacket. 18 Wooster St. (June 8-15).

BOOKS

Questions Without Answers (Phaidon). A remarkable sequence of photo-stories from photo agency VII, documenting world history as we have experienced it since the end of the Cold War. The 11 extraordinarily talented photographers who are part of this agency work at the cutting edge of digital photojournalism, committed to recording social and cultural change as it happens around the world.

FILM

Under African Skies (2012). For the 25th anniversary of "Graceland," Paul Simon returns to South Africa for a historic reunion concert-and a look at his landmark album's turbulent birth. Interviewing anti-apartheid activists and music legends like Quincy Jones, Harry Belafonte, Paul McCartney and David Byrne, Berlinger's (Crude, Paradise Lost) new doc explores both the anatomy of a musical masterwork and the responsibilities of art.

ONLINE

The New York Times - When it comes to fashion concept stores, the Japanese designer at the head of Comme des Garçons, Rei Kawakubo, has a certain commercial magic touch that comes from a sense of place.

White Drama, part of Musée Galliera’s Comme des Garçons exhibition at Les Docks in Paris. Photograph by Pierre Antoine.

Monocle - Long overshadowed by its neighbours, Seoul's creative community is flourishing as a new generation of designers, artists and entrepreneurs develop projects from product design to theatre spaces. Monocle's Gabriel Leigh travelled to the South Korean capital to meet some of the people leading the charge.

The Independent - A new documentary about the legendary Vogue editor Diana Vreeland reveals how her unparalleled drive and perverse taste changed the face of modern fashion. Geoffrey Macnab meets the director. 

Vogue - Usain Bolt isn't just the world's fastest man, he's also one of the world's most stylish athletes with his signature pose and ever-changing running kit.

Chictopia - Get acquainted with the stylists behind your favourite actresses.

Vogue - A look back at style in 1952, the year Queen Elizabeth II ascended to the throne.