Welcome to 2026.

I hope your year has begun with momentum, with clarity, with the quiet thrill of watching intentions turn into action. I hope you are already surprising yourself with your discipline, your softness, your courage. This is our first issue of the year, and it felt only right that it be devoted to Love. Not only the cinematic kind. Not only the candlelit dinners and carefully chosen notes. But the enduring, shaping, life altering kind.

In this Love Issue, we explore affection as a practice rather than a performance. We look at what we nurture, what we protect, what we build patiently over time.

Our health and fitness editor examines love through the lens of legacy. How the way we care for our bodies becomes something we pass on. How movement, nourishment, rest, and reverence are not fleeting resolutions but quiet inheritances. The habits we form today ripple outward into families, communities, futures. Self care, when done well, becomes communal care.

We also invite you to rethink how you give. Our non fragrance Valentine’s Day gift guide is a love letter to thoughtfulness. Stylish objects that are meant to be used, cherished, woven into everyday life. A reminder that romance does not have to arrive wrapped in roses or glass bottles. The most memorable gifts are often the ones that say, I see how you live, and I chose this with you in mind.

Elsewhere, we turn our attention to the AI Epoch. Artificial intelligence is no longer a distant horizon. It is now a central driver of economic strategy, creative expression, and societal debate. We explore what this acceleration means for culture, for labour, for beauty, for storytelling itself. How we navigate innovation is becoming one of the defining love stories of our era. The relationship between humans and the tools we create will demand discernment, ethics, and imagination in equal measure.

And because this is the Love Issue, we linger on the bond that so often sustains us longest.

Friendship.

The relationships that witness our becoming. The women and men who hold our secrets, sharpen our thinking, steady our grief, and celebrate our wins with an intimacy that rivals any romance. The group chats that become lifelines. The late night voice notes. The quiet coffees after difficult weeks. The shared ambitions. The shared history. These are the love stories that stretch across decades, that survive cities, seasons, reinventions.

This issue is devoted to them. To chosen family. To the friendships that teach us how to love better everywhere else.

We also take a close look at Pat McGrath Labs and what recent filings suggest about the future of beauty. It is a story about artistry meeting infrastructure, about what happens when visionary creativity matures into long term strategy. It is a reminder that behind every iconic product is a business model, and behind every business that lasts is foresight.

At Chaud, we believe luxury is not only about what gleams. It is about what endures. Health. Intellect. Integrity. Community. Curiosity. The relationships we tend. The worlds we are brave enough to imagine.

As you turn scroll through the articles, I hope you feel held, challenged, inspired. I hope you find something that makes you pause, something that makes you text a friend, something that nudges you to take better care of yourself, something that reminds you that love is rarely loud but always powerful when practiced daily.

Here is to a year of intentional living.

Here is to ambitious tenderness.

Here is to friendships that feel like home.

With love and gratitude,

Reenie xx