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contributors

CHIMAMANDA NGOZI ADICHIEThe author of three award-winning novels and a collection of short stories, Adichie is among our era’s most significant writers. She is also that rare thing: a public intellectual whom the public actually wants to hear from. Her Ted talk, The Danger of a Single Story, has been viewed 18m times. Her Tedx talk, We Should All Be Feminists, was sampled by Beyoncé, turned into a T-shirt by Dior, and distributed in book form to every 16-year-old in Sweden. She may be the only MacArthur Fellow to also be the face of Boots No7. For Esquire, she writes about Lagos, Nigeria. She lives between the city and the US.(Stacey Liu)TASH AWBorn in Taiwan, raised in Malaysia, resident in London, Aw is an acclaimed novelist and short story writer.…

up in the air

THE HISTORY OF SUPERSONIC PASSENGER flight is unusual in the annals of design and tech in that it is a story of retreat. It is a transport story that travels in the wrong direction. There has only ever been one supersonic passenger air-liner. Concorde took off in 1969, the year men first walked on the moon. It landed for the final time in 2003, a beautiful failure. That’s how Will Hersey puts it in his piece on supersonic flight past, present and future, beginning on page 114. For a few decades, Concorde made the world feel smaller, and then the world got bigger again.I never flew on Concorde. No one I knew did. Concorde was for the point one per cent, before they were called that. People rich enough to…

the only way is ethics

Brendon Babenzien, the former Supreme creative director and founder of the ethical clothing company Noah, is drinking tea in a café in downtown Manhattan, talking about his early years growing up in New York.Brendon Babenzien, founder of Noah, photographed for Esquire at his shop on Mulberry Street in SoHo, NYC (See Stockists page for details)“You’re a suburban kid,” he remembers, “you’re into skating and surfing, wildly influenced by California in the Eighties. But then you’ve got New York: hip-hop, graffiti, B-boy culture and break dancing, and that’s just as appealing to you. So, by the time you’re 16, you’re this kind of crazy mashed-up person.”Babenzien grew up on Long Island. Now 48, he began skating when he was five. By 13, he was working at the local surf shop, and…

unnatural high

Yes, on the face of it, putting an electric motor on a mountain bike sounds like a gimmick. One’s inner sceptic might sensibly point out that isn’t the whole point to do it under your own steam? And aren’t you supposed to endure the physical and mental lows — those “why did I come here?” moments — to truly appreciate the highs?Then you ride one — and realise this view completely misses the point. This is a different sport altogether. First, it’s hard not to have a slightly manic grin when you’re on one. With speed comes adrenaline, but also a sense that trails and routes that might otherwise pass you by are yours for the taking. You also cover more ground, which means more exploring in the time you…

absolutely fabulist

Inside a small store in Rome’s Piazza di San Lorenzo in Lucina, a woman called Suzanne is holding my left hand and gently washing it in a bronze sink. Looking on is the film director Luca Guadagnino. He is wearing a slouchy green cardigan; a Prada backpack sits at his feet. Light pours over us through a large window, high-lighting the intricate rhomboidal-patterned travertine floor, inspired by a nearby church. “There is a special reverence for the sink in every Aesop space,” says Suzanne. It is a lovely sink.Suzanne Santos is Aesop’s chief customer officer, and I am in Rome to visit the Australian skincare brand’s first store in the eternal city, the interiors of which have been overseen by Guadagnino — director of Call Me by Your Name and…