Aesthetic

"Regret" -- nostalgia turned upside down -- is a strong word. For a critic, it's also a loaded one. My feelings about buildings have certainly shifted or deepened over time. But I don't know that I've ever had the experience of writing about a piece of architecture one year, then going back the next and finding that my feelings had changed so markedly that I had to look back on my earlier judgment with embarrassment -- or anything resembling shame, which is a close cousin of regret and maybe even a prerequisite for it. What I've learned, instead, is that if there's one reaction to architecture that I know I can trust and that won't waver on later visits, it's a visceral rather than an intellectual one. A great building (or a really terrible one, for that matter)

Time may heal all wounds, but the scars that remain can be unsightly, itchy, stiff and painful. Pharmacy aisles beckon with "clinically proven, doctor-recommended" scar products, and the Internet teems with anecdotes of different creams and elixirs that supposedly erase old scars or prevent new ones from forming. But not all of those claims stick. "There are a thousand wives' tales and a whole bunch of things you can buy, but none have scientific validity to speak of," says Dr. Terence Davidson, a professor of surgery at UC San Diego School of Medicine.

You can count on the hippest restaurants to have dazzling menus, stylish servers and an attractive clientele. And increasingly, there's a featured side dish: noise. As restaurateurs strive to attract a younger crowd, they've ditched the pile carpets, soft tablecloths and plush velvet booths for crowded communal tables, clattering open kitchens and pounding Rihanna music. And it's all amplified by cavernous ceilings, spartan walls and bare floors. The hustle and bustle is credited with bringing in more business, but it's also creating a backlash.

Lots of pills and gadgets promise to help you "burn" fat. And they almost always disappoint. Maybe it's all a matter of degrees. Instead of burning fat, should you be trying to freeze it instead? FOR THE RECORD: In an earlier version of this article, a headline said that neither Zeltiq's CoolSculpting system nor Cool Shapes Contouring Shorts had been studied for effectiveness. CoolSculpting has been studied for effectiveness. Two new products take a cold approach to fat loss.

The last time I was in Rome I saw a young man in linen shorts and wraparound sunglasses, talking on a cellphone and smoking a cigarette while riding a Vespa, moving fast down a narrow street in the direction of the Piazza Navona. Perhaps only an Italian can do that, and only in the Eternal City, but there is something timelessly cool about the classic Italian scooter. As a motorcycle snob, I never rode a scooter -- or wanted to. Give me horsepower and performance, I said. Scooters are for ... amateurs.

Antique picture frames are highly valued collectibles in Europe, where they are often displayed, without canvases, as art in their own right. Such is not the case in the United States. According to Traditional Home magazine, many galleries and even some museums--until recently--routinely discarded old frames, considering them out of style or not worth restoring. Even today, savvy frame collectors are rare, and old frames are often ignored.

It seemed like a typical dinner party for the well-heeled set: eight women, some dressed in stilettos and skinny jeans, gabbing over glasses of wine and endive spears with goat cheese at a lavish Hollywood Hills home. But amid the Kate Middleton pregnancy chatter and a debate on the best mascara brands, the conversation turned to mobile app strategies and the latest tech companies to score millions of dollars in venture capital funding. Not too long ago, such meet-ups among tech-savvy women - or men, for that matter - were a rarity in Los Angeles.

Aging baby boomers are feathering their empty nests with bent plywood chairs from Design Within Reach and bubble lamps fondly remembered from childhood. Their own offspring, who likely set up their first apartments with IKEA sofas and tables, are now shopping for kids' furniture inspired by midcentury design. It doesn't seem premature to say it: For some consumers, modern is quickly becoming the new traditional.