It’s hard to believe with royal wedding and baby fever already reaching epidemic levels, but there are other things to look forward to next year – and we’re not talking about the trend for berets. (Really, it’s a trend, and really, we’re not talking about it.) Below are 24 cross-cultural highlights of 2018 to pre-record in your diary, from fashion to film via football and furniture. And please also note that this author fully intended to include Pacific Rim: Uprising but was overruled by his editor. Clearly, there’s no accounting for taste.

Monochrome

As fashion trends go, dressing in a single colour – or if you don’t want to look too one-note, several tones thereof – is refreshingly straightforward: a palette cleanser, if you will. Whether that’s millennial pink (also on trend for SS18) or ultra violet (Pantone’s colour of the year) is up to hue.

Stampd For Ikea

Thought Balenciaga’s blue bag homage was as fashionable as flatpack furniture could get? Minimalist streetwear brand Stampd is collaborating on a collection designed to showcase your wardrobe and accessories. Oh, and Ikea’s collab with Virgil Abloh’s Off White is dropping in 2019.

Red Dead Redemption 2

The first Red Dead was more than the already-compelling sell of “Grand Theft Auto in the Wild West”: it was a transcendent entertainment experience, as anyone who crossed the Mexican border as the sun set and Jose Gonzales kicked in will testify. Expectations for the second are higher than noon.

The World Cup

For one month from June 14, (hopefully) forget about the beautiful game’s ugly side – hooliganism, racism, “inquiries” into the bidding process that saw Russia win the right to host the tournament in the first place – and concentrate on watching football. Ideally with a cold beer in a warm pub garden.

Dadcore

You don’t need to have reproduced in order to enthusiastically welcome the newfound fashionability of roomy jeans, sweaters and blazers. Certainly, they’re a mite more practical than jumpsuits. Us actual dads might not buy ours from Balenciaga though – baby sick does tend to get everywhere.