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Leonardo da Vinci and a Memory of His Childhood


Sigmund Freud - 1910
    A detailed reconstruction of Leonardo's emotional life from his earliest years, it represents Freud's first sustained venture into biography from a psychoanalytic perspective, and also his effort to trace one route that homosexual development can take.

Fashion: The Definitive History of Costume and Style


Susan Brown - 2012
    Tracing the evolution of fashion — from the early draped fabrics of ancient times to the catwalk couture of today — Fashion: The Definitive History of Costume and Style is a stunningly illustrated guide to more than three thousand years of shifting trends and innovative developments in the world of clothing.Containing everything you need to know about changing fashion and style — from ancient Egyptian dress to Space Age Fashion and Grunge — and information on icons like Marie Antoinette, Clara Bow, Jacqueline Kennedy, and Alexander McQueen, Fashion catalogs the history of what people wear, revealing how Western fashion has been influenced by design from around the world and celebrating costume and haute couture.Fashion will captivate anyone interested in style — whether it's the fashion-mad teen in Tokyo, the wannabe designer in college, or the fashionista intrigued by the violent origins of the stiletto and the birth of bling.

Taking Things Seriously: 75 Objects with Unexpected Significance


Joshua Glenn - 2007
    Inquire about the object's provenance and you'll likely be treated to a lively anecdote about how it came into your host's possession. Keep digging, and you might even crack the code of what the thing really means. Taking Things Seriously is a wonder cabinet of seventy-five unlikely thingamajigs that have been invested with significance and transformed into totems, talismans, charms, relics, and fetishes: scraps of movie posters scavenged from the streets of New York by Low Life author Luc Sante; the World War I helmet that inoculated social critic Thomas Frank against jingoism; the trash-picked, robot-shaped hairdo machine described by its owner as a chick magnet; the bagelburned by actor Christopher Walken, moonlighting as a short-order cook. The owners of these objects convey their excitement in short, often poignant essays that invite readers to participate in the enjoyable act of interpreting things. You'll never look at the bric-a-brac on your shelves the same way again.

The Style Checklist: The Ultimate Wardrobe Essentials for You


Lloyd Boston - 2010
    His style philosophy is: Less is Modern.The good news is: the most stylish clothes you can have are probably already in your closet. But savvy women are on a perpetual quest to find the perfect addition to their wardrobe: the perfect bathing suit, a traffic-stopping pair of jeans, that classic little black dress. While the editorial pages of high fashion magazines can offer inspiration, they can’t help you find what works for your looks and lifestyle. But Lloyd Boston’s The Style Checklist offers basic guidance to help make your everyday commute your runway. With solutions to common fashion problems and a lot of how-to advice, this book simplifies and demystifies how to achieve style.

Dreaming in Pictures: The Photography


Lewis Carroll - 2001
    But before achieving fame as an author, Carroll was a prolific and sophisticated photographer, acutely engaged in the art world of Victorian England. This illustrated volume examines Carroll's photographs not as the sideline of a celebrated writer, but as the creations of a serious photographic artist, and demonstrates their importance to the history of photography. Douglas Nickel traces the evolution in thought about Carroll's photography in the period since his death, demonstrating the ways it has been viewed largely through the filter of his literary reputation. Key to this have been certain preconceptions built up around Carroll's attitudes toward children, especially Alice Liddell, the inspiration for his first book and the subject of a number of his photographs. Nickel demonstrates how, by overturning the modern myths that have attached themselves to Carroll's photography, the works themselves can be seen again as they were by their original Victorian viewers. This analysis is designed to reveal not only Carroll's signal achievement in the medium, but also a new understanding of Victorian art photography in general.

Christian Lacroix and the Tale of Sleeping Beauty: A Fashion Fairy Tale Memoir


Camilla Morton - 2010
    Now, spun as if by magic from the threads of the beloved Brothers Grimm fairy tale comes the enchanting memoir of fashion designer Christian Lacroix—the haute couture icon whose creations have invited millions of women to enjoy  the fairy princess fashions of their dreams. Sorcery and style combine in this enchanting new twist on a time-honored tale; re-imagined by international bestselling author Camilla Morton, and illustrated by Monsieur Lacroix himself, the spell cast by Christian Lacroix and the Tale of Sleeping Beauty will reawaken every reader’s childhood fantasies—reassuring you that dreams really do come true…

La Bonne Table


Ludwig Bemelmans - 1989
    The entrancing memories and charming pictures assembled here transport the reader behind the scenes of the great hotels of Europe and America – including the immortal “Hotel Splendide” – and such restaurants as the Tour d’Argent in Paris and Le Pavillon in New York. Memorable dishes, the eccentric geniuses of the kitchens who created them, the opulent and often astonishing patrons who ordered them, the legendary wines and the occasions they toasted, are all evoked in rich and piquant flavor.

Man on Wire


Philippe Petit - 2008
    In August 1974, a young Frenchman named Philippe Petit boldly—and illegally—fixed a rope between the tops of the still-young Twin Towers, a quarter mile off the ground. At daybreak, thousands of spectators gathered to watch in awe and adulation as he traversed the rope a full eight times in the course of an hour. In Man on Wire, Petit recounts the six years he spent preparing for this achievement. It is a fitting tribute to those lost-but-not-forgotten symbols of human aspiration—the Twin Towers. 120 black & white illustrations

Wall and Piece


Banksy - 2005
    Not only did he smuggle his pieces into four of New York City's major art museums, he's also "hung" his work at London's Tate Gallery and adorned Israel's West Bank barrier with satirical images. Banksy's identity remains unknown, but his work is unmistakable with prints selling for as much as $45,000.

The Audience


Peter Morgan - 2013
    It is private. Both parties have an unspoken agreement never to repeat what is said. Not even to their spouses.The Audience breaks this contract of silence. It imagines a series of pivotal meetings between the Downing Street incumbents and their Queen. From Churchill to Cameron, each prime minister has used these private conversations as a sounding board and a confessional - sometimes intimate, sometimes explosive.From young mother to grandmother, these private audiences chart the arc of the second Elizabethan Age. Politicians come and go through the revolving door of electoral politics, while she remains constant, waiting to welcome her next prime minister.The Audience by Peter Morgan premiered at the Gielgud Theatre, London, in March 2013.

Diane Arbus: Monograph


Diane Arbus - 1972
    These landmark images now have a clarity and depth not achievable in earlier editions.

Alligators, Old Mink and New Money: One Woman's Adventures in Vintage Clothing


Alison Houtte - 2005
    Narrated by Alison Houtte, a former fashion model who runs the beloved Brooklyn, New York, boutique Hooti Couture -- a shop that Ginia Bellafante of the New York Times has toasted as a premier spot for vintage finds -- this book is not only the story of one woman's life in fashion, but also a vintage-shopper's guide that helps readers embrace the idea of seeking out fashion finds from past decades to accent their current wardrobe.Marrying two of women's favorite pastimes -- shopping and reading -- Alison Houtte uses the merchandise she has bought, worn, or sold as a prism through which she examines everything from the labels we wear to the labels we put on our surroundings. Whether talking about her grandmother's navy blue slip or a creamy white forties alligator purse, Houtte knows that every article of vintage clothing has a story behind it. She uses these items as a springboard to explore such universal topics as relationships, self-image, the bond between mothers and daughters, and that elusive thing called style.Whether you're a flea market veteran who savors the thrill of the hunt or a couture shopper with a Vogue budget, or are simply drawn to the de rigueur world of vintage, Alligators, Old Mink and New Money offers a shopping adventure -- through auctions, estate sales, flea markets, and clothing racks all over the world -- to be savored, and inspired by!

Album Cover Album


Storm Thorgerson - 1977
    This led to the release of six follow-up hits, inspired a host of imitations, and generated a long-playing sub-genre in art and design publishing.Album Cover Album is edited and compiled by two designers who were among the most innovative pioneers of the work that it celebrates. Storm Thorgerson's Hipgnosis earned world renown for the epic photo shoots and iconic designs that went so perfectly with the music of Pink Floyd. Meanwhile, Roger Dean's dreamscapes and unique typography became as much a part of the rock generation as the Yes albums they adorned. Album Cover Album features their selection of more than 600 sleeves in full color, and showcases the astonishing diversity and excellence of design that the medium produced in its first three decades.This new edition retains the lavish 12-inch format of the original and replays the ingeniously themed compositions of each page. The album is given a fresh spin by a new preface from Peter Gabriel and new forewords by Storm Thorgerson and John Wetton, plus a 21st-century typographic facelift. The result is a celebration of the enduring appeal of vinyl.

Naked City


Weegee - 1944
    But his profound influence on other photographers, most famously on Diane Arbus, derives not only from his sensational subject matter and his use of the blinding, close-up flash, but also from his eagerness to photograph the city at all hours, at all levels: coffee shops at three in the morning, hot summer evenings in the tenements, debutante balls, parties in the street, lovers on park benches, the destitute and the lonely. No other photographer has better revealed the non-stop spectacle of life in New York City.Weegee's first book, Naked City (1945), was a runaway success and made him a celebrity who suddenly had assignments from Life and Vogue. By the publication of his second book, Weegee's People (1946), he had cut the wires to his police radio and had begun to photograph the furred and bejeweled grandes dames at the Metropolitan Opera as well as his beloved street people. Naked Hollywood (1953) and Weegee by Weegee (1961) feature portraits of Marilyn Monroe, Andy Warhol, John F. Kennedy, Nikita Khruschev, and Liberace -- many of them viewed through the distorted lens of his Weegee-scope.Regarded as some of the most powerful images of twentieth-century photography, Weegee's work now resides in the permanent collection of the Museum of Modern Art.

Elvis Presley (Unseen Archives)


Marie Clayton - 2002
    Over 400 fabulous photographs document the important events of his life and career; his early concerts, the movies, his time in the army, his marriage to Priscilla and the birth of his daughter Lisa Marie, the resurgence of his career in the 1970s with the Las Vegas shows, and the gradual decline of his health. The photographs show how Elvis lives on today, in the hearts and minds of his legions of fans. The pictures are accompanied by informative captions adding context and depth to his amazing story, and an appendix of facts and figures sets out his remarkable achievements in the music industry.