A Letter From Our Managing Editor: Change of Season
My partner and I are in the midst of moving to a new apartment this month. This will be our third place together since moving to the city and the first move that’s left our sanity intact. Of course, my superstitious instincts are telling me to knock on wood; that there might be a crucial form I’ve overlooked, or poor water pressure gone unnoticed. But far stronger instincts — ones honed through time and experience — are telling me this is merely the nature of life. Change is inevitable and outgrowing one’s surroundings is often uncontrollable. But what is controllable, I’ve learned, is how one chooses to embrace such change.
A few weeks after we signed our new lease, we attended a farewell party for our friends, a couple I met within days of moving to the city. One of them had accepted his dream job in Paris, the culmination of a year-long plan. Despite the long lead-up to the move, it didn’t make the final goodbyes easier. That party was the latest we’d stayed out in months, perhaps part of us hoping we could forever prolong their move. But eventually, the night ended. We traded heartfelt goodbyes, offered “See you soon!” sentiments that we knew to be untrue, and walked home.
Although few changes cut quite as deep as saying goodbye to close friends, I’m at the age when momentous life updates are almost routine. It feels as though every week another friend or colleague is getting engaged. Others are making drastic career pivots. Some have surrendered entirely to the inevitability of change to travel the globe nomadically. But I’ve learned that the more I experience such change, the better equipped I am to not only accept it, but also celebrate it.
It’s an instinct SHARP is privileged to be driven by. Much like the people in my life, our business is in constant motion. This fall, our art team succeeded in taking on a Herculean scope of new creative assignments. Our events staff has hosted TIFF celebrations and organized flagship launches for major brands. And our leadership team, perhaps most importantly of all, has championed the opportunity for us to take on projects that no other media company in the country would possibly be equipped to do.
As I get older, that instinct to celebrate change — to dive into uncharted waters headfirst — is something I find increasingly admirable. There are several watch brands found within this issue — Hublot, Citizen, and Longines — celebrating landmark anniversaries not by regurgitating old lore, but by introducing daring manufacturing and design innovations. In Toronto’s culinary scene, we feature a trio of restaurateurs offering a radically distinct festival to the community. And, of course, our cover star, Barry Keoghan, epitomizes a celebration of change, as he ushers in a new vanguard of Hollywood’s rising stars. Ahead of a starring role in the upcoming Peaky Blinders film and British-set drama Bird, he describes the constant evolution of his identity as both a father and actor.
That’s not to say change isn’t daunting, as the stack of labelled cardboard boxes littering my apartment keeps reminding me. Rather, it’s that the benefits on the other side of that daunting sea of “change” will always outweigh the safety of stagnation, whether that be jetting off to Paris, growing a business, or moving on.
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