Vogue's Book of Houses, Gardens, People 1968.

Lawford, Vreeland, Horst. VOGUE'S BOOK OF HOUSES, GARDENS, PEOPLE. The Viking Press, New York, 1968.

Current Selling Prices
$350-$600 /£180-£300

PHOTOGRAPHY / INTERIOR DECORATION
1968. While a younger generation were manning the barricades or kicking out the jams, the older rich beautiful people were having their homes and gardens arranged to perfection and photographed. This was a more elegant age before the TV makeover, trash culture and the cult of mass celebrity. Horst was the appointed photographer. He was the Bruce Weber of his time known for his cleverly lit, painstaking photos of buffed guys hawking their brawn under a Meditteranean sun, beautiful girl models in swimwear and one of Vogue's best-known photographs, Mainbocher Corset (1939) which was 'homaged' by Madonna in a video in the late 90s. That's him below photographed in youth by his one time lover and mentor Hoyningen- Huene.

The Vogue Book with the red cover (there are many with similar titles but you need the 1968 book with photos by Horst) is not especially scarce but always makes good money and has a sort of iconic status among taste freaks, decorators and fashion/ design people. The blurb, very much of its time, says it all:

"...the houses and rooms, furniture and collections, gardens and daily lives of some of the most interesting people in America and Europe are here presented in over two hundred beautiful colour photographs by Horst...from Miss Doris Duke's extraordinary Muslim-inspired house near Honolulu, and State Senator and Mrs. Taylor Pryor's Oceanarium at Sea Life Park, also in Hawaii, we are transported to the revived Georgian splendours of Mr. and Mrs. Desmond Guinness's. Irish castle, and to Mr. Henry Francis du Pont's world-famous estate at Winterthur, Delaware; from the work-rooms and living-rooms of the brilliant designer Emilio Pucci in Florence, to the Duke and Duchess of Windsor's magnificently appointed house in the Bois de Boulogne, and to Baron and Baroness Philippe de Rothschild's unique Chateau de Mouton..there are chapters about the young: Mr. and Mrs. Carter Burden, Jr., in their New York apartment, Mr. And Mrs. Cy Twombly in their Roman palazzo, Lord and Lady Eliot at their ancient family seat in Cornwall...this book provides an opportunity to see how a number of well-known and less well-known people live during their private hours, among the possessions they love and in the surroundings they have planned or improved or cultivated.. for anyone curious about the personalities and habits of some of the most attractive and creative people of our time."

Bruce Weber in, in a 1992 television documentary on the elderly Horst, gushed '...the elegance of his photographs ... took you to another place, very beautifully ... the untouchable quallity of the people is really interesting as it gives you something of a distance ... it's like seeing somebody from another world ... and you wonder who that person is and you really want to know that person and really want to fall inlove with that person'. An archive of Horst's photos built up by a German businessman sold last year at auction for several million dollars. Although ignored by Martin Parr and the more serious photo people his name (and also his associates George Platt Lyne and Hoyningen-Huene) are always worth looking out for on books.

VALUE? No copies available for less than $350, a fine copy is listed at $1000, hard to find a respectable copy at less than $450. Its outlook is probably OK as it is becoming harder to find and as time goes by it may take on a period charm. Photo is still very bankable - although this isn't Horst at his best or most typical. There are some photos from it on Flickr including a shot of the Duke Windsoer in a suit so boldly checked that you'd have to be a royal in exile or a welching bookie to get away with it. Avoid ex library copies (unless ex library lite) - a copy sits on a web mall at an outrageous $450 described thus - 'Brodart-covered dust jacket of ex-library reference book (never circulated) with usual marks and stamps. Pages 93-108 are bound in duplicate, Pages 81-92 are missing. Interior pages are clean, tight, and unmarked, except that book opens at page 80. All proceeds go to our public library.' Ex Lib and defective -the kind of copy that should be tossed in the recycling box or priced at $10 for the impecunious Vogue / I.D. collector, if such exists.

Decorative Designs of Donald Deskey

David A. Hanks. DONALD DESKEY: DECORATIVE DESIGNS AND INTERIORS. E.P. Dutton, NY 1987. ISBN 0525243607

Current Selling Prices
$300-$500 / £140-£260



DESIGN
Lavishly illustrated monograph on the preeminent modernist designer in 1930s USA. Art Deco etc., DD did the interior at Radio City Music Hall and Crest toothpaste still use the package he designed. An art book that came and went in a flash as some applied art monographs will do. There are guys walking around in Comme des Garcons shirts and Prada shoes who know the names and value of every one of those vanished books.

VALUE? Not common. Copies seen at a little less than $300, the ones at $300 and a bit over have been sitting there for a few moons. This leads me to advance a sound but obtuse economic theory that the right price is the wrong price -- i.e. if you put the right price on a book it will not sell, at least not with alacrity - the trick is to put it at a bit less than the right price. This is especially true of the net where most people are looking for deals, if not screaming bargains. Some books have been sitting on the net since the dot.com bubble. One seller with an 'exquisite' copy wants $550. 'Exquisite' is not a word used much in book dealing, except with bindings where it was once used so often they became known as 'squizz bindings.' Pic above show one of Deskey's most excellent table lamps.

Want level 25-50 Highish

David Stone Martin - Jazz Graphics 1991

I went into a minor rant yesterday about the 'average price' heresy (see Bennion/ Medical Instruments below). The thrust of it is that buyers do not choose to buy a book with the average price , they buy at the lowest price, all things being equal. There are, of course, exceptions. Firstly when (esp on Amazon or Ebay) the lowest price dealer has low feedback and is thus a possible bilker or scuzz ball. Secondly when the lowest price is with someone 1000s of miles of ocean away, with consequent slowness of delivery and high postage. Thirdly when the seller is well known and highly esteemed; you don't want to pay alot extra for this but it is reassuring-- the book will be as described and can be returned without fuss if it isn't. If the book is expensive the dealer may look upon you with favour in some future transaction or even quote you a book or send a catalogue. The book will also arrive well packed and protected against the vagaries of air travel etc.,

Manek Daver. DAVID STONE MARTIN. JAZZ GRAPHICS. Graphic-sha Publishing Co. Ltd, Tokyo, Japan, 1991 ISBN 4766105745

Current Selling Prices
$400-$600 /£190-£320 Want level 25-50 Highish



JAZZ/ DESIGN
Manek Daver has brought together around 150 of David Stone Martin's jazz record covers, as well as around 65 of DSM's portraits of individual jazz musicians in this attractive book. The text is in both English and Japanese. Small art book size (12 by 9 inches) Soft cover with a jacket. Martin's work is instantly recognisable if you ever looked through collections of ol LP's. It is also recognisable from 50s and 60s paperback covers. He drew more than 400 album covers and created covers for Time Magazine. His work is in the Museum of Modern Art and the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York, the Art Institute of Chicago, and the Smithsonian. He illustrated books, posters, billboards and advertisements for film, television and theatre, and created cover art for Asch, Clef, and Jazz at the Philharmonic labels of the 40's and 50's. Nice!

VALUE? In the summer a copy turned up at $300 and sold fairly quickly. A silly billy (possibly a relister) had one at £1200 which appears to now languish at half.com - a site that you never hear people talking about and may, like zshops, only enjoy a sort of half-life. A difficult and desirable book - hard to buy at less than $450.