First and foremost, the year 2006 brought The Standard Spa into the world—and leisure in Miami Beach has never been the same. Besides that, The Departed made waves in cinemas and Daniel Craig suited up for his first outing as James Bond. The British institution Top of the Pops bid farewell after 42 years bringing music to living rooms, and Pluto was demoted from planet status.
North Korea tested its first nuclear weapon and Saddam Hussein was executed. A platform called Twitter quietly launched with the promise of connecting the world, 140 characters at a time. On TV, Grey’s Anatomy and The Office gained legions of viewers and global audiences tuned in to watch Italy defeat France in the year’s controversial FIFA World Cup. “Sexyback” and Gnarls Barkley’s “Crazy” dominated radio play while Britney Spears and Kevin Federline called it quits. The first MacBook debuted, Google acquired YouTube and Facebook unveiled the news feed feature.
The art world saw Gustav Klimt’s Adele Bloch-Bauer I fetch a staggering $135 million, setting a new record and highlighting the Golden Age of Vienna. Meanwhile, Al Gore’s An Inconvenient Truth turned environmental concerns into a global conversation, raising awareness about climate change like never before.
