Opener: Top of the world

We've been around the globe putting cities to the Monocle metrics test.

Quality of life: The World's top 25 most liveable cities

Monocle's researchers have spent the past months putting the world's leading cities to the test to find the best places for you to make your base.

Quality of life: Nice restaurants, but...

For a third year running, Italian cities failed to make our list.

Quality of life: 01 Zurich

Zürich leaps into the winning spot with its extraordinary urban plans.

Quality of life: 02 Copenhagen

Our 2008 winner is pipped at the post but is a city we still admire Metropolitan life coupled with intimacy, Scandinavian welfare, low crime rates and a relaxed atmosphere - an ideal combination, right?

Quality of life: 03 Tokyo

Tokyo runs like clockwork and its service culture beats any competition

Quality of life: Getting interactive

Increasingly, how cities are run is evolving to include grass roots organisations - particularly when elected officials fail in their civic mission.

Quality of life: 04 Munich

Our 2007 winner slips as others up their game.

Quality of life: 05 Helsinki

Defying its small size, Helsinki continues to advance eastwards

Quality of life: 06 Stockholm

Living in the European Green Capital of 2010 has its major plus points

Quality of life: 07 Vienna

A city with big ambitions, Vienna has high hopes for its hub status.

Quality of life: 08 Paris

If Paris improves its suburbs, it's on its way to offering the full package.

Quality of life: 09 Melbourne

Melbourne holds its position but must do more about its urban sprawl.

Quality of life: 10 Berlin

Berlin is the home of start-ups. Shame it's not more connected.

Quality of life: 11 Honolulu

Honolulu is more than a pretty face, and is our top (and only) US city.

Quality of life: We can make it

City halls need a new focus on helping small businesses.

Quality of life: 12 Madrid

Its strength is its adaptability, which is why Madrid's risen up the ranks.

Quality of life: 13 Sydney

Progress is a little unforthcoming but the Sydney lifestyle is enviable.

Quality of life: 14 Vancouver

Canada's sharp-looking outpost gets ready to take its Olympic bow.

Quality of life: 15 Barcelona

So far, changes have been cosmetic and the routine is getting tired.

Quality of life: 16 Fukuoka

Fukuoka edges ahead because of its great connections and easy living.

Quality of life: 17 Oslo

Oslo bursts in this year thanks to the wise use of its oil wealth.

Quality of life: 18 Singapore

Singapore is adding a softer side to its reputation as a business city.

Quality of life: 20 Auckland

Re-formed Auckland re-enters our Top 25 after a year's absence.

Quality of life: 19 Montreal

Quality of life is uneven in Montréal but its liberalism is admirable.

Quality of life: 21 Amsterdam

Amsterdam is green-thinking but may be a bit too relaxed.

Quality of life: 22 Kyoto

Kyoto has a sense of its own identity and a commitment to craftsmanship.

Quality of life: 23 Hamburg

Hamburg's economic and educational reforms get top marks.

Quality of life: 24 Geneva

Geneva lacks the oomph of a big city but that's also its beauty.

Quality of life: 25 Lisbon

Lisbon comes last but we're looking forward to seeing how plans develop.

Affairs Report: Please turn off the lights

Do cities have a sell-by date?

Americas Briefing: Changing Chattanooga

Chattanooga, Tennessee, was known in the 1960s as "the dirtiest city in America".

Americas Briefing: It's catching

How do you find out how sick a city is?

Q&A: Q&A - Gilberto Kassab

Monocle talks to Sao Paulo's mayor on his views on quality of life.

Americas Briefing: Zero hero

A new zero-emissions car could soon be joining the ranks of Mexico City's already colourful taxi fleet.

Africa/Middle East Briefing: Mr Motivator

Moïse Katumbi, the first democratically ­elected governor of Congo's mineral-rich Katanga province, has begun to turn the place round since he took over in 2007.

Q&A: Q&A - Nir Barkat

Jerusalem's mayor - Nir Barket tells us his plans for improving quality of life in his hometown.

Africa/Middle East Briefing: On the rails

Abu Dhabi has decided it needs a public transport network.

Africa/Middle East Briefing: Clean sweep

Unlike most other cities in West Africa, Ouagadougou impresses by its orderliness.

Oceania Briefing: Pixel perfect

Work begins this July on Australia’s first carbon-zero office building.

Oceania Briefing: Place to stay

Christchurch, the largest city on New Zealand’s South Island, has decided to give itself a revamp in a bid to stop its young generation moving away.

Oceania Briefing: Long lunch

New Zealanders have got their priorities right.

Oceania Briefing: Q&A - Lisa Scaffidi

Lisa Scadffidi defines true quality of life

Europe Briefing: Benchmark for kids

Imagine being a kid in a world built for adults, having to sit on gigantic sofas, climb up towering staircases and open huge doors.

Q&A: Q&A - Corine Mauch

Corine Mauch lays down her views on quality of life in Zürich.

Europe Briefing: Smoke screen

Turkey is promoting a healthier lifestyle: from 19 July, smoking will be banned in restaurants, cafés and bars.

Europe Briefing: Talking rubbish

Would you be more likely to throw rubbish in a bin if it told you a joke as a thank you?

Asia Briefing: Q&A - Takashi Kawamura

Nagoya's mayor explains his ideal quality of life.

Asia Briefing: Happy shoppers

In China's impoverished countryside, the route to prosperity is to head to the city, where even dangerous or menial work holds the promise of money to send home to the family.

Asia Briefing: Perfect alibi

The vast numbers of empty steel-and-glass towers on Beijing's skyline are a developer's night-mare -but a relief to owners of the remaining traditional alleyway houses in their shadows.

Asia Briefing: Old timers

Women in Japan can now expect to live to 86, according to the latest WHO figures.

Affairs Essays: Reclaim the street

What’s the future of the city?

Affairs Essays: Art and soul

When it comes to artful administration and passionate planning, museums and their directors have a lot to teach the cities they sit in.

Affairs Essays: Austerity aesthetics

Last autumn's financial meltdown means there's less money available for public buildings.

Affairs Essays: Dense and sensibility

After Israel was founded in 1948, the speed at which it built towns for the influx of refugees meant that town planning was often rushed.

Affairs Essays: Turkish lessons

If it ain't broke, don't fix it... Some of the best ideas for improving a neighbourhood are surprisingly old-fashioned.

Affairs Essays: Dirty London

London has once again topped an internet poll as Europe's dirtiest city, an epithet it has born since the 17th century.

Affairs Essays: Can African cities work?

Faced by a failure of civic government, many African cities rely on private firms and individuals to carry out basic services such as collecting rubbish.

Affairs Essays: Scale watching

Why do some streets just seem wrong or shops leave us feeling uncomfortable?

Affairs Essays: The Ancient Greeks were streets ahead

The cities of the Ancient Greeks, with their wide, straight streets and simple grid patterns, were not just the result of a desire for order but also the offspring of necessity.

Affairs Essays: Make some noise

City streets need to be pleasant places to live but also home to small businesses, craft makers and even the odd car mechanic.

Affairs Essays: Secret treasures

These outposts may not score highly on the Monocle city metrics - they're not very well connected for starters.

Affairs Report: Full-speed ahead

Obama is allocating $8bn for high-speed rail - but much of the expertise will come from Europe.

Affairs Report: Talk of the town

From a Beijing air-quality expert to an Italian architect, these urban planning visionaries have ideas with the potential to transform our urban world - and soon.

Affairs Essays: Vive le flâneur!

If many modern urban planners had their way, the city would be divided into strictly designated zones for living and working with little opportunity for chance encounters, surprise and, above all, sauntering.

Business Report: Korea moves

Global property markets may be undergoing a brutal shakedown but big corporations and sovereign wealth funds have not stopped shopping.

Q&A: Ask the boss

What makes a city a great place to do business in?

Business Report: Hearts of the city

Identikit suburban projects and architects without imagination have sullied the reputation of property development but Monocle has tracked down five firms putting passion, innovation and social conscience back into the world.

Culture Report: Reel Estates

If your town needs a tourism boost, there is nothing more likely to bring in the punters than a blockbusting film set on your street.

Diary: Music

Monocle's summer arts calendar creams off the pick of the albums to line up, the books to take to the beach, the shows to saunter round and the movies to get to grips with in the evening - preferably in an open-air cinema in Melbourne.

Diary: Film

Monocle picks the key movies for the summer and looks ahead at the Cannes hits coming our way.

Diary: Visual arts

From Tokyo to Tuymans, here are six of the best in a crowded summer art calendar.

Diary: Books and media

Some to sling in your beach bag, others to savour at home, our literary pick encompasses fiction, travel, politics, media and e-books.

Culture Report: British Council, UK

Culture Report: Botton publishing - London

Culture Report: Sale 01: Paris

This month Phillips de Pury adds four new thematic sales to their annual calendar, beginning with Now: Art of the 21st Century on 26 September in London.

Culture Report: Well hung

Just over a year old, Iain Dawson's contemporary art space in Sydney presents the best of emerging Australian and Asian painters, sculptors, photographers and video-makers.

Culture Report: Film

Faced with the recession and competition from retail giants and online sellers, small bookshops have been disappearing fast from our high streets. But there's one London gem that's a textbook example of how to buck the trend.

Culture Report: Music

Faced with the recession and competition from retail giants and online sellers, small bookshops have been disappearing fast from our high streets. But there's one London gem that's a textbook example of how to buck the trend.

Design Report: Building the dream

Engineering company Arup is the name that connects the Sydney Opera House to the proposed Guggenheim museum in Abu Dhabi.

Fashion Briefing: Florentine export

Beginning his career with a degree in architecture, Elio Ferraro soon made the transition into fashion.

Fashion Briefing: Big chief

"We make the type of tie you can put on without having your shirt tucked in," says Emil Corsillo, who, with his brother Sandy, founded The Hill-Side, a new casual neckwear and handkerchief label.

Fashion Briefing: Cycle therapy

A year ago, Tyler Clemens and Abe Burmeister founded Outlier, which makes bike-to-boardroom clothing in quick-dry, Swiss-made Schoeller and New Zealand merino wool.

Fashion Briefing: Arch nemesis

When the soles of your Visvim Foley GY FOLK degenerate, you can now have the soles replaced while you wait at the new "footwear laboratory" at F.I.L. Tokyo.

Fashion Briefing: Master stroke

It takes more than a bit of sun, sand and salt water for the Swiss to sacrifice looking sophisticated, and since 1922 they have largely been keeping native swimwear brand Lahco secret.

Fashion Briefing: At your leisure

Korean-born womenswear designer Jean Yu has unveiled a simple dressing gown collection.

Fashion Briefing: Silky way

Kimono-inspired prints and Swiss silk, finished off with a Made-in-Switzerland label, are the secrets behind Kazu Huggler's couture and ready-to-wear lines.

Fashion Briefing: Weaving magic

Ryoko Tanabe launched accessories brand Iroe almost five years ago, following an education in weaving at Bunka Women's University and working at various textile producers in Tokyo.

Fashion Briefing: Foxy feet

With work experience for Zac Posen and Manolo Blahnik under her belt, Texan shoe designer Nicole Brundage moved to Milan from the US five years ago.

Fashion Briefing: Hats on

A hat from Borsalino usually guarantees you'll turn a few heads.

Q&A: Q&A - James Perse

How important is quality of life when choosing a base?

Design Report: Power block

We have fallen for elements of urban living in many different cities and have often dreamed of being given a city block where we could bring them together.

Design Report: Air time

Cities are combating urban sprawl by adding another layer -on their roofs.

Design Report: City revival

In New York, Tobruk, Foshan, Beirut and Stockholm there are pioneering architectural projects that will transform their cities.

Fashion: Short story

Urban beach clubs call for clothing that doesn’t sacrifice elegance in the pursuit of sun worship.