In an effort to get tourist numbers up, Britain’s Visit London campaign, in association with Virgin Atlantic, has presented an award to actor Michael Caine—Sir Maurice Micklewhite—for being London’s Favourite Londoner. The award was voted on by fellow Londoners and is one of fourteen Visit London awards that are presented. The awards are now in their fifth year.
   Visit London has been more consistent with its marketing than various efforts to brand the country, from the Tony Blair favourite of Cool Britannia in the late 1990s to UK OK earlier this century.
   For Michael Caine fans, the great Academy Award-winning actor does not say in this video, ‘My name is Michael Caine,’ ‘Not a lot of people know that,’ or ‘You’re only supposed to blow the bloody doors off!’

Mini has revealed its new convertible, based on the latest platform. Earlier this year, Lucire tested the Clubman estate, which we dubbed a fashion item for the RAV4 crowd turning away from SUVs because of their negative image in 2008. The cabriolet should equally be a winner for BMW and Mini, especially with new engines, the electrohydraulical roof and the usual customization beloved of new-generation buyers.

We like this idea: Above + Below London, a new footwear label, uses fabrics that have been reclaimed from London buses and Underground carriages from the 1950s through to the 1990s—with the permission of Transport for London. Some are rare and will likely take wearers back to an earlier era.
   Central St Martin’s graduate Robert Taylor and music promoter–film-maker Caroline Read are the brains behind Above + Below London.
   ‘The first in the range is a tribute to Chuck Taylor’s enduring hi-top classic basketball shoe,’ says the company. ‘They incorporate recycled tyre rubber in the soles, restored Tube and bus seat textiles in the uppers and reused leather cheque book wallets in the trim.’
   Unlike other labels that have reclaimed materials, Above + Below’s are rather stylish. Their designs are also not stuck in the past.
   The label aims to create the ‘greenest trainers on the market’ and currently seeks retailers. It pledges to donate a tree for each pair sold, to be planted inside the M25 by charity tree planting partners Trees for Cities.

Above: Model Veronika Fasinova and Matthew Williamson, previewing one of the designs in next spring’s collection for H&M. (Photographed by Magnus Magnusson for H&M.)

Continuing the idea of accessible luxury, Hennes & Mauritz has announced that its next guest designer will be Matthew Williamson. Williamson follows in the footsteps of Karl Lagerfeld, Stella McCartney, Viktor & Rolf and Comme des Garçons in creating capsule collections for the mass-market brand.
   Williamson will begin with an exclusive women’s fashion range at selected stores on April 23, then continuing with men’s and women’s pieces for summer available from mid-May, in all H&M stores worldwide. In an exclusive for H&M, Williamson will début his first-ever menswear pieces.
   ‘It is an incredible opportunity to be working with H&M, creating a “Matthew Williamson for H&M” capsule collection,’ said the designer in a release. ‘I love the fact that H&M have created a new phenomenon in fashion through the pioneering concept of collaborating with high-end designers to create one-off limited-edition capsule collections. I am thrilled that my creations for H&M will be accessible to and hopefully enjoyed by so many people around the world.’
   Creative adviser Margareta van den Bosch says, ‘Matthew has such a good eye and a way for working with prints that he mixes up in a new way. When he combines these things, you get a very contemporary London look. It’s for people who want to look special, but his clothes can also be worn in a nonchalant way—you can really play around with them. He is fantastic with piling on colour—it’s a very stylish collaboration for H&M, and very much in line with the way we’re thinking about fashion for spring–summer.’
   Williamson burst onto the London fashion scene in 1997, with a colour-drenched collection modelled by Kate Moss, Helena Christensen and Jade Jagger. His clothes are worn regularly by celebrities such as Sienna Miller, Keira Knightley, Kate Hudson and Gwyneth Paltrow, and last year he was honoured with an exhibition on his first decade at the Design Museum in London.

Porsche has released footage of its new Panamera sports sedan—we have the latest video of the car, both stationary and in motion. If it’s anything like the 911s we have driven, this car could do well. And we were right about the Cayenne being a sales’ hit for Porsche. While there are still people smarting from the financial crisis to prevent the Panamera from doing quite as well as the Cayenne, there are probably enough of the rich who see potential for a four-seat, four-door Porsche in their garage.

It was nice to join GAS in Wellington, New Zealand on its store’s ?rst anniversary last Friday, at which deputy mayor Ian McKinnon was a guest. The store, meanwhile, slashed 40 per cent off its retail prices for the VIP function. The Italian label, whose New Zealand venture has the support of All Black Dan Carter, appears in issue 26 of the print edition of Lucire.

We’ve put up some extra images from behind the scenes of the Lancôme Magni?que TV commercial, starring Anne Hathaway and directed by Peter Lindbergh, this week. A video showing the making of the commercial was shown on the Lucire TV site last month.

Above: Karolína Kurková in La Perla, as featured in Lucire in 2001.

E! Entertainment Television has named Karolína Kurková as the world’s sexiest woman for 2008.
   Model Bar Rafaeli and actress Angelina Jolie took second and third places.
   Rounding off the top 10 were Gisèle Bündchen, Scarlett Johansson, Adriana Lima, Heidi Klum, Penélope Cruz, Manuela Arcuri and Shakira.
   Kurková has been in the press lately after modelling in the 2008 Victoria’s Secret show, which was broadcast on American television. There has been press speculation over her missing navel, the result of infant surgery.
   Czech-born Kurková began modelling in 1999 at age 15, and came to most fashion followers’ notice in 2001 when she appeared on a Vogue cover.