“Vintage t-shirts” a book recently edited by Taschen is a must-have for anyone interested in pop culture, design and fashion. This wonderful publication presents a great collection of 650 t-shirts coming from the collection of Patrick and Marc Guetta, owners of World of Vintage T-Shirts on Melrose Avenue in Los Angeles. The pieces assembled come mostly from the 70′s and the 80′s and they document the political and popular history of modern America. Beautifully edited and wonderfully narrated by a fashion journalist Alison A. Nieder.

You can order your copy from www.taschen.com

“With the addition of just a few letters or an image the simple T-shirt can become a personal billboard. What started as the standard issue undershirt of the U.S. military, by the mid-1970s had evolved into a means of self-expression and individualism. Musical taste, political slant, favorite TV show or movie, vacation destination and brand preference — it’s all on a tee.”

Angelika Taschen knows New York. She’s been behind the velvet ropes, explored the secret, unmarked restaurants and beloved neighborhood delis, scoured Soho, Nolita and Tribeca’s stylish stores, and scoped out hotels uptown and downtown, from sleek and chic to hidden charms. She provides an all-access pass to parts of New York even most locals don’t know. Dictionary-style cutout tabs make it easy to flip through, and a pocket-sized map of Manhattan lists all the shops, hotels, and restaurants in the book. With this guide in hand, New York is yours for the taking.

Featuring the Maritime Hotel, a former sailors’ dorm, now Chelsea’s coolest hotel; Robert De Niro’s Greenwich Hotel, with its authentic Japanese spa; the cheap but chic Pod Hotel. Learn how to get the best table at the Waverly Inn, Vanity Fair editor Graydon Carter’s exclusive salon for the glitterati; how to find Soho’s hidden basement bar subMercer; the Shake Shack, for a terrific burger in the shade of Madison Square Park; Rao’s, the Spanish Harlem Italian joint run by the Sopranos’ actor who turned Madonna away; where to buy New York’s best cheesecake; and Greenwich Letterpress, for hand-printed cards to send to envious friends who didn’t make this fabulous New York trip!

Photos by Poul Ober
Texts by Daisann McLane
source: Taschen

PARIS….Ville magique

The perfect guide to the Paris of your dreams by Taschen

This book combines all of Angelika Taschen’s recommendations for Paris hotels, shops, restaurants, cafes, and bars into one volume, ensuring visitors a wealth of ideas and a guarantee that their Parisian sojourn will never have a dull moment. From the ultra-hot Colette fashion concept store to Tom Ford’s secret hideaway to Hemingway’s favorite brasserie, all of the best insider tips are gathered together between these covers so that when you hop out from under yours, you’ll have plenty of exciting things on your agenda.

Dictionary-style cut out tabs help the reader to have quick access to each chapter.

Among the highlights are:

* Decorative ceramics shop Astier de Villatte
* The ultra-modern Comme des Garçons perfume and candle boutique
* Ladurée, the best macaroons in the city
* Ma Bourgogne restaurant on the beautiful Place des Vosges
* Classic bistro Allard that has hardly changed in 70 years
* Left bank restaurant La Palette, a favorite of Picasso and Braque
* Brasserie Lipp, where Hemingway ate the eat herrings he wrote about in A Moveable Feast
* The ultra-luxurious Ritz hotel on elegant Place Vendôme
* The cozy and cute Hôtel Bourg Tibourg in the Marais
* Hôtel Verneuil in St. Germain-des-Prés opposite the former residence of Serge Gainsbourg
* The quintessentially French Hôtel Duc de Saint-Simon

author: Angelika Taschen
photos: Vincent Knapp

At a time when surfing is more popular than ever, it`s fitting to look back at the years that brought the sport into the mainstream. Developed by Hawaiian islanders over five centuries ago, surfing began to peak on the mainland in the 1950s, taking America—and the world—by storm. Surfing became not just a sport, but a way of life, and the culture that surrounded it was admired and exported across the globe. One of the key image-makers from that period is LeRoy Grannis, a surfer since 1931, who began photographing the scene in California and Hawaii in the longboard Gidget era of the early 1960s.

This collection, drawn from Grannis`s personal archives, showcases an impressive selection of surf photographs—from the bliss of catching the perfect wave at San Onofre to dramatic wipeouts at Oahu`s famed North Shore. An innovator in the field, Grannis suction-cupped a waterproof box to his board, enabling him to change film in the water and stay closer to the action than other photographers of the time. Equally notable is his work covering an emerging surf lifestyle, from “surfer stomps” and hoards of fans at surf contests to board-laden woody station wagons along the Pacific Coast Highway. It is in these iconic images that a sport still in its adolescence embodied the free-spirited nature of an era—a time before shortboards and celebrity endorsements, when surfing was at its bronzed best.