The people behind the craft

Julien Royer

Chef-Owner

Julien Royer is a French chef and restaurant owner. He is the Chef-owner of Odette in Singapore and Louise in Hong Kong. In 2019, Odette was awarded Asia's Best Restaurant.

Junghyun Park

Head Chef, Atomix

Head chef of Atomix, a two-Michelin-star Korean fine dining restaurant in NoMad, New York City, featured in The World's 50 Best Restaurants.

Junya Watanabe

Fashion Design

Pushed technical textile experimentation and radical pattern-cutting under his own line within Comme des Garcons.

Karen Torosyan

Chef & Co-owner, Bozar Restaurant

Karen Torosyan is the chef and co-owner of Bozar Restaurant, the two-Michelin-starred dining room at the heart of Brussels' Palais des Beaux-Arts. Named Gault&Millau's Chef of the Year 2026, Torosyan runs a kitchen defined by artisanal rigor, precision, and respect for time — each dish a studied exercise in craft with no shortcuts taken. Source: Bozar Restaurant official site, Michelin Guide.

Kathe Kollwitz

Printmaking — historical

Made prints and drawings of grief, poverty and war that gave working-class suffering unflinching monumental dignity.

Katsushika Hokusai

Printmaking — historical

Created 'The Great Wave off Kanagawa' and the woodblock series that shaped ukiyo-e and later European modernism.

Kengo Kuma

Architecture

Developed a 'weak architecture' of layered timber and traditional joinery, realized at the Tokyo National Stadium and countless wooden lattices.

Kyle Connaughton

Farm-driven Cuisine

Chef of three-Michelin-star SingleThread in Sonoma, blending Japanese kaiseki discipline with a five-acre estate farm.

Laura Caro

Head Chef (Cap de cuina), Els Comdals

Head chef (cap de cuina) of Els Comdals in Cervera, Catalonia, a restaurant recommended by the Michelin Guide in 2025. Cooks a proximity- and season-driven menu rooted in traditional, unfussy Catalan cuisine, working alongside sous chef Anna Asensi. The dining room and cellar are run by owner-sommelier Ángel Segura.

Lee 'Scratch' Perry

Producer — historical

Invented dub's studio-as-instrument approach at his Black Ark, drenching reggae in echo, reverb and phantom space.

Leo Fender

Instrument Maker — historical

Designed the mass-producible Telecaster, Stratocaster and Precision Bass, making the solid-body electric guitar a household object.

Les Paul

Guitarist / Inventor — historical

Pioneered multitrack recording and overdubbing while championing the solid-body electric guitar that bears his name.

Lino Tagliapietra

Glassblowing

Murano-trained maestro who broke tradition by teaching guarded Venetian techniques to Americans, transforming studio glass worldwide.

Luis Barragan

Architecture — historical

Fused Mexican vernacular with modernism using saturated colour, water, and light to create emotionally charged spaces.

Madeleine Vionnet

Couture — historical

Invented the bias cut, draping fabric diagonally so it flowed and clung to the body without corsetry.

Magdalene Odundo

Ceramics

Kenyan-born British potter whose hand-built, unglazed burnished vessels fuse African, Grecian and Nubian forms into taut, figure-like silhouettes.

Maksut Askar

Chef

Chef at the helm of Neolokal, Istanbul (No.100, World's 50 Best Restaurants 2025), in the Salt Galata complex. Sources from a sustainable farm in Gumusdere and publishes his recipes openly.

Manolo Blahnik

Shoemaking

Spanish shoemaker who hand-carves his own lasts and heels, elevating the stiletto into an object of architectural precision and wit.

Marc Newson

Industrial Design

Created the Lockheed Lounge chair and designed everything from Qantas cabins to watches with sculptural, liquid-metal forms.

Mario Hermoso

Fundador

Jugador de fútbol y empresario con interés en la cocina y gastronomía.

Masa Takayama

Sushi

Chef of Masa in New York, the only US sushi restaurant with three Michelin stars, famed for an uncompromising omakase.

Massimiliano Alajmo

Chef & Restaurateur

Italian chef. In 2002, at the age of 28, became the youngest chef in history to be awarded three stars by the Michelin Guide.

Mauro Uliassi

Head chef

Head chef of Uliassi in Senigallia (No.43, World's 50 Best Restaurants 2025), set between the marina and the beach; a menu moving between classical and innovative plates.

Mira Nakashima

Woodworking

Daughter and successor of George Nakashima, leading the New Hope studio making live-edge furniture that honours the 'soul of the tree.'

Mitsuharu Tsumura

Chef & Owner, Maido

Chef and owner of Maido in Lima, Peru. Maido was ranked #1 in The World's 50 Best Restaurants in 2025 and is renowned for its Nikkei cuisine blending Peruvian and Japanese traditions.

Mónica Oropeza

Restaurant Director

Joined Quintonil in 2018 and is responsible for connecting different parts of the project, ensuring attention to detail and bringing Chef Vallejo's vision to life.

Nadia Santini

Italian Cuisine

Self-taught chef of three-Michelin-star Dal Pescatore in Lombardy, named World's Best Female Chef in 2013.

Naoto Fukasawa

Industrial Design

Coined 'design dissolving in behaviour' and created MUJI's wall-mounted CD player, an icon of intuitive product design.

Nikola Tesla

Electrical Engineering — historical

Pioneered the alternating-current system that became the global standard for electrical power transmission.

Nile Rodgers

Producer / Guitarist

As Chic's guitarist and a producer, defined a rhythm-guitar language behind disco, then Bowie's 'Let's Dance' and Daft Punk's 'Get Lucky'.

Norbert Niederkofler

Chef & Co-owner, Atelier Moessmer

Norbert Niederkofler is an Italian chef, entrepreneur and author. He is the chef and co-owner of Atelier Moessmer, a Michelin three-star restaurant in Bruneck, South Tyrol, Italy, known for its refined Alpine cuisine.

Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan

Qawwali / Vocals — historical

Pakistani qawwal whose staggering vocal range and improvisation brought centuries-old Sufi devotional music to global stages and film.

Olafur Eliasson

Light / Installation

Built immersive environments of light, weather and perception, most famously Tate Modern's artificial indoor sun.

Pablo Rivero

Founder & Owner

Pablo Rivero is the founder and owner of Don Julio, the acclaimed Argentine steakhouse in Buenos Aires' Palermo neighborhood established in 1998. Under his leadership, Don Julio was ranked No. 1 on Latin America's 50 Best Restaurants list in 2024 and was named the world's best steakhouse. Rivero was recognized as the Best Sommelier in the World by the same organization.

Peter Zumthor

Architecture

Designed the Therme Vals thermal baths, an exercise in atmosphere, stone, water, and light that redefined phenomenological architecture.

Pia León

Chef & Founder, Kjolle

Pia León is the chef and founder of Kjolle in Lima, Peru, ranked #9 on the World's 50 Best Restaurants in 2025. Kjolle celebrates Peruvian ingredients through a cuisine rooted in her identity and culinary research. León is also a key figure in the broader Peruvian gastronomic movement, collaborating closely with related restaurants in Lima. She has been recognized as one of Latin America's leading female chefs. Sources: World's 50 Best, Wikimedia Commons, culinary press.

Pierre Herme

Patisserie

Patissier dubbed 'the Picasso of Pastry' who reinvented the macaron as a haute-couture flavour object with his rose-lychee Ispahan.

Piet Oudolf

Landscape Design

Designed New York's High Line plantings and pioneered the New Perennial movement, which values a plant's death as much as its bloom.

Quincy Jones

Producer / Arranger — historical

Produced Michael Jackson's Thriller, the best-selling album ever, and arranged across jazz, pop and film for six decades.

Quique Dacosta

Chef & Owner, Quique Dacosta

Quique Dacosta is a Spanish chef. He began his professional career as a chef in 1986. In 1988, he joined the team at the restaurant that would later become Quique Dacosta Restaurante.

Rasmus Munk

Chef and Founder

Rasmus Munk is chef and founder of Alchemist, the Copenhagen restaurant ranked among the world's most innovative dining establishments, known for its radical approach to gastronomy and immersive storytelling on a plate.

Rembrandt van Rijn

Painting — historical

Redefined portraiture and etching through radical use of light, shadow and raw psychological presence.

Ricardo Legorreta

Architecture — historical

Extended Barragan's chromatic, wall-and-light vocabulary to a monumental civic scale across Mexico and beyond.

Robert Moog

Synth Builder — historical

Built the first commercially viable voltage-controlled modular synthesizer, giving musicians a playable electronic instrument.

Rodolfo Guzmán

Chef & Founder, Boragó

Rodolfo Guzmán is the chef and founder of Boragó in Santiago, Chile, a restaurant dedicated to showcasing Chilean ingredients and terroir through innovative cuisine. Boragó has been ranked on the World's 50 Best Restaurants list, reaching #23 in 2025. Guzmán is known for his research into native Chilean botanicals and ingredients, positioning Boragó as a leading voice in Latin American gastronomy. Sources: World's 50 Best, Wikimedia Commons, culinary press.

Roger Deakins

Cinematography

Shot Blade Runner 2049 and 1917, mastering naturalistic light and the long-take illusion of continuous time.

Rudy Van Gelder

Recording Engineer — historical

Engineered the defining Blue Note and Prestige jazz catalog, shaping the sound of hard bop from his New Jersey studio.

Ryoji Ikeda

Audiovisual Art

Fuses raw data, sine waves and stroboscopic light into overwhelming audiovisual installations at the edge of human perception.

Sakaida Kakiemon XV

Porcelain

Fifteenth-generation head of the Kakiemon kiln in Arita, keeper of the overglaze 'akae' enamel style prized in Europe since the 1600s.

Sakichi Toyoda

Mechanical Invention — historical

Invented the automatic power loom that stopped itself on a broken thread, seeding the principles that became the Toyota Production System.

Salvatore Ferragamo

Shoemaking — historical

Engineered footwear anatomically and invented the cork wedge heel, marrying comfort with sculptural innovation.

Sandor Katz

Fermentation

Author of The Art of Fermentation, the self-taught revivalist who globalized wild kraut, miso and live-culture pickling.

Santiago Lastra

Chef

Launched Kol in London in late 2020 (No.49, World's 50 Best Restaurants 2025), cooking authentic Mexican food from predominantly UK ingredients. His langoustine taco is the menu's only mainstay since launch.

Satyajit Ray

Film Direction — historical

Directed the Apu Trilogy, bringing a humanist, poetic realism to world cinema and controlling music, design, and script himself.

Saul Bass

Graphic Design — historical

Invented the modern film title sequence for Hitchcock and Preminger and designed enduring corporate logos.

Sebastiao Salgado

Photography — historical

Made vast, luminous black-and-white photo-essays on labour, migration and nature that redefined documentary photography's scale and ambition.

Sergio Torres

Chef & Co-founder, Cocina Hermanos Torres

Sergio Torres is one half of the Torres twin brothers who founded Cocina Hermanos Torres in Barcelona in 2018. His culinary training spans two decades of staged work at Europe's most decorated kitchens, including three-Michelin-starred temples: Pedro Subijana's Akelarre in San Sebastián and Alain Ducasse's Plaza Atenée in Paris. He also worked at Neichel in Barcelona and Le Jardin des Sens in Montpellier. Together with his brother Javier, Sergio created a restaurant centered on an open, educational kitchen concept that places the guest at the heart of the culinary experience. Source: Cocina Hermanos Torres official site, Michelin Guide.

Sheila Hicks

Textile Art

Pioneering fibre artist whose monumental woven and wrapped installations elevated textile into globally exhibited fine art.

Shigeru Miyamoto

Game Design

Created Super Mario Bros. and The Legend of Zelda, establishing the grammar of the modern video game.

Suzanne Ciani

Synthesist / Composer

Pioneered the Buchla synthesizer in commercial sound design and quadraphonic live performance as an early female synth virtuoso.