Luxury

“With Deluxe: How Luxury Lost Its Luster, [Dana] Thomas—who has been the cultural and fashion writer for Newsweek in Paris for 12 years—has written a crisp, witty social history that’s as entertaining as it is informative.” —New York Times From the author of Fashionopolis: The Price of Fast Fashion and the Future of Clothes Once luxury was available only to the rarefied and aristocratic world of old money and royalty. It offered a history of tradition, superior quality, and a pampered buying experience. Today, however, luxury is simply a product packaged and sold by multibillion-dollar global corporations focused on growth, visibility, brand awareness, advertising, and, above all, profits. Award-winning journalist Dana Thomas digs deep into the dark side of the luxury industry to uncover all the secrets that Prada, Gucci, and Burberry don't want us to know. Deluxe is an uncompromising look behind the glossy façade that will enthrall anyone interested in fashion, finance, or culture.

Marketing Luxury Design: Attracting Affluent Clients ? is your one-of-a-kind guide to identify, attract, and capture affluent clients for luxury interior design. Whether you're an interior designer, an architect, or a builder, you'll learn smart strategies for connecting and building relationships with affluent clients that deliver profitable results and lifetime clients.

21st century luxury is about the interplay between cult streetwear brands and elite fashion houses. Explore fashion's transformation for a new generation of in-the-know consumers. Highsnobiety, the publication geared at culturally-connected, style-savvy, forward-thinking young men, is seen as a gatekeeper to the growing intersection of music, fashion, and style. Their latest book seeks to define "New Luxury," a term that summarizes how streetwear and sneakers have not only infiltrated the upper tiers of fashion, but became it. The New Luxury isn't just about what you wear, but also what you know. This book provides the foundational knowledge of how youth-driven culture and fashion trends start from the ground up.

Fleeting human moments memorialized by Oberto Gili's camera translate formally into beautifully balanced classical images. His camera, like his personality, is whimsical questioning, non-judgemental and tenderly objective. Gili's images of interiors capture fundamental moments of human existence, quiet moments and basic needs, wether it's a man on sitting on his coach surrounded by his dogs, a young couple getting into bed, a woman watching herself getting dressed in the mirror or a girl swimming alone in a pool, we experience narrative, isolation, intrusion through Gili's lens. Gili shows us different perspectives of home: color, happiness, sex, depression, arrogance, creativity, simplicity, boredom. These images in this stunning volume are a diairy of the interiors and situations that have, over the last thirty years, strung Gili's curiosity and fantasy the most. Simple, still and understated, Gili's images of interiors all have possibility as their subtext. Illustrated

An exploration of the many issues and debates that surround the idea of luxury. The idea of luxury has secured a place in contemporary Western culture and the term has now joined common parlance in both established and emerging economies. Crafting Luxury explores contentious issues surrounding perceptions of luxury, its relationship to contemporary branding as created by marketers, and the effect this has on consumers and their purchasing habits. It examines the industry structures, analyzing production practices as well as the effects of hierarchies on both internal and external perceptions of luxury, from the makers to the sellers and consumers. Offering different perspectives and interpretations of luxury, the authors dissect the work of companies across the industry, from established companies to emerging models and from conglomerates to small independents. They further explore the impact of technology on consumption, manufacture, the retail environment, and sales, providing a true insider's view of this complex world.

Meta-Luxury sets out to define the ultimate meaning of true luxury, exploring it as both a culture and business model. Through the concept of Unique Achievement and the drivers of Craftsmanship, Focus, History and Rarity, the authors examine what is at the heart of true luxury through a unique series of conversations.

We live in a world obsessed by luxury. Long-distance airlines compete to offer first-class sleeping experiences and hotels recommend exclusive suites where you are never disturbed. Luxury is a rapidly changing global industry that makes the headlines daily in our newspapers and on the internet. More than ever, luxury is a pervasive presence in the cultural and economic life of the West - and increasingly too in the emerging super-economies of Asia and Latin America. Yet luxury is hardly a new phenomenon. Today's obsession with luxury brands and services is just one of the many manifestations that luxury has assumed. In the middle ages and the Renaissance, for example, luxury was linked to notions of magnificence and courtly splendour. In the eighteenth century luxury was at the centre of philosophical debates over its role in shaping people's desires and oiling the wheels of commerce. And it continues to morph today, with the growth of the global super-rich and increasing wealth polarization. From palaces to penthouses, from couture fashion to lavish jewellery, from handbags to red wine, from fast cars to easy money, Peter McNeil and Giorgio Riello present the first ever global history of luxury, from the Romans to the twenty-first century: a sparkling and ever-changing story of extravagance, excess, novelty, and indulgence.

Showcasing travel photographs by more than 150 of America’s top architects and designers, Travel by Design is an inspiring guide to the power of travel to shape and expand our world. Travel by Design reminds us of the beauty and importance of travel, with images of more than 100 locations in 60 countries, from exotic destinations and global cities to adventure travels and all-American escapes. More than 350 photographs take readers on a global journey through cityscapes, ancient civilizations, luxurious resorts, and stunning natural wonders, all seen through the discerning and artistic eyes of today’s leading creative talents. The images are sure to inspire dreams of escape, and the 40 pages of insider resources—from favorite hotels and restaurants to secret shopping sources and must-see monuments—will make planning future trips reassuring and easy.

The word "luxury" has almost lost its meaning. Once used to describe genuinely prestigious products or places, the concept of luxury has been hijacked by a multitude of aspiring or overpriced commodities, from foot spas to chocolates. So what is real luxury? Which are the genuine luxury brands, and how have they reacted to the rise of the "mass luxury" sector? What strategies do they use to lift themselves into the realm of the truly elite? Who are their customers - and what kind of lives do these remarkable people lead? How do luxury brands attract and retain them? And above all, where can the industry turn now excess is out of fashion? With wit, accuracy and insatiable curiosity, Luxury World takes us on a voyage around the luxury universe, slipping behind the facades of the world's most sophisticated businesses to demonstrate how they function. Among other destinations, Luxury World visits Swiss watchmakers, the Champagne houses of France, the diamond district of Antwerp, the luxury enclave of Monte Carlo, the discreet ateliers of the last craftsmen and a host of brands in Paris - the self-proclaimed capital of elegance. Along the way, he uncovers the true face of today's luxury industry.

A sweeping history of luxury--from the pharaohs to the plutocrats--celebrating the quintessential role of opulence in human evolution From diamonds to Daimlers, banquets to yachts, a garden planted with porcelain roses, a giraffe gifted to a king, a town presented to a queen, a mantle sewn with 45,000 feathers, verse carved on rubies, a house built of vapor, a cathedral carved of salt, a temple clad in gold, a mansion traded for a strand of pearls, and tea served in a $36 million cup, here is luxury as pleasure, luxury as fabulous, luxury as beyond. In this sweeping new survey, richly illustrated and in full color with over 250 photographs, Jill Spalding, former Vogue editor and author of Only the Best, tracks the world's greatest luxuries and humankind's eternal quest for the rare, the best, and the over-the-top.