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An illustrated guide for watch buyers and enthusiasts that provides tips and advice to select and care for a timepiece, profiles nearly fifty watch brands, and includes market value and price information.
Fred Samuel was a master of colored stones who seduced his clients with the stylish lifestyle of the French Riviera at its peak. Opening his first jewelry shop in Paris in 1936, the jeweler became famous bringing original drawings by Jean Cocteau to glittering life, garnering clients of movie fame and royalty alike, and today the brand's modern ingenuity remains in the spotlight with colorful and unique jewels featuring exceptional stones. 'Fred Joaillier' chronicles the rich history of a jewelry brand that has cultivated a timeless mystique.
With the promise of eternity, jewels bestow gifts of adornment and beauty on those who wear them. Their value is multifaceted: intrinsic, sentimental, magical, human. Since the dawn of time, these few grams of precious metals and gems have acted as distillations of the highest sentiments and catalysts of the lowest passions.
This book is a poetic and timeless memento, a voyage into the heart of jeweler Van Cleef & Arpels’ universe to discover their creations. This opus, arranged as an alphabetical guide, is a veritable A-Z lexicon that revisits the themes and codes of the famous jeweler: indispensable historical references to emblematic jewels, precision watchmaking and jewelry-making techniques demonstrating unique savoir faire, and artistic collaborations. Fabienne Reybaud’s lively text leads the reader into the center of an enchanting world where everything wondrous and fantastical serves as an ever-rejuvenating source of inspiration and creativity. This poetic and timeless memento is magnificently illustrated with fabulous miniature worlds inhabited by the masterpieces that have forged the international identity and renown of the jewelers Van Cleef & Arpels.
Reybaud, Fabienne Book jacket. Over the past few decades, the watch has evolved from an essentially functional accessory into an object of desire. A multitude of brands, collections, increasingly complicated movements have flooded the market, disorienting not only general buyers but even enthusiasts. Watches is designed to help the neophyte and to guide the aficionado. It features a straightforward introduction to the leading contemporary brands. Written by a noted watch specialist, this indispensable book is rounded out by a comprehensive glossary, expert advice, and a table of current prices. Book jacket.
The history of Rolex is rooted in the visionary spirit of its founder, Hans Wilsdorf. In 1905, young Wilsdorf founded a company in London for the distribution of timepieces, but his true dream was to produce wristwatches—in their infancy at the time, and not very precise—that would be technically durable and reliable, and supremely elegant. The company first concentrated on producing the highest quality movements, and this quest for precision rapidly led to the first wristwatch in the world to receive the Swiss Certificate of Chronometric Precision, granted by the Official Watch Rating Centre in Bienne in 1910. Four years later, Kew Observatory in Great Britain awarded a Rolex watch a class A certificate, a distinction that had been previously reserved exclusively for marine chronometers.
The authors of this book are top executives in the luxury goods industry. In an environment in which brands have come under attack they argue that brands can be factors of progress if they are correctly managed. The book includes an analysis of brand nature and history and highlights the importance of semiotics in the management of brand identity. In summary they argue that brands cannot be held responsible for the imperfections and excesses of the worldwide economic and political systems, but that they can be signs of excellence and differentiation and vectors of values which favour multicultural understanding and put people in a position to generate progress.
While readers will come away from Chinese Art with a nuanced understanding of Chinese culture, the volume is also a work of art in its own right—a must-have collectible for any devotee of Chinese art and culture. Assouline’s Ultimate Collection is an homage to the art of luxury bookmaking—the oversized volume is hand-bound using traditional techniques, with several of the plates hand-tipped on art-quality paper and housed in a luxury silk clamshell.
This slipcase presents the history of Chanel, from its beginning through the creative trilogy which made this brand famous: Fashion, Jewellery and Perfuume.
This book is a literary museum exhibition, a curated selection of 100 iconic and signature looks of the house of Chanel, from the timeless Little Black Dress to the impeccably simple tweed suit, the apothecary-style perfume bottle, two-tone pumps, abundant strands of faux pearls and stones, and diamond-quilted leather handbag, from Mademoiselle’s revolutionary designs to Karl Lagerfeld’s unexpected and even irreverent variations on her original codes.