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Glass of Fashion: A Personal History of Fifty Years of Changing Tastes and the People Who Have Inspired Them
Gorgeously repackaged, this reissue of the classic book presents the iconic photographer s expert and witty reminiscences of the personalities who inspired fashion s golden eras, and left an indelible mark on his own sense of taste and style. The camera will never be invented that could capture or encompass all that he actually sees, Truman Capote once said of Cecil Beaton. Though known for his portraits, Beaton was as incisive a writer as he was a photographer. First published in 1954, The Glass of Fashion is a classic an invaluable primer on the history and highlights of fashion from a man who was a chronicler of taste, and an intimate compendium of the people who inspired his legendary eye. Across eighteen chapters, complemented by more than 150 of his own line drawings, Beaton writes with great wit about the influence of luminaries such as Chanel, Balenciaga, and Dior, as well as relatively unknown muses like his Aunt Jessie, who gave him his first glimpse of the grown-up world of fashion. Out of print for decades but recognized and sought after as a touchstone text, The Glass of Fashion will be irresistible to a new generation of fashion enthusiasts and a seminal book in any Beaton library. It is both a treasury and a treasure."
ebook
First published January 1, 1954
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About the author
Cecil Beaton
173 books44 followersPeople noted sets and costumes of British photographer, diarist, and theatrical designer Cecil Walter Hardy Beaton for
My Fair Lady
on stage in 1956 and on film in 1964.
Cecil Beaton first styled his sisters decadently. His unique flair for elegance and fantasy led him to the most successful and influential portrait and fashion of the 20th century. From Adolf de Meyer, baron, and Edward Jean Steichen as sources of inspiration, he nevertheless developed all his own style. He worked for Vogue for more than a quarter-century and also as court official to the royal family in 1937. A constant innovator, Beaton worked for five decades to captivate some figures of his time from Edith Sitwell to the Rolling Stones, Greta Garbo, Jean Cocteau, and Marilyn Monroe.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cecil_B...
Cecil Beaton first styled his sisters decadently. His unique flair for elegance and fantasy led him to the most successful and influential portrait and fashion of the 20th century. From Adolf de Meyer, baron, and Edward Jean Steichen as sources of inspiration, he nevertheless developed all his own style. He worked for Vogue for more than a quarter-century and also as court official to the royal family in 1937. A constant innovator, Beaton worked for five decades to captivate some figures of his time from Edith Sitwell to the Rolling Stones, Greta Garbo, Jean Cocteau, and Marilyn Monroe.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cecil_B...
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Displaying 1 - 10 of 10 reviews
February 19, 2016
Gorgeous edition of fashion photographer Cecil Beaton's 1950s book, a sort of "Lifestyles of the Rich and Famous" for the first half of the 20th century. This edition also has his sketches interspersed throughout and it's a fun, interesting read but one star taken off for the insane amount of typos. Grrrrr, especially for a beautiful new edition like this one.
October 22, 2020
I re-read this one periodically. It's a lovely book -- witty and wise. He represents an era of elegance and exquisite taste that is long gone. As the noted wit, Quentin Crisp once noted, "The ship of fashion has sunk off Punk Rock."
June 30, 2024
What I expected— a chronicle of fashion/society/taste for the first 50 years of the 20th Century from a socialite himself in the (rich and white) New York scene. Replete with wit, artistic sensitivity, and the sort of high/low culture metaphor sandwiches that can only come from a popular culture focus like this.* It’s always so refreshing to read about where enduring trends originated, from dress all the way to personality itself and speaking in affected manners or standing in a certain posture. Nothing new under the sun, etc. which means it started from an imitation somewhere, an itch to express in a certain idiom somewhere until it was actualized in the flesh.
I appreciated the introduction and conclusion the most probably, as they were the crowning jewels of his philosophy. Most of all his defense of the seemingly fickle and useless but deeply personal, and how he manages to tread that line between art and mere trend. He also drew from history, at the very end of the book suggesting that fashion is a symbol, as it is influenced by political, economic, and psychological factors.
The rest of the book had good analyses of fashion as well, but a lot of it was unending descriptions in no particular organization scheme. I grew tired of reading long descriptions of household items that I had no reference to or reading about another paragraph of a new person who is just so X but also Y and look how amazing and complex and human. I guess I also don’t really care as much for early 20th century fashions as I thought I did, as much as I found a lot of it fascinating.
A book about fashion is inevitably a book about people, and I found his characterizations scintillating and compelling. It is interesting that although a lot of personality came through mimicking and affectation, the trendsetters were able to do so without seeming affected and it came from their honest personality. It resonated with me each time he described the tragic quality of some of the most beloved figures. I especially liked him linking it to pop music and Cole Porter, how it is of the moment unlike eternal works of Michelangelo or Mozart, and how it makes it that much more compelling. I liked his descriptions of the women from the 20s and their coltlike nature and energy. It is most inspiring to read about these women of society who were in the public eye and living vigorous, curiosity fueled lives.
Beaton would differentiate such muses and culture shapers from modern day influencers now, not only due to the increased unreality of social media but because these are glitzy figures without character (like the Hollywood stars he was apt to disdain), or interestingly coined as a fault, without enough leisure. True art is spending five hours on a sauce and not thinking it a waste of time (from the French). I thought so much of this book was prescient; much of Beaton’s sentiment is what we feel now and was only felt in a wide scale by American society recently (such as processed foods and bleached flour). It also sounded very natural to me; we must’ve had modern English as we know it at least since the 1950s.
I enjoyed learning more personally about Chanel, Dior, Balenciaga and Diana Vreeland. Also how Beau Brummell influenced men’s fashion and for Beaton bringing up at all the question of why menswear is so monotonous.
My biggest takeaway from reading is that modernity went through a lot. Even the biggest fashion connoisseur, the most shrewd observer here speaks of how the soul was sucked from culture by consumerism and run parallel to a loss of humanity, tradition, and virtue.
My favorite insight is that Eastern clothing was able to show great aesthetic perfection because of long tradition of wearing the same kind of garment, while European fashions are gripped with an incessant need for change (388).
As much as I love the gorgeous, stylistic drawings in the book, it would have benefitted immensely from color pictures and less writing. I wish I didn’t have to learn about fashion from books, it would be better as lived experience.
It was beautiful of Beaton to retain the magic of fashion and art and end with hope.
(Read as hard copy not ebook!! For the record. My bleeding eyes are proof)
*’her hat, resembling airplane propellers or a Brancusi bird’ 66 / ‘…in that Great Gatsby era when ladies willed their bodies to look as much like cooked asparagus as possible’ 366 / Those whose lives or work are involved in fashion breathe the air of instability: they are like the Mexican farmer who several years ago discovered a volcano growing in his cornfield.’ 388
I appreciated the introduction and conclusion the most probably, as they were the crowning jewels of his philosophy. Most of all his defense of the seemingly fickle and useless but deeply personal, and how he manages to tread that line between art and mere trend. He also drew from history, at the very end of the book suggesting that fashion is a symbol, as it is influenced by political, economic, and psychological factors.
The rest of the book had good analyses of fashion as well, but a lot of it was unending descriptions in no particular organization scheme. I grew tired of reading long descriptions of household items that I had no reference to or reading about another paragraph of a new person who is just so X but also Y and look how amazing and complex and human. I guess I also don’t really care as much for early 20th century fashions as I thought I did, as much as I found a lot of it fascinating.
A book about fashion is inevitably a book about people, and I found his characterizations scintillating and compelling. It is interesting that although a lot of personality came through mimicking and affectation, the trendsetters were able to do so without seeming affected and it came from their honest personality. It resonated with me each time he described the tragic quality of some of the most beloved figures. I especially liked him linking it to pop music and Cole Porter, how it is of the moment unlike eternal works of Michelangelo or Mozart, and how it makes it that much more compelling. I liked his descriptions of the women from the 20s and their coltlike nature and energy. It is most inspiring to read about these women of society who were in the public eye and living vigorous, curiosity fueled lives.
Beaton would differentiate such muses and culture shapers from modern day influencers now, not only due to the increased unreality of social media but because these are glitzy figures without character (like the Hollywood stars he was apt to disdain), or interestingly coined as a fault, without enough leisure. True art is spending five hours on a sauce and not thinking it a waste of time (from the French). I thought so much of this book was prescient; much of Beaton’s sentiment is what we feel now and was only felt in a wide scale by American society recently (such as processed foods and bleached flour). It also sounded very natural to me; we must’ve had modern English as we know it at least since the 1950s.
I enjoyed learning more personally about Chanel, Dior, Balenciaga and Diana Vreeland. Also how Beau Brummell influenced men’s fashion and for Beaton bringing up at all the question of why menswear is so monotonous.
My biggest takeaway from reading is that modernity went through a lot. Even the biggest fashion connoisseur, the most shrewd observer here speaks of how the soul was sucked from culture by consumerism and run parallel to a loss of humanity, tradition, and virtue.
My favorite insight is that Eastern clothing was able to show great aesthetic perfection because of long tradition of wearing the same kind of garment, while European fashions are gripped with an incessant need for change (388).
As much as I love the gorgeous, stylistic drawings in the book, it would have benefitted immensely from color pictures and less writing. I wish I didn’t have to learn about fashion from books, it would be better as lived experience.
It was beautiful of Beaton to retain the magic of fashion and art and end with hope.
(Read as hard copy not ebook!! For the record. My bleeding eyes are proof)
*’her hat, resembling airplane propellers or a Brancusi bird’ 66 / ‘…in that Great Gatsby era when ladies willed their bodies to look as much like cooked asparagus as possible’ 366 / Those whose lives or work are involved in fashion breathe the air of instability: they are like the Mexican farmer who several years ago discovered a volcano growing in his cornfield.’ 388
November 2, 2022
dedicated today's reading to finishing all of the books i was 90% done with and was putting off finishing for whatever reason
March 6, 2021
These snippets of Cecil Beaton’s fashionable life give a lively insight into his experience through the first half of the 20th Century, an interesting viewpoint for how tastes had changed. Though he names several different people as undoubtedly the most stylish around, there are plenty insights into the value of the ‘minor arts’ which he champions well, just enough to make up for the proofing errors every few pages which jar with the care taken in the beautiful coffee table-type book. Nevertheless, great escapism to the sophisticated glamour of different ages !
December 23, 2014
waited forever for this to come back in print!
January 3, 2022
Mostly, just not what I expected. A lot of gossip about long-dead socialites I’ve never heard of, rather than a focus on their personal style and fashion— but the level is snark is occasionally glorious.
April 27, 2023
An engaging and comprehensive history of a personal perspective on aesthetics. One of the most interesting books I have ever read.
December 12, 2024
if you get it you get, i love this book its my favorite and it changed my perspective
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May 8, 2015391.009 B3692 2014
Displaying 1 - 10 of 10 reviews