Inside the archives of shoemaker Roger Vivier

While such institutions have intrinsic value, that doesn’t mean they are entitled to be socially favoured or economically exceptional for ever, says Jianyang Geng In today’s evolving educational landscape, liberal arts institutions must confront a hard reality: reverence for tradition does not justify resistance to reform (Universities blame ‘societal shift’ for axing foreign language degrees, 21 November). For too long, these colleges have clung to the notion of being uniquely “noble”, insulated from market pressures and buffered by government funding and external endowments. While liberal arts institutions do have intrinsic value, that doesn’t mean they are entitled to be…

The leftist party exploded out of Spain’s anti-austerity protests in 2011 and upended Spain’s entrenched two-party system. I was instantly captivated – and for the next decade, I worked for the party. But I ended up quitting politics in disappointment. What happened? This article originally appeared in Equator, a new magazine of politics, culture and art I never expected to retire in my 30s, but I suppose politics is the art of the impossible: what it promises, what it extracts. A decade at the heart of Spain’s boldest modern political experiment aged me in ways I’ve only just begun…

With one former MEP jailed for taking Russian bribes, Reform UK was under the spotlight – so no better time for its leader to make a swift exit Just occasionally the House of Commons is more remarkable for who isn’t in the chamber than for who is. So it was striking that Nigel Farage was absent for Keir Starmer’s statement on the G20 summit and the Ukraine peace process. You might have thought the man who has spent the last six months telling anyone who will listen that he will be the next prime minister might take some interest…