A stunning work on contemporary fashion spectacles, showcasing the most innovative, creative, and artistic high-fashion runway shows of the last twenty years.
A stunning work on contemporary fashion spectacles, showcasing the most innovative, creative, and artistic high-fashion runway shows of the last twenty years. In recent years, as fashion shows have become a part of our collective imagination and an important part of contemporary culture, blockbuster productions have redefined the runway show as a form of entertainment and creativity on par with the clothes themselves. This book focuses on designers for whom fashion and the mode of presenting it have held equal significance: Alexander McQueen, Martin Margiela, Hussein Chalayan, Viktor & Rolf, Marc Jacobs, Karl Lagerfeld at Chanel, Raf Simons, Thom Browne, and Imitation of Christ, among them. From the performance art spectacles of the first Alexander McQueen collections in the mid-1990s and the high-art concept shows of Hussein Chalayan in the late 1990s to the lavish beauty of Chanel haute couture in 2012, author Alix Browne explores the highest pinnacles of fashion today. Runway gives the reader full access to the theatrical and creative aspects of the production, in both intimate, little-seen runway shows from the pre-Internet era-many of the photographs here have never been published before-as well as major productions with elaborate sets and full-blown narrative. A thrilling, immersive, and inspiring look into the wide-ranging creativity of contemporary fashion, Runway is the most thorough book available on the subject. Featuring the most innovative fashion designers of the last twenty years, this book is a must for lovers of fashion and culture.
"As fall unfurls, glossy and gorgeous coffee table books appear"
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The New York Times "A new book celebrates the
most electrifying fashion shows of recent history, recasting the runway as seductive art performance."
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Interview Magazine". . . should be read by all involved with fashion, including lecturers and mentors for students."
—Colin McDowell,
BusinessofFashion.com"At its core,
Runway is about the times in recent fashion when “you had to be there.” As paper-and-ink, it leaves us wishing we could have been. It is a lucid presentation of contemporary history that arouses wistfulness and invites us to dream."
—Crush Fanzine"Without question, the cast of characters reads like a who's who of fashion over the past quarter of a century."
—Jeffrey Felner,
New York Journal of Books
"Editor Alix Browne’s study of how the most progressive
fashion designers have pioneered the idea of using a show or presentation as a means of creative expression."
—15 of the Most Covetable Fashion Tomes to Hit Bookshelves This Year,
Vogue
"
Holiday books: From 250-ton icebergs flown in from Scandinavia to sets adorned in more than a million real flowers, fashion shows are more than a simple parade of next season’s clothing: They’re a means by which to make manifest a designer’s all-encompassing vision.
In Runway: The Spectacle of Fashion, author and features director at
W magazine Alix Browne highlights shows from Chanel, Alexander McQueen, Marc Jacobs, and more to
explore the most significant and sensational productions from the last two decades of catwalk history."
—Departures.com "...chronicles the stand-outs, from models floating down a Milanese canal at Carol Christian's Poell's 2004 show to the moving escalators at spring 2013 Louis Vuitton."
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WMagazine.com
