FLIGHTS OF FANCY
ALTHOUGH OUR HORIZONS MAY CURRENTLY BE DMINISHED, THERE’S NOTHING TO STOP US TAKING A JOURNEY OF THE IMAGINATION, ONE AIDED BY THE EYES OF LUXURY PUBLISHING HOUSE ASSOULINE
For the last quarter of a century, the bespoke New York-based publishing house of Assouline has served as what’s appropriately been called a “librarian of luxury”. Although starting out with compact, hand-size volumes devoted to famous names in fashion and luxury goods that sold for a mere handful for dollars, the company quickly moved on to specialise in huge, lavishly photographed, printed and bound tomes that could cost upwards of four or, in the case of limited editions, even five figures. Still a family business today, the company was founded in a Paris basement by a couple with extensive experience in the luxury ecosystem: Prosper Assouline had worked in an advertising agency, while his wife Martine had served as head of communications for the house of Rochas. So it was perhaps inevitable that when they began their own publishing venture they didn’t stray too far from terra cognita, with a catalogue of beautiful books devoted to the grand maisons of French fashion and luxury, names such as Cartier, Chanel and Dior – one that’s expanded in magnitude along with the physical dimensions of the publications themselves.
In addition to fashion and luxury – subjects with which the company has served as a several brands’ semi-official biographer – Assouline explores other subjects likely to be of interest to a readership that is by definition affluent and globally aware. Art, design, architecture, automobiles and high society naturally figure prominently, but at the other end of the scale the publishing house is perfectly happy to engage with elements of culture that are less obviously elevated. So far it’s produced five monumental collaborations with Coca-cola, while a 2008 enquiry from the toymaker Mattel resulted in a pair of equally enormous publications, one devoted to the Barbie Doll and the other to Hot Wheels.
Travel is another topic perfectly suited to Assouline’s exquisitely excessive treatment – indeed, the imprint’s first outing, in 1994, was with a book devoted to the couple’s favoured hotel in southern France. Today the Assouline library, which now extends to more than 1,700 volumes, positively groans with titles devoted to destinations exotic and chic, both near and far away. So to sweeten the bitter pill of being confined for months on end to our own all-too-familiarly dreary necks of the woods, we’ve decided to offer some respite by delving into the pages of five of Assouline’s newest travel tomes: St Tropez Soleil, Uzbekistan – The Road to Samarkand, Amalfi Coast, Zanzibar and Athens Riviera. Travel has always been about turning the dream of the unfamilar into reality, and it’s hard to imagine a more evocative way of provoking such visions than this collection of beautiful images.