In a few words, I bought an amazing book and I'm totally sure this will be a perfect Christmas present for any vintage and travels addicted.
I always looked at travel guides as wishlists more than practical books. A way to escape from reality in a certain way: in a cold winter afternoon when you lay on your coach with flu and sore throat, you can always imagine to travel to your favorite spots feeling great with a warm sun kissing your skin!
So it doesn't matter if I'm a million green counties from sunny California and I'm not currently planning any trip to L.A. (any trip anywhere indeed...), I'm totally hooked on this book!
Vintage L.A. is an amazing guide to every amazing vintage spots - boutiques, decor, landmarks, markets & more - in this amazing city. A guided tour of a glittery town, home of oh so many marvellous stories.
Featuring gorgeous, gorgeous pictures and interviews to cool Angelenos (Mark Ryden too!!), this guide will take you from Westside to Hollywood, from the Valley to Beverly Hills to L.A. sadly lost vintage landmarks. It's a book full of colors and fascinating old school stories. Definitely my thing!
The author, the L.A. native and lifelong resident and former Elle Girl columnist Jennifer Brandt Taylor - a super cool and stylish redhaired girl, by the way - has relocated to New York City where she's working on her next book, Vintage New York. And I can't wait for this one too!!
Sex and food is a classic duo, but it seems the new thing is fashion and food combo. It's not surprising indeed, as Refinery 29 pointed out recently, there are lots of fashion/food related blogs, from Maison des Reverie, which I love, to the over the top Luxirare . Also we surely can't forget these adorable fashion cupcakes and all the designers inspired cookies and desserts from bakeries and restaurants all around the world, like the marvellous ones from The Berkeley .
Just to confirm once again the theory, CFDA has just published American Fashion Cookbook , a book compiled by over 100 american designers where you can find illustrations, food related quotes, a foreword by Martha Stewart and, of course, recipes. From Derek Lam’s Yellowtail Crudo to Mark Ecko’s “Adults Only” Chocolate Chip Cookies...yum!
You can have a look at the first 30 pages on Assouline publisher website .
Fear not, this is not another methereopatic post, but despite my skeptical soul it will probably sounds a bit cheesy. Valentine's Day is a bad bad thing, stop reading my blatant digressions while you're still on time!
While we say love is an impalpable feeling, we often forget love stories are made of memories and that these memories are built around objects. The very first time we meet someone that will become important to us, we take a mental picture of the moment and we do the same for every important moment we live together since that first one. In these pictures we include feelings, words and gestures of course, but also a lot of other things like places, clothes we are wearing and every little tangible detail. A book, a photo but even a bus ticket or a candy can be the key to "open" that memory.
A lot of people tend to keep these things like treasures and when our stories reach an end, we find themselves alone but surronded by objects. We then must choose if we want - or better, if we are able - to keep them or we have to get rid of (even if maybe we could regret it later), as we try to go on with our lives.
In the end, is not weird to say that love stories are made of objects.
The first time I've heard the name of Leanne Shapton was when I've read The New Yorkers and saw her illustrations. She is a New York based artist, art director, contributor to The New York Times and The New Yorker, she runs J&L Books with photographer Jason Fulford and she is author of interesting and quirky books.
Her latest one has probably the longest title you can imagine and if you're a slave to details and think life (and love life...) is all about little things, you will probably love it as much as I'm doing.
Working as a puzzle, Important Artifacts shows the relationship of Leonore and Harold, a columnist for the New York Times and a photographer, from beginning to breakup, through their material belongings that are now up for auction.
The book and the whole idea are very smart and at the same time wonderfully heartbreaking. You have not real informations about the love affair, but you build it, listen to it and spy the characters involved just watching at each photo and reading the description of each "lot" of objects. It's all up to reader, like in real life...
EDIT: though it's not my fault, I'm really sorry for the awful pop-up Google ads in the Leanne Shapton video interview above...
