Contrast that with Château Voltaire, which feels almost deliberately designed for the fashion crowd.
Created by Zadig & Voltaire founder Thierry Gillier, the hotel behaves less like a hotel and more
like an editorial set. The rooms are intimate, intentionally restrained: soft linens, muted tones,
furniture that looks collected rather than purchased. There is nothing overtly grand, yet everything
feels considered. Staying there feels like stepping into a Parisian apartment styled by someone with
impeccable taste but no interest in display. It’s the hotel equivalent of a perfectly cut blazer worn
with nothing flashy underneath: quiet, controlled, deeply coded.

Then there is The Carlyle, a hotel that understands the theatre of ritual better than almost anywhere else. The experience is not just about the room, but about repetition and memory. The elevators feel ceremonial. The corridors echo with decades of cultural history. Sitting at Bemelmans Bar at night, surrounded by murals and hushed conversation, feels like participating in a lineage rather than consuming a service. Much like a heritage fashion house, The Carlyle trades in continuity. It doesn’t chase relevance, relevance comes to it. 

For a more contemporary expression of this idea, Aman Tokyo offers an entirely different kind of authorship. Staying there feels like entering a sanctuary engineered for sensory recalibration. The lobby is vast and almost monastic, light filtering through washi-inspired textures. Rooms are stripped back to essentials: wood, stone, space, silence. Luxury here is absence — the removal of visual noise. Like modern fashion that prioritises cut over embellishment, Aman Tokyo designs through restraint. You leave feeling not impressed, but realigned. 

In Milan, Bulgari Hotel Milano functions as a bridge between fashion, business and social performance. Hidden behind a discreet entrance, the hotel opens into a private garden that feels like a secret shared among insiders. During fashion week, breakfast turns into an informal boardroom; dinner becomes a networking ritual. The rooms are understated but impeccably material-driven — heavy woods, stone bathrooms, tactile fabrics. Staying there feels strategic, not indulgent. It’s luxury as infrastructure, much like a fashion brand whose power lies in network and positioning rather than spectacle. 

What unites these hotels is not aesthetic similarity, but intentionality. Each knows exactly who it is for and what kind of world it is offering. Like fashion houses, they communicate values through detail: how light enters a room, how staff interact, how public and private spaces are calibrated. There is choreography involved — a sense that the guest is moving through a designed narrative. This is why hotels have become such powerful cultural symbols. They are no longer neutral. They take sides. They align with certain lifestyles, industries, rhythms of living. Choosing where to stay has become as expressive as choosing what to wear. In this new luxury landscape, the hotel is no longer a backdrop. It is a protagonist. And for those fluent in its language, staying somewhere is not about escape, it is about belonging to a world that makes sense. 

Words by Fabiana Gutierrez

The post Inside the Luxury Hotels That Think and Feel Like Fashion Houses appeared first on Voir Fashion.

Photography, as an art form, has historically been used against women. Male photographers have typically presented their female subjects as sexualised, passive, and weak; a subject to be looked at from the heterosexual, male gaze. The feminist photographers of the 1970s contested how women should be perceived in images, establishing themes of provocation, self-objectification, and non-traditional representation. Women photographers today can represent the complexities of womanhood through an honest viewpoint, without relying on the voyeuristic tendencies of masculine photography. Their contemporary images allow the viewer to adopt an alternative view of reality: the creator’s point of view, who carefully curates the image into something which promotes the truth of people today.

Sandy Kim

Sandy Kim shares intimate portrayals of the people who surround her, whilst working in her home of California. Her photographs are of unfiltered events, even in her more editorial shoots, her subjects remain natural compared to the exaggeration often found in fashion photography. Her array of NSFW images do not shy away from honesty. Her subjects’ nudity is not forced or uncomfortable, but simply an aspect of their personality and freedom.

Ashley Armitage

Ashley Armitage breaks down societal standards to include all bodies in beauty and intimacy. Her photographs often have feminine qualities of gentleness and sweetness, embodied across all genders and body types she depicts. Creating images of women, without adopting a voyeuristic lens, Armitage instead uses a welcoming intimacy to present her subjects.

Ayesha Kazim

Ayesha Kazim is creating fresh portraits which embody the individuality of each of her subjects. Working between New York and Cape Town, Kazim’s portraits often blend nature and people to produce gorgeous sunlit subjects. Her subject is the star of her portraits, with their personality shining through Kazim’s photographs to freeze joyous moments in time.

Amber Asaly

Amber Asaly’s photography brings together the nostalgia of Y2K editorials with the Tiktok stars of today. Recently shooting Addison Rae and Charli D’Amelio, Asaly is recreating the beloved style of the 90s and early 2000s photography which plastered our favourite fashion magazines. Her shots embody a nostalgia of 2000s pop stars, and when paired with chic 90s styling, creates romantic images.

From cultural references to provoking intimacy, and showing pure honesty, these photographers embody the nuances of femininity. Women artists are rethinking what they choose to present to the public; using their power to establish the women’s point of view in a previously masculinised lens.

Words By Caitlin Sahin

The post The Women of Contemporary Photography appeared first on Voir Fashion.

Anisha Joshi, a.k.a OsteoAnisha, is an award-winning osteopath with a high-profile clientele (Rita Ora and Professor Green to name a few) and a passion for sharing the healing powers of osteopathy.

As most of us continue to work from home, without the assistance of a proper workplace, it’s easy to forget about the damage that sitting down, and a lack of exercise can do to our bodies. On top of this, the stress and anxieties of the pandemic don’t help with muscle tension and general comfort.

That’s where Anisha is stepping in, offering her years of expertise and experience, she has created affordable plans to help you rehabilitate and ease injuries from home, using her own mix of holistic and educational approaches. Anisha has answered our questions to help you prevent and combat the strains caused by this pandemic, everything from her incentive behind her plans, to products to help your posture at home.

So your practice is praised by the likes of Rita Ora and Nick Grimshaw and you’ve won awards as a principal osteopath, with your care described as a mix of holistic and medical. How do you combine the two in your clinic?

Osteopaths have undergone a 4-5 year degree which incorporates orthopedics, neurological testing and pharmacology. With this knowledge we take a case history in a patient’s first appointment to take all aspects of their lifestyle into consideration. For example, a patient that suffers with neck pain may need to adjust their work station and also incorporate mindfulness in help with stress that quite often manifests in your shoulder muscles.

You have a project called The Stronger Body Plan which allows people to treat their injuries and prevent further pain from home, which we’re sure became very convenient during this pandemic. What was your reasoning behind this idea? What does the plan entail?

I realised that in my clinic the majority of the aches and pains experienced were very similar as we now live in a society where screen time and HIIT (High-intensity interval) training are the new normal. Patients kept presenting similar aches and pains and I realised what exercises and self-help techniques helped them recover quickly.

I decided to create the stronger plan and split it into areas of the body that most commonly cause pain and discomfort. I have the Upper Body, Lower Body, Hips and Knees. They contain a series of strengthening exercises and foam rolling techniques that can help reinforce the strength around those areas of your body.

You must find correlations and trends in certain osteopathic problems like this all the time. What, from your experience, is the biggest complaint from clients that corresponds to the pandemic at the moment?

I have seen a big rise in headaches that are caused from stress and neck tension. I’ve also seen new complaints of more jaw pain which can also cause headaches from people adapting to masks and hip pain from the increased levels of sitting at home.

With these increased levels of sitting at home, from a lot of people working without the situation of an office space, how can we fix our posture to prevent back pain while working remotely?

Try your best to use a chair that goes up and down, but failing that, always sit on a hard chair, at the back of the seat. Try to use books to lift up your screen to eye level and bring the screen closer towards you. Quite often we lean into our screens when concentrating and this can lead to neck and head pain.

If you get lower back pain, you can put your laptop on your ironing board to then alter the height of your workstation and create a makeshift standing desk.

What are other ways to prevent further back pain while working from home?

It’s important you keep moving. So many people underestimate how much they move in an office setting, even if it’s to get up and talk to a colleague at their desk. Try to step away from your workstation every 45 mins to an hour if you can. Set an alarm on your phone!
Also try not to sit with your legs crossed.

“It is important to keep moving. Try to step away from your workstation every 45 mins to an hour if you can“

There are plenty of ways that we can invest in our home office areas to maximise comfort and concentration and prevent these pains even further. Are there any items you’d recommend to help with posture and back pain while working from home?

• Investing in a good chair that goes up and down and has arm rests is probably the best thing I’d recommend you get.
• A laptop stand to bring your screen to eye level.
• A Bluetooth keyboard so that you can have your forearms resting on the chair armrestsis great.
• Some people find resting their feet on a foot rest can reduce the pressure in their lower back.For those of us that need further osteopathic help with strains, aches and pains, clinic visits and consultations are an important part of getting back to comfort and regularity.

In light of the pandemic and the strain on medical services, people may feel discouraged from seeing an osteopath, or like their pains and strains aren’t important. What’s your message to encourage people that they should still consider treatment at the moment?

Osteopaths are considered essential healthcare and were asked to reopen in lockdown 1 along with Dentists. The reason for this is that by addressing your aches and pains it prevents them from getting worse and needing more medical intervention that requires more urgent hospital care. This in itself is reducing the strain on the NHS massively and ensuring you are able to work and stay on your feet throughout this time.

Now obviously this is a stressful time for everyone, with the working from home, the worrying about loved ones and the alienation of lockdown. These anxieties can be detrimental to our bodies from our physical health to our sleeping patterns. How does stress and anxiety affect the body in terms of osteopathy?

Stress has a huge impact on the body. When we are stressed our breathing changes and this can cause us to hyperventilate subconsciously. Just an altered state in our breathing can impact the rib cage movements, the diaphragm and the neck. Stress also causes teeth clenching and for us to hold our shoulders in a constant state of tension. The muscles that attach onto your jaw and neck are all closely linked to neck pain, upper back pain and this can predispose to headaches. An Osteopath is trained to be able to relax the muscles associated with stress to reduce these symptoms and reduce the level of pain in the patient. Stress can also lead to insomnia and sleep is the most consistent thing that research has shown to help lower back pain. So sleep is a big factor in how your body recovers from injury or aches and pains also.

How can we combat or prevent it?

I advise my patients to take small steps at a time. Looking at stress and pain and trying to deal with all of it in one go can be as daunting as the prospect as someone who wants to lose lots of weight or run a marathon. It’s important to implement one thing at a time… so as well as physically treating the patients symptoms with hands-on osteopathy, I will ask them to try journaling before bed and getting into a good sleep routine. Mindfulness or counselling are also other ways in which I help my patients target stress.

So in relation to osteopathy, what general advice would you give people to help them maintain a healthy body, inside and outside of the pandemic?

Prevention is better than cure. If you are getting a twinge in your body it’s the equivalent of a warning light coming on your car dashboard. If you ignore the warning light, it will eventually stay on and that can cause your body to break down. Osteopaths take your whole lifestyle into consideration and will give you the tools you need in order to help maintain your back and live your life to the fullest. It’s good to check in with an Osteopath every 2/3 months to just give your body a check and enable you to go and workout as much as you want and work productively without ever experiencing pain or discomfort.

Although it can be difficult to keep up with bad habits and certain elements of your physical health during this pandemic, it’s so important to take care of your body beyond your diet and mental health. Adjusting how you work from home, deal with stress and exercise during this difficult time starts with listening to your body and professionals like Anisha who know the importance of posture and joint care for overall well-being and comfort. Pay attention to any strains and keep active and supported while you stay at home.

To find out more about Anisha’s treatments and advice, visit her website.

Words and Interview by Daisy Grace Greetham

The post Why You Are Having Back Pain In Lockdown Explains Award Winning Osteopath Anisha Joshi appeared first on Voir Fashion.

“This abuse has found a home on the internet. We have seen right-wing extremists call for the shooting of farmers, for the genocide of Sikhs“

Neelam Kaur Gill

It’s now coming into the sixth month of a long and painful battle between the farmers of India and their government, after new agriculture laws, that seem to favour large corporations at the detriment of the small farmer’s livelihood, were unveiled back in August, sparking outrage and protest from the people affected.

The farmers fear the three new laws will leave them vulnerable to exploitation and will devastate their earnings, as the laws were introduced to incentivise private participation through deregulation of production, movement and sale – something that threatens the small and medium-scale farmers businesses and livelihoods with the possibility of manipulation and unfair prices. This is another blow to the people of India’s largest employer, as the climate crisis has already taken a large toll on the agricultural sector, and with no chance for open discussion on a topic that would impact hundreds of thousands of Indians, these farmers took to protest.

For months now, through cold and struggle, farmers have been protesting to get these laws repealed, taking to mass demonstrations, highway camping and other peaceful methods to get their points across. A lot of these protests have been spearheaded by the women of the farming industry, as the majority of working women in India are employed by agriculture, and a women farmers’ day was declared amongst the protests to commemorate this statistic.

The protests turned violent towards the end of January when a storm of Delhi’s Red Fort ended in the death of a protester and the detainment of over 200 more. Some peaceful demonstrations have been met with brutal force too, with images of police brutality and suppression from the authorities circling social media, causing Humanitarian Aid Organisations such as Khalsa Aid to appeal for discipline and adherence to be maintained by the government.

The Indian government continued to inhibit peaceful protestors this past weekend  by blocking mobile internet services around the New Delhi area, preventing protestors from communicating and gathering during a hunger strike, organised to resume more peaceful demonstrations. This internet shutdown was criticised all over international social media, sparking statements and solidarity for protestors from the likes of Rihanna, Greta Thunberg and Meena Harris.

Such tweets were met with a mix of comments for and against the protests, some going as far as threats against these supporters, something sadly becoming a common and relentless occurrence surrounding the events, as particularly women in the South Asian diaspora have received online abuse for supporting the protests. Fashion model Neelam Kaur Gill was one of the women targeted, speaking up about it in a recent statement posted to social media:

“This abuse has found a home on the internet. We have seen right-wing extremists call for the shooting of farmers, for the genocide of Sikhs. And, many women including myself have received relentless abuse online including sexual harassment, intimidation and death threats.”

But the supportive voices continue, as South Asian and Sikh communities all over the world along with allies to the cause have protested and defended out of solidarity for the farmers protesting.

What You Can Do To Help

Like Neelam Kaur Gill said in her statement, “Each like, comment and share has amplified the voice of farmers and labourers into the halls of power – media, parliaments and beyond.” Using any platform you have to share the stories and events of the last 5 months and the movement’s continuation will raise awareness for the matter and help to get these farmers’ needs met.

Change.org have a petition to get the law revoked, that only requires a signature, or if you want to donate, the following organisations are supporting Indian farmers.

Fundraiser for medical facilities, created by https://unitedsikhmission.org/

saveindianfarmers.org runs several projects to aid Indian farmers inside and outside of this movement, providing support with everything from rural education to water conservation.

Khalsa Aid are supporting the protests on the ground, working closely with the organisers.They aren’t currently requesting funds but are continuing to support and share their work, and will share any projects when approached.

Words by Daisy Greetham

The post Indian Farmers Protest: Everything You Need To Know And How To Help appeared first on Voir Fashion.