Rizzoli (RCS MediaGroup)

A self-taught architect, Tadao Ando combines the influences of Japanese building traditions with the elegance of modernism. His projects encourage contemplation and demonstrate a reverence for essential forms. Respected for his powerful, meditative spaces and his sensual yet refined use of ordinary materials--wood, steel, concrete, glass--Ando's work resonates with profound intelligence, unpretentious elegance, and an almost palpable sense of harmony. The Modern Art Museum of Fort Worth is comprised of five pavilions that seem to float on a pool of water. Inside, diffuse and reflected natural light bathe the interior and the art in an even glow. This book thoroughly and luxuriously documents Ando's most recent masterpiece with glorious new color photography of the building, the reflecting pools, the grand interior spaces, and the galleries.

The work of influential, award-winning interior designer Thomas Pheasant is best described as «contemporary classical» and simply serene. Celebrated interior designer Thomas Pheasant is best known for his seamless melding of tradition and the contemporary. His spaces are fresh and of the age yet also enduringly timeless. Balancing classical elements, like recessed paneling, pilasters, crown moldings, and carved plaster garlands, Pheasant introduces modern details, sometimes including such flourishes and surprising complements as a scroll coffee table and a room screen of ribbed, translucent glass. Unafraid of combining pieces from various traditions, he achieves a sense of harmony and balance. This lavish offering of his work gives the reader a sensible, artful approach to interior design, presenting models of great aesthetic subtlety and beauty. Based in Washington, D.C., Thomas Pheasant works around the globe. Recent projects include the redesign of Blair House, the President's guest house on Pennsylvania Avenue across from the White House, and apartments in Washington, New York, Paris, and Moscow. Never a strict by-the-book traditionalist, Pheasant responds to and sees in classicism its rational order, its quietude, its serenity.

»Valentino: Master of Couture» is an exhibition at the Somerset House co-organized by Valentino himself, who selected over 130 dresses for the exhibition. The book focues as much on Valentino and his glamorous lifestyle as it does on his legendary dressmaking techniques and atelier. (The overwhelming success of Matt Tyrnauer's film «Valentino: The Last Emperor» attests to the public's hunger for «behind the scenes» glimpses of Valentino's life). The designers had unprecedented access to Valentino's personal archive, and the selected visual material includes personal photographs of and by Valentino and his close circle (often with glamorous women such as Jackie O., Elizabeth Taylor, Lee Radziwill, and the like) in his art-filled homes and at social events, giving the book the feel of a personal album and the viewer access to a unique life. The catalog also includes two photographic portfolios by Deborah Turbeville and Cathleen Naundorf, showing Valentino at work. A number of dresses in the exhibition sprinkled throughout the catalog rounds out this intimate look at the life of a design legend.

With specially commissioned photography, this unprecedented volume celebrates a legacy of accessories design by the legendary couture house of Valentino. This lavish tribute to the couture house of Valentino s accessories line is exceptionally timely: since the long-time accessories team, Maria Grazia Chiuri and Pierpaolo Piccioli, took over as the creative directors for Valentino in 2008, the house has experienced record-breaking success and received international acclaim. Known for their daring approach redefining femininity, Chiuri and Piccioli s continuance of accessories design has only magnified the line s popularity. Equally important is Chiuri and Piccioli s transformation of traditional Italian handcraftsmanship into a new international barometer of glamorous design. By infusing the highest quality materials and crafts with streetwise attitude, their accessories have become some of the most coveted items in the fashion world. Valentino: Objects of Couture showcases commissioned images and artworks by various well-known artists David Bailey, Luisa Lambri, Nobuyoshi Araki, Duane Michals, Scheltens & Abbenes, Philip Lorca di Corcia and Douglas Gordon of over 300 of the house of Valentino s most well-known accessory designs. Art directed by REM-Ruini e Mariotti and along with an insightful essay by the art curator Francesco Bonami, this work presents a rich volume in celebration of Valentino s exquisitely designed collections. This book is perfect for devotees of fashion, style, photography, and glamour, and also anyone who understands that a Valentino handbag or heels, even when paired with jeans, is statement-worthy.

In the tradition of Rizzoli’s Historic Houses of the Hudson Valley and The Houses of McKim, Mead & White, Great Houses of New England features a stunning array of newly photographed houses that range over four centuries and are distinctive examples of the architecture of the region—from the mid-seventeenth-century New England Colonial Judge Corwin House (Witches House) in Salem, MA., and the eighteenth-century Jeremiah Lee Mansion in Marblehead, MA., to the late-nineteenth-century McKim, Mead & White Shingle-Style Isaac Bell House in Newport, R.I. With lavish photography of sumptuously appointed interiors including many rarely seen rooms, wonderfully detailed house exteriors and gardens, and authoritative text by architectural historian Roderic H. Blackburn, Great Houses of New England comprehensively considers the magnificent building styles of the region—including Early New England Colonial, Georgian, Federal, Greek Revival, Gothic Revival, Italianate, Shingle Style, Colonial Revival, and Tudor. Great Houses of New England is a landmark work of enduring interest to homeowners, architects, architecture historians, and all those who love fine architecture and interiors.

From the beautiful mountains and streams of Canada and the Adirondacks to the sandy beaches of New England, from the picturesque coasts of English villages to the sunny shores of the Bahamas, Winslow Homer captured in his paintings the true magnificence of nature. For more than thirty years between 1873 and 1905, Winslow Homer turned to watercolors during his working vacations, concentrating on capturing the spirit of each place he visited with both spontaneity and intensity. Many of Homer’s most beautiful paintings focus on the interaction between humans and nature — a hunter carrying a deer on his shoulders, a man fishing from a small canoe, a girl lounging and reading in the grass, a young man driving cattle, a fisherman’s family anxiously watching for his return. It is Homer’s understanding of this important relationship between humans and nature that makes his paintings so intriguing. Winslow Homer Watercolors reproduces the best of these paintings. Large color plates allow these reproductions to be appreciated almost as much as the originals. Accompanying the more than 100 color plates is an eloquent introduction and detailed chronology of Homer’s life and artistic development. This stunning volume allows one to experience nature through the eyes of one of America’s greatest painters. It is a vision of nature from a century ago that is still appreciated today.

The first and definitive book on the fashion of Kenneth Cole and his thirty-year career in fashion and social activism. His advertising campaigns are ubiquitous, and his footwear and fashion design capture New York urban style. Kenneth Cole jump-started his business in fashion in the most unorthodox of ways: he created a film set and pretended to make a film in order to gain access to New York Market Week. In two and a half days, Kenneth Cole Productions sold 40,000 pairs of shoes. Moments like this are par for the course when viewing Cole's career, a truly original yet classic American success story. A Kenneth Cole Production looks at Cole's world in fashion, from his earliest days learning the shoe business from his father to building his empire into a brand powerhouse; from creating sought-after shoes and bags to being credited with making basic black the ultimate go-to color for sleek and stylish city garb; and from the origins of his powerful ad campaigns to his vigilant social activism and his significant style and exciting pop-culture contributions to the fashion world.

The most celebrated and historic golf clubhouses in America and Great Britain. If golf courses are the soul of a golf club, then the golf clubhouse is the heart of a golf club. The private inner sanctum for member camaraderie and refreshment appeared in golf's earliest history, but purpose-built clubhouses didn't exist until the nineteenth century. Focusing on the most celebrated golf clubhouses built from the late-nineteenth century and into the 1930s, Legendary Golf Clubhouses of the U.S. and Great Britain showcases the true golden age of golf clubhouse architecture. The clubhouses chosen for this book are stellar examples of expansive and lush private estates that were converted into golf courses, and the estate manors into golf clubhouses. Experience the turn-of-the-century coastal charm of thatched Maidstone Country Club located in chic Easthampton, New York; savor a view of the ocean from the locker rooms in the luxurious Mediterranean-influenced Gulfstream Golf Club in Palm Beach, Florida; and behold the lavish grandeur of England's Stoke Park, best remembered for its appearance in the James Bond film Diamonds Are Forever. Diedrich gives the reader an insider's view of these singular grand golf structures — their grounds, and the dining, sitting, and club rooms — clubhouses that are distinguished not only for their architectural beauty, but also for how they are symbolic of a particular golf club's identity. This book is the perfect gift for avid golfers and golf enthusiasts alike.

Ne «L'idiota», per ammissione dello stesso Dostoevskij, c'è tutto quel che nel suo animo premeva. Sulla vita del grande romanziere russo si stanno addensando le ombre del dolore e della tragedia e il suo genio sta formando i panorami più vasti e terribili della sua opera. È al culmine del suo travaglio creativo. Scrive, nella storia delicata e drammatica del principe Myskin, un romanzo che si interroga sul senso della bellezza della natura umana, e sul tentativo di far vincere il bene sul sopruso e sul male. Le doti di finezza e di crudità psicologica, il senso dello smisurato mistero della libertà umana danno vita a una vicenda affascinante e avvincente.

Come un'innocente gita al fiume può trasformarsi nella più inimmaginabile avventura della letteratura europea? Semplicemente inseguendo un coniglio bianco con un panciotto e un orologio da taschino. Comincia così, senza stupore, il viaggio di Alice nel paese delle meraviglie, uno strano mondo abitato da animali parlanti e stizzosi, sorridenti e sentenziosi. Ma la sua storia non è solo il capolavoro fiabesco che tutti hanno conosciuto, è anche una fitta trama di significati nascosti e palesi nonsensi, imbastita per scardinare le logiche anguste dei precetti morali. Il viaggio di Alice diventa così occasione, per adulti e bambini, di scoprire la luminosa mutevolezza di tutte le cose.

Anna è giovane, bella e sposata a un uomo che non ama: quando incontra Vronskij, brillante ufficiale, con spavento e gioia se ne scopre attratta. Per Vronskij lascia marito e figlio, ma allo spegnersi dell'amore di lui si rifiuta di tornare sui propri passi e decide da sé quale dev'essere la fine. Il contraltare di Anna è il tormentato Levin, che cerca la sua strada lontano dal mondo aristocratico da cui proviene, nella semplicità della terra, nella fede. Nella vasta architettura del romanzo, Tolstoj osserva i suoi personaggi — Levin in cui mise così tanto di sé, l'amatissima Anna — mentre si muovono alla disperata ricerca di quei pochi, intensi spiragli di luce e di felicità che la vita concede agli uomini e alle donne. Introduzione di Pietro Citati.

An ideal volume for lovers of Venice and architecture aficionados, combining in-depth history of this singular city with more than 100 color photographs and maps. Of Venice's many majestic spaces, none is as evocative and significant as the Piazza San Marco. An authoritative account of the development of the entire piazza complex, through which unfolds the history of the Republic in general, The Genius of Venice celebrates the city's oldest and most important architectural site. Dial Parrott's view of Venice is a heroic one. From their lagoon, the bold and calculating Venetians forged a city that stands today not merely as an attraction for millions, but as a testament to architectural genius: the epitome of what we now call New Urbanism and a shining example of Western communal art. Enhanced by more than 100 illustrations, The Genius of Venice presents the magnificent edifices of the piazza as, in the words of John Ruskin, the living books of history of this iconic urban environment.

The eagerly anticipated first monograph to celebrate the fifty-years-and-counting career of decorating legend Mario Buatta. Influenced by the understated elegance of Colefax and Fowler and the doyenne of exuberant American decor, Sister Parish, Buatta reinvented the English Country House style stateside for clients such as Henry Ford II, Barbara Walters, Malcolm Forbes, and Mariah Carey, and for Blair House, the President's guest quarters. The designer is acclaimed for his sumptuous rooms that layer fine antiques, confectionary curtains, and sublime colorations, creating an atmosphere of lived-in opulence. This lavishly illustrated survey — filled with images taken for the foremost shelter magazines as well as many unpublished photographs from the designer's own archive — closely follows Buatta's highly documented career from his professional start in the 1950s working for department store B. Altman & Co. and Elisabeth Draper, Inc. to his most recent projects, which include some of the country's finest residences. Buatta shares exclusive insights into his process, his own rules for decorating, and personal stories of his adventures along the way.

Essential Colonial Revival-style stone houses in bucolic settings — on hillsides, beside streams — and their inviting interiors, by the architect who popularized the beloved form. Stone Houses showcases a beloved kind of home that many of us aspire to own and live in — a place of warmth and security, of charm and romance. The stone house speaks to a very basic dream of stability and comfort, and the houses featured here represent the epitome of this dream. Built in traditional styles with artful construction and considered design between 1904 and 1943, these gems display the hallmarks we associate with the stone house, here polished and beautifully presented: deep fireplaces, thick beamed ceilings, wide plank floors, and country kitchens. Focusing on the work of the eminent architect R. Brognard Okie, who is credited with having greatly contributed to a popular appreciation and understanding of early American domestic architecture and who has had a lasting impact on American residential design, this book will both enchant the reader and serve as an unprecedented resource.

Accompanying a major traveling exhibition, this catalogue celebrates the groundbreaking avant-garde artists whose works embody the spirit and decadence of fin de siecle and Belle Epoque Paris. Toulouse-Lautrec and La Vie Moderne is a celebration of the work of a generation of avant-garde artists at the turn of the nineteenth century in Paris who fought for artistic liberation against the strict codes of the Academy. Like the Impressionists and Post-Impressionists who preceded them, the Nabis, Incoherents, Symbolists, and Naturalists sought to reinterpret a rapidly changing society that was no longer easily definable. Artists such as Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec, Edouard Vuillard, Pierre Bonnard, Mary Cassatt, and Felix Vallotton, among others, render with naturalism and vivacity modern Parisian life and its cafe-concerts, cabarets, and brothels; street scenes and landscapes; and intimate domestic interiors. This rich presentation of paintings, watercolors, drawings, rare zinc shadow-puppet silhouettes, Chat Noir cabaret programs, and key ephemera for Parisian theaters, circuses, cabarets, and cafe-concerts, are accompanied by essays by internationally known scholars, catalogue entries, artist biographies, a timeline of historical events and iconic works, a map of Paris, and a select bibliography.

Tapping into today’s trend to return to unstructured playtime and move away from over-scheduling and electronic games, Playful Home is perfectly suited to the times. Andrew Weaving celebrates the best of childhood, from his favorite games and crafts projects to the whimsical décor that kids love. The result is kids’ rooms designed to feed and inspire the imagination, as well as to hold fabulous collections of toys and books. With the philosophy of integrating play into our daily lives, Playful Home looks at twelve family homes designed with children in mind, from the foyer to the back door, which stylishly embrace kids’ activities and interests. The featured spaces are the kids’ rooms, which combine flair and fun so successfully that they end up being the hub of the entire house. Including design ideas for displaying toys and collectibles, plus clever ways of storing them, as well as great tips on how to make murals and unique wall decorations, Playful Home inspires creativity as well as good design.

The first book to celebrate the timeless beauty and craftsmanship of Dior’s jewelry designs. Since launching Dior Fine Jewelry in 1998, Victoire de Castellane has been celebrated for having revolutionized the staid world of jewelry design. Her designs play with the barriers between natural and artificial. Renowned as one of the most creative and fearless jewelry designers in the world, she trailblazed the use of the semiprecious gemstones and lacquered gold in baroque, translucent colors. Her sources of inspiration include a global mix of pop culture, floral and natural motifs, and the visual excesses of Bollywood.

Mary McFadden helped define the look of the 1970s with original clothing designs created from textiles picked up on her travels around the globe. With tunics of hand-painted fabrics layered over floating silk pants and pleated Fortuny-like gowns with elaborate embroidery, McFadden created a sensation in the fashion world. This volume explores McFadden’s thirty-year career, from her debut in Vogue in 1972, launching her as a designer, to her subsequent status as a multimillion-dollar brand, famous for looks inspired by historical cultures as well as by her extensive art collection. McFadden was her own best model and was frequently photographed by legends such as Horst P. Horst, Richard Avedon, Sam Haskins, and Norman Parkinson, among others. Her passion and vision translated into wearable works of art that were as collectible as the antiquities that inspired them. This book features both her stunning portraits and singular designs, as well as the places and objects that inspired her. Unparalleled in her dual identities of fashion visionary and erudite art collector, this volume celebrates McFadden’s inspiration and breadth as an incredibly influential tastemaker.

George Barbier (1882-1932) is one of the great French illustrators of the early twentieth century. He is famous for his elegant art deco works that were heavily influenced by orientalism and Parisian couture. Born in Nantes, France in 1882, he skyrocketed to fame and notoriety after his first exhibition in 1911. Known as one of the knights of the bracelet for his luxurious and glamorous lifestyle and work, George Barbier also received renown for costumes and set designs he did for theater, film, and ballet. Even today, his modern and stylish illustrations are popular all over the world. With critical essays on such topics as coloration and composition, this volume is a complete compendium of Barbier's work. This valuable reference book is categorized by Barbier's major projects in fashion, book illustration, theater art, and editorial design and is perfect for illustrators and graphic designers as well as a beautiful gift for someone very special.

Selecting favorite rooms from more than fifty renowned designers such as Kelly Wearstler, Bunny Williams, Albert Hadley, Nate Berkus, and Mary McDonald — and shot by the world's top shelter photographers — Susanna Salk offers insightful advice on how to apply basic design principles to interiors. Organized into chapters on balance, color, mixing, accessorizing, arrangements, rule breaking, and whimsy, Salk walks through the process of great design, illustrating how the featured designers made the decisions they did to make these rooms look so great. The book's encouraging, conversational tone, practical tips and ideas, and quotes by the designers themselves explaining their philosophies empower the reader to create stylish, functional, and unique rooms of their very own. Covering a range of styles from traditional to modern, formal to whimsical, and showcasing some of the best work by the best designers of our age, Be Your Own Decorator is a rich resource for the aspiring decorator.

Showcasing one hundred years of innovation and environmental sensitivity, Handmade Houses celebrates some of the world's most idiosyncratic homes from Big Sur to Sardinia. Author Richard Olsen unveils the components used for their construction, including driftwood, boulders, and even old wine vats. The first study of the handmade-homes phenomenon since its inception in the late 1960s, Handmade Houses revisits the subject's roots and history, exploring how these homes and their owners paved the way for the architectural-salvage business and the reclaimed, industrial look ever-popular today. As fascinating as the structures are themselves, their owners — professionals and amateurs who personally designed and built each residence — offer their inspirations and stories behind the convention-defying homes. Design lessons are gleaned from each home — some examples of environmentally aware construction with applicable tips for use in more mainstream scenarios. Handmade Houses is an important and relevant volume to be appreciated by anyone interested in environmentally friendly design, craft, and the expression of personal style in the home.

World's fairs were the most important vehicles for debuting advancements in modern living. These renowned international expositions were showcases for design on a national and global level, and they democratized design unlike any previous forum. Inventing the Modern World is lavishly illustrated with two hundred examples of woodwork, metalwork, ceramics, glass, jewelry, and textiles from private and public collections, primarily in America and Europe, many never before published or seen outside of their respective collections. Incredibly diverse but all representing the pinnacle of scientific and artistic achievements of their time, these extraordinary creations range from a monumental 1850s Gothic Revival cabinet to a streamlined glass chair from 1939, to masterpieces of jewelry and objects in glass, silver, and porcelain by Baccarat, Tiffany, Gorham, Cartier, Sevres, and Herman Miller. This unprecedented volume, edited by Jason Busch and Catherine Futter, and with contributions by them and many other specialists and scholars, breaks new ground in the study of decorative arts.

This fascinating publication presents the roles two men have played in turning a small workshop in nineteenth-century Paris into one of the most successful and recognized brands in the world. Known for both craftsmanship and must-have high design, Louis Vuitton the luxury house was started by its eponymous founder in 1854. The first half of this publication traces the innovations by Vuitton, who turned the little-known guild profession of emballeur (packer) into the foremost luxury trunk maker in Paris, with a clientele that included in his lifetime the French nobility as well as the elite of a prosperous empire. Prime and never-before-seen examples of Vuitton's craftsmanship, along with the fashion that went into them, are the highlights of these chapters. The second half of the book examines the role of Marc Jacobs as Louis Vuitton's creative director (since 1997), who took the Louis Vuitton house into a new era with a series of collaborations with artists and designers — such as Takashi Murakami, Richard Prince, and Stephen Sprouse — as well as designing a line of highly successful and desired clothing for the company. By examining two divergent but often similar careers one hundred years apart, Louis Vuitton / Marc Jacobs is not only a layered study of the evolution of a luxury brand in the past 150 years but also a celebration of technical and design innovations in the new century.

Adored by celebrity patrons and admired by his peers in the industry, Scott Campbell is known not only for his amazing technique and vision as a tattoo artist, but also as a respected fine artist on the contemporary scene. Both Campbell's artwork and tattoo work are informed by timeless trends of new antiquarian style, nineteenth-century hand-lettering, kitsch, and classic tattoo flash. Campbell is considered the tattoo artist of both the trendsetter and the daring celebrity. However, though Campbell has tattooed celebrities from the late Heath Ledger to visionaries like Marc Jacobs, it is through his distinctive aesthetic that he has become a celebrity in his own right. Campbell renders fleeting trends into timeless masterpieces not only on canvas and in sculpture, but also on skin. This book captures both, exemplifying how his tattoo work informs his artwork and vice versa.