Capella Brings Fresh Energy to Sydney’s Hotel Scene, and Other News

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Capella Brings Fresh Energy to Sydney’s Hotel Scene

In the lobby at the core of the sandstone building that, in 1912, became a new home to Sydney’s Department of Education, a kinetic sculpture offers a robotic tribute to eighteen local wildflowers. The piece is called Meadows, by Amsterdam’s beloved Studio Drift, and joins a vibrant collection of Australian artists, including Judy Watson and Otis Hope Carey, installed throughout the ground floor gathering space. It’s a bright entry to Capella Sydney, the city-block-sized property reimagined by Pontiac Land and architecture firm Make as the city’s latest hospitality destination, complete with a new five-story extension. 

Nine stories and 192 rooms and suites float above the lobby, full of serene rooms detailed in walnut and stocked with amenities including Frette linens and standalone tubs with vegan Haeckels bath products. And while the hotel is just steps from the Opera House and Harbour Bridge, guests could do worse than refresh themselves at the Auriga Spa, swim laps in the 66-foot-long heated indoor pool, and relax at one of the lobby’s dining options. Chef Brent Savage’s Brasserie 1930 highlights local produce, while the Victorian throwback McRae Bar offers libations in honor of the building’s first architect, George McRae. For the best view of Drift’s work, however, have a seat in the lobby’s Aperture, where a 23-foot-high green wall with 70 species of local flora compliments Drift’s mechanical meadow. —Jesse Dorris

Telfar will debut a dynamic pricing model that lets buyers set the cost of each item.

Next week, Telfar plans to roll out a unisex collection with a dynamic pricing experiment that essentially allows buyers to decide how much the New York City label’s items cost. Known for selling out of its coveted bags online within seconds, the label will introduce a pricing tool that initially sets each item at the wholesale price, which increases by a few dollars every second until it sells out. Each product’s sell-out price will become its price forever. The move is the latest step the label has taken to reinforce affordability and flip the script on the fashion industry, where brands often charge more for popular items. “I want people who want my clothes—and will look cool in it—to be able to get it,” Clemens says. 

Jeremy Scott is departing Moschino after ten years as the label’s creative director.

After ten years, Jeremy Scott announced he will be departing his role as creative director of Moschino. In a statement, the designer described his tenure as “a wonderful celebration of creativity and imagination,” adding that he feels “so proud of the legacy I’m leaving behind.” During his decade at the helm, Scott mastered the tongue-in-cheek spirit mastered by founder Franco Moschino and on display in the label’s recent Fall/Winter 2023 season in Milan, where models donned prim coats and houndstooth prints that melt like a Salvador Dalí clock. 

The Gardner Museum closes for a day after learning about a planned climate protest.

Boston’s Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum promptly shut its doors for the day after learning about Extinction Rebellion’s plans to stage a climate protest on the 33rd anniversary of the institution’s infamous 1990 art heist, which remains unsolved. In a statement, museum leadership said the decision to close on Saturday was made out of caution for the safety of the staff, volunteers, visitors, and its art collection. Extinction Rebellion, which claimed its original protest would be non-violent and non-destructive, instead staged a die-in outside the museum to speak out about biodiversity loss. 

Deborah Berke Partners renovates Harvard Law School’s Lewis International Law Center.

Deborah Berke Partners has overhauled a 1957 building that houses Harvard Law School’s Lewis International Law Center by adding a new top floor, enlarging the rectangular building, and reconfiguring the interior. The building, which formerly housed libraries and classroom space, now features additional meeting rooms and social spaces in step with the university’s contemporary needs. “The original modernist structure became outmoded with the changing needs of libraries and law pedagogy alike,” the firm said in a statement. “As the teaching of law has shifted its focus to diverse modes of social interchange, rather than on traditions handed down from generation to generation, the spatial needs of law schools has evolved.”

PriestmanGoode develops an autonomous vehicle for limited-mobility air travelers. 

For people with reduced mobility, navigating airports can be tough. A group of British companies—PriestmanGoode, Centaur Robotics, and Naurt—have developed a two-wheeled individual vehicle concept called Geo that can drive through terminals. The design is based on Centaur’s self-balancing personal electric vehicle, which can drive autonomously thanks to Naurt’s location optimization software. The team is now seeking to create a proof-of-concept and is eyeing the Dubai Airport to test prototypes. If picked up, they also plan to introduce similar vehicles to malls and cruise ships. 

Artists and writers are deploying a range of tactics to help protect their jobs from AI.

As OpenAI released GPT-4—an enhanced version of ChatGPT—last week, artists and designers are starting to fight back. Campaigns and lawsuits are being waged in an effort to prevent job loss, such as veteran audiobook narrator Gary Furlong and SAG-AFTRA speaking out against Apple for using his audiobook files for machine learning. Nick Cave notably called AI-generated lyrics “a grotesque mockery of what it means to be human.” Meanwhile, the opt-out movement is gaining traction with tens of millions of artworks and images being excluded from machine learning in the past few weeks alone. 

Today’s attractive distractions:

Scientists are developing “cosmic concrete” to construct habitats on Mars.

According to a new study, saliva may be the next frontier in cancer detection.

Welcome back to Good Burger! A sequel to the comedy classic gets greenlit. 

Domus unearths Joe Colombo’s modular, futuristic flat in early-’70s Milan.