As days grow shorter, the publishing world is offering no shortage of new tomes this fall to bring the glitz and glamour of stylish lives, sumptuous settings and striking images alive at home.
“Karl: No Regrets”
244 pages, 35 euros
Published by Flammarion
In “Karl: No Regrets,” art historian and former Vogue Paris artistic director Patrick Hourcade chronicles “25 years of complicity, 20 years of divorce” with Karl Lagerfeld, starting with Anna Piaggi introducing the pair in 1976 and ending with the couturier’s private funeral and the “Karl For Ever” memorial at the Grand Palais.
In the form of chronological vignettes organized in three sections dedicated to the happy times, the heights of extravagance and the pair’s falling out, the book meanders between houses, characters and topics such as automobiles or Lagerfeld’s beard to retrace a friendship sparked by a shared love for 18th-century art.
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Never-seen-before documents from Hourcade’s personal archives, including the final note Lagerfeld sent him, create the visual backdrop of this narration, while segments in which the author directly addresses his erstwhile friend directly lay bare a sense of wistful regret.
“Captivate!”
200 pages, 49.99 British pounds
Published by Prestel
Like many, the 2020 lockdown gave supermodel Claudia Schiffer the time to sort through her photographs. The result is “Captivate!,” a coffee-table book that is a personal photographic journey through the ‘90s that she curated as “a celebration of fashion photography and also of the teams of photographers, models, stylists, hair and makeup artists, and art directors that harnessed the transformative power of fashion,” Schiffer stated.
Spanning some 150 images that include unseen material from the model’s personal archives, the book offers a perspective on a decade of reinvention and rebellion through the lens of bold-face names such as Richard Avedon, Herb Ritts, Corinne Day and Ellen von Unwerth, who captured Schiffer and her contemporaries including Naomi Campbell and Kate Moss. A companion exhibition is running until Jan. 9 at the Kunstpalast art museum in Düsseldorf, Germany — the city where Schiffer was scouted in 1987.
“Art Deco Style”
300 pages, 95 euros
Published by Assouline
From skyscrapers and advertising to home appliances and art, Art Deco has become a byword to describe the forward-leaning aesthetics of the first decades of the 20th century. But what went into the melting pot of a new decorative style meant to bring modernity at a time of unseen-before technological advancement?
In “Art Deco Style,” independent researcher and former assistant curator of the Department of Modern and Contemporary Art at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York Jared Gross gives insight into the wealth of references that were modernized, assimilated and adapted into this worldwide movement that marked the advent of attractive consumer goods.
“Last Night on the Town in Paris”
192 pages, 39 euros
Self-published
“Last Night on the Town in Paris” is a follow-up to François Goizé’s 2016 photography book “A Night on the Town in Paris.” The photographer picks up where he left off five years earlier to document a metaphorical last night out, from the mid-2010s to the days just before the COVID-19 pandemic sent everyone home in sweatpants. Working square images, inspired by the iconic Rolleiflex 6 by 6-centimeter image format, he strives to “give event portraiture its meaning in the face of throwaway snapshots instantly consumed on websites and social media.”
Expect posse battles between the winners and losers of Sidaction auctions of different years; an imaginary dance-off between Coco Rocha and Pigalle’s Stéphane Ashpool, or just to see the mischievous true faces of his subjects, like Marc Jacobs hiding his face in a puff of white smoke in this ode to nighttime fun.
“The Little Theatre of Vincent Darré”
216 pages, 65 euros
Published by Flammarion
Parisian man-about-town Vincent Darré throws open the doors of his colorful universe in “The Little Theatre of Vincent Darré,” a scrapbook in which he features 20 of his projects through original drawings and personal photographs. A foreword by French journalist and author Laurence Benaïm and contributions from actresses Arielle Dombasle, Valérie Lemercier, Amira Casar, Isabelle Adjani and Eva Ionesco add even more color to what Darré describes as “the life of an itinerant scenographer.” From haute couture shoots for Vogue to his collaboration with popular French retailer La Redoute, this is a rollercoaster ride through the extravagance and vast visual culture of a decorator who has turned frivolity into an entertaining art form.