WINTER WARMERS

Mittens have covered human hands since our days as cave dwellers, so it’s natural that mitten lore has evolved in so many cold-weather lands. You can buy kits to sew particularly Finnish or Swedish mittens. Norway’s mitten tradition has inspired not only how-to-knit literature but also inquiries into the mitten’s cultural importance.

Jan Brett’s book The Mitten — in which a child’s mitten becomes an improbable shelter for a bear, a hedgehog, and other beasts — is the retelling of a Ukrainian folk tale. The “three little kittens who lost their mittens” is a rhyme said to have New England origins. And a Latvian tradition has it that a bride’s wedding chest be filled with hundreds of pairs of hand-stitched mittens, woven with designs that symbolize fertility, happiness, and love.

In the 1700s, wealthy European women wore embroidered linen mittens, elbow-high, as a fashion statement, while the Italians knitted silk mittens for the Catholic church.

Today’s mittens are hardier and speak more to fun and to folly — often brightly colored and often, due to their easy on-and-off-ness, on the hands of a child. Yet no adult north of Abilene should be without a pair. They may be less practical than gloves, and they’re lousy in a snowball fight, but mittens keep our fingers together and are infinitely cozier — which, in the end, is their purpose.

TAKE THAT
The now-obsolete expression to “give someone the mitten” meant to reject a would-be beau. (It’s a folkier, softer version of today’s “talk to the hand.”)

STATE OF THE UNION
Michigan’s Lower Peninsula (nearly the entire state) is called the Mitten for its geographical shape. As legend has it, the formation is the handprint of Paul Bunyan.

DIGITAL DEFINITION
The hardest part of knitting a mitten is the thumb, and doing it presents the decision that defines the mitten itself: whether to sew the thumbs coming out of the mittens’ palms or from their sides — the latter suitable to wear on either hand.

— Kostya Kennedy

Photography by Mark Wagoner

2008 BENTLEY CONTINENTAL GT SPEED

Class, opulence, and horsepower converge in this attractive 5,180-pound British import.

Unlike other exotic sports cars, sliding into the driver’s seat of the Continental GT Speed requires no acrobatics or body contortions. Once at the wheel, take note of the exquisite craftsmanship throughout the interior, from the stitching on the wide sport seats to the three-spoke steering wheel. Notice, too, the heavy knurled-aluminum key fob, the contemporary dashboard covered in glistening machine-turned metal, and the Breitling timepiece prominently situated between the two distinctive circular air vents on the center stack.

Tap the pedal and prepare for effortless acceleration. The GT Speed’s engine is a reworked version of Bentley’s twin-turbo W12. Even with the increased horsepower (from 552 to 602) and torque (from 479 lb-ft to 553), the GT Speed is 3.5 percent more fuel-efficient and emits less carbon dioxide than the slower 2007 Continental GT. This added displacement yields outrageous performance: 0 to 60 mph is achieved in a mere 4.3 seconds, three-tenths of a second faster than the Porsche 911 Carrera S. Keep the pedal nailed to the floor and you’ll reach a top speed of 202 mph.

More so than other cars in its class, the GT Speed is made for everyday driving; the standard all-wheel-drive system keeps you right on course. Take the Continental GT Speed for a test drive when it arrives at Bentley dealers this month, and be prepared for a memorable road experience.

— Nate Chapnick

YOU BE THE JUDGE

Looking for a brief but rewarding winter escape? Watch these films that almost took home the gold.

Last year’s Academy Awards would have been completely lackluster had Martin Scorsese not finally picked up a best director Oscar. His win for The Departed after five nominations (plus two for adapted screenplay) saved him from the dubious honor of being the director with the most losses in Academy history. That honor remains with Clarence Brown, who, thanks to an ersatz and long-defunct rule that only allowed nominees in 1930 to be selected once for two films, was nominated five times for six movies yet never brought home the prize. He’s in good company — eight directors have been nominated for four or more directing Oscars without winning.

Clarence Brown isn’t a household name, even though he directed popular family fare such as The Yearling and National Velvet. His masterpiece is 1930’s Anna Christie, the first sound film by Greta Garbo, for which he won his first nomination alongside a mostly forgotten film called Romance. Brown was ultimately defeated by Lewis Milestone and his landmark All Quiet on the Western Front.

Alfred Hitchcock is possibly the most recognized name in director history. Over the course of his career he was nominated five times for best director (Rebecca, Lifeboat, Spellbound, Rear Window, and Psycho); although he received a Thalberg award for his cinematic oeuvre, he never took home the coveted best director trophy. 1940’s Rebecca is his first U.S. film and a best picture winner. It was selected from a field of ten films, including The Grapes of Wrath and The Philadelphia Story, but Hitchcock ultimately lost to John Ford, director of The Grapes of Wrath and the winner of more directing Oscars than anyone else (four in five nominations).

The controversial nature of his movies probably kept Stanley Kubrick away from the podium, though he was nominated four times. It’s difficult to decide if Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb (1964), 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968), or A Clockwork Orange (1971) is his masterwork. Nonetheless, splashy movie musicals shot down Kubrick’s directing nods for Dr. Strangelove and 2001, as George Cukor and Carol Reed won for My Fair Lady and Oliver! respectively. And an iconic car chase outpaced the violence of A Clockwork Orange when William Friedkin won the Oscar for The French Connection.

Of all the most nominated directors, it’s Peter Weir who arguably deserves a win. Though he is a specialist in setting relationships against a climate of change, it’s his introspective work that gets nominated: Dead Poets Society over Gallipoli; The Truman Show over The Mosquito Coast. (And Witness and Master and Commander are hardly forgettable.) If there’s one work that encompasses Weir’s expertise in both relationships and action, it’s 1982’s The Year of Living Dangerously, for which he wasn’t even nominated. Watch it unfold on DVD, and you’ll understand that Weir’s time might still come.

— Leslie Mizell

Photography by Mark Wagoner

Robert Altman, founder of Lionsgate Films and a hero to indie filmmakers, earned his Honorary Award in 2006 (about eight months before his death). He also picked up best director noms for five movies: M*A*S*H, Nashville, The Player, Short Cuts, and Gosford Park. Altman’s use of improvisation, intertwining storylines, and characterization instead of strict plot development made his films always interesting but often flawed. The Player, his entertaining 1992 satire of Hollywood, is arguably his most polished feature. To get the true Altman experience, watch Nashville, a star-studded movie about politics set against the country-music industry.

Federico Fellini was such an iconic director that he’s made his way into the lexicon. (“Felliniesque” describes a hallucinatory scene in an otherwise ordinary situation.) His stylized Italian films influenced a generation of directors. Perhaps the most poignant example is 1960’s La Dolce Vita, for which he earned the first of his four nominations. The film explores the downward spiral of a womanizing gossip columnist played by Marcello Mastroianni. (The movie also thrust the word “paparazzi” into the global lexicon.) The other films for which Fellini was nominated — 8 ½, Fellini Satyricon, and Amarcord — are all available on DVD.

Nobody captures anger on celluloid like Sidney Lumet, and the Academy showed its appreciation of him in 2005, when he received his Honorary Oscar after four nominations. Tension and outbursts mark 12 Angry Men, Dog Day Afternoon, and The Verdict, but one movie takes that rage and makes it integral to the plot. Network, released in 1976, is a brilliant and prophetic satire (penned by Paddy Chayefsky) of a television network willing to do anything for ratings and the “mad as hell” anchorman it raises to celebrity status. Under Lumet’s guidance, Network crackles with actors (Faye Dunaway, William Holden, and Peter Finch among them) at the top of their game and a plot that approaches nonfiction more with each passing year.

King Vidor never received credit for his most famous work as a director: the Kansas scenes in The Wizard of Oz, filmed when Victor Fleming left the production to take over Gone With the Wind. Largely unknown by today’s audiences, Vidor made one of the most successful switches from silent films to talkies and picked up five Oscar nominations before earning an honorary award in 1979. Vidor’s most important work, 1928’s silent war drama The Crowd, isn’t yet available on DVD. Study his directorial range in other movies for which he was nominated, such as the 1929 African-American musical Hallelujah!, the classic tearjerker The Champ, and the epic War and Peace, which took two years to film.

— Leslie Mizell

A SHARED VISION

Exotic beauty comes from an unexpected source.

The intricately beaded necklaces that make up the Julio Pagliani jewelry line are stunning enough to have been prominently featured in swanky gift bags for the premiere of the 2007 western 3:10 to Yuma. But the exquisite handmade jewelry has the humblest of origins. It’s a means of sustenance for many residents of the remote village of Norogachi, tucked away in northern Mexico’s Sierra Madre.

It started when New Jersey–based photographer Richard Speedy began documenting the Tarahumara Indians and the primitive way of life on the outskirts of Norogachi. He vowed to help the people he met find a way to earn a living without having to leave their families behind. The jewelry enterprise took root after a colleague in Speedy’s commercial photography business returned from a trip to Russia, where she discovered a unique form of crocheted beadwork. In an epiphany, Speedy and his colleagues determined to teach Norogachi residents how to make beaded jewelry.

A handful of villagers continue to create necklaces and bracelets crocheted with beads, gems, or pearls. All have ornate clasps cast by Guadalajara artist Xio Auxiliadora in sterling silver and 14 karat gold. The Caballo Collection features horse-head clasps, while the distinctive beadwork and snake-head clasps of pieces in the Viboras del Mundo Collection reflect the natural beauty of reptiles.

Julio Pagliani can be found in many boutiques and galleries in the States. $149 and up juliopagliani.com

— Callie Young

A TASTE OF LOVE

A Valentine’s Day guide to finding choice handcrafted chocolates for your sweetheart

1. Woodhouse Chocolate
Former winemaker Tracy Wood Anderson crafts Belgian-style bonbons in her Napa Valley storefront. Fiori di Sicilia (with orange-scented marzipan), ginger Thai, and others are packaged in an elegant Tiffany-blue box; a special-edition red box is available for the 14th.
$22 for a 12-piece assortment woodhousechocolate.com

2. L.A. Burdick
Walpole, New Hampshire–based Larry Burdick learned to make chocolate in Switzerland. His delightful signature mice- and penguin-shaped candies are filled with chocolate and lemon ganache and coated in dark and white chocolate.
$15 for a ¼ pound assortment, $33 for a box of 9 penguins burdickchocolate.com

3. Recchiuti
Chocolatier Michael Recchiuti opened his first shop in San Francisco’s Ferry Building in 2003; his best sellers include burnt-caramel almond and tarragon grapefruit. Every six months a local artist designs colorful chocolates for Recchiuti’s Artisan Collection.
$22 for an 8-piece assortment, $18 for the 8-piece Artisan Collection recchiuti.com

4. John & Kira’s
This Philly–based husband-and-wife team make simply formed bonbons with old-fashioned signatures to identify flavors. Ganaches like lavender honey and lingering lemongrass are infused with locally grown berries, fresh herbs, or spices from organic farms; then they’re enrobed in Valrhona chocolate.
$39 for a 28-piece assortment johnandkiras.com

5. Sahagún
From her tiny shop in Portland, Oregon, Elizabeth Montes lovingly makes eclectic chocolates crafted from premium single-origin dark chocolate such as De Vries and Chocolat Michel Cluizel. Savor rose geranium truffles and chocolate barks like palomitapapá (chile japonés with exploded corn and fleur de sel). All are handsomely packaged in a white box with a scarlet ribbon.
$20 for an 8-piece assortment sahagunchocolates.com

— Aine Doyle

Photography by Mark Wagoner

STATIONARY OBJECTS

Get your hands on notable works from two inventive sculptors.

Canadian sculptor Colin Schleeh takes simple scratch paper to another level with his irresistibly touchable Morph pads. The towering pads contain a thousand sheets of notepaper and can be manipulated into an infinite number of shapes. A further twist: For orders of 250 or more, Schleeh will put your own design on the side of the pad.
$19 charlesandmarie.com

The humble pencil is completely reinvented in the hands of San Francisco artist Agelio Batle, who casts sculptural objects (the first was, fittingly, his own hand) in solid graphite. The handsome pieces are fully functional writing instruments from every angle; the graphite formula Batle uses resists smudging on your hand so you can leave your mark only where you wish.
$36–$62 asbworkshop.com

— Liz Seymour

Photography by Mark Wagoner

CAIPIRINHA

You’ve probably seen it on cocktail menus and wondered what it was, let alone how to pronounce it. The Caipirinha (kye-purr-EEN-yuh), the national drink of Brazil, is becoming an international sensation. According to beverage industry experts, it now ranks with the Mojito and the Cosmopolitan as one of the top-selling cocktails in the world.

The Caipirinha is made with cachaça (kuh-CHA-suh), an unaged liquor distilled from the fermented juice of sugarcane and produced only in Brazil. The Caipirinha’s refreshing flavor and simplicity (its only ingredients are lime, sugar, and cachaça) evoke the sexy, carefree spirit of the country where the drink originated. Brazilians celebrating carnival this month will no doubt be sipping Caipirinhas; whip up a cocktail and join in the fun.

— Dean Blaine

Photo by Eightfish / Getty