Fashion may be fabulous, but what price true luxury? With incredible access to the glamorous world of the luxury brand, "Deluxe goes" deep inside the workings of today's world of profit margins and market share to discover the fate of real luxury. From the importance of fashion owners, to red carpet stars and the seasonal 'must-have' handbags, Dana Thomas shows how far illustrious houses have moved from their roots. Thomas witnesses how these 'luxury' handbags are no longer one in a million, discovers why luxury brand clothing doesn't last as long, and finds out just who is making your perfume. From terrifying raids on the Chinese sweat shops to the daunting chic of Paris workshops, from the handcrafting and economics of early-twentieth century designers to the violent truth behind the 'harmless' fakes, "Deluxe" goes deep into the world of extravagance, and asks: where can true luxury go now?

Deluxe: How Luxury Lost Its Lustre

Business & Money

Dana Thomas

Marketing & Sales

Penguin??Books

Once luxury was available only to the rarefied and aristocratic world of old money and royalty. It offered a history of tradition, superior quality, and a pampered buying experience. Today, however, luxury is simply a product packaged and sold by multibillion-dollar global corporations focused on growth, visibility, brand awareness, advertising, and, above all, profits. Award-winning journalist Dana Thomas digs deep into the dark side of the luxury industry to uncover all the secrets that Prada, Gucci, and Burberry don?t want us to know. Deluxe is an uncompromising look behind the glossy façade that will enthrall anyone interested in fashion, finance, or culture.

Deluxe

PENGUIN BOOKS LTD, UK

In February 2011, John Galliano, the lauded head of Christian Dior, imploded with a drunken, anti-Semitic public tirade. Exactly a year earlier, celebrated designer Alexander McQueen took his own life three weeks before his women's wear show. Both were casualties of the war between art and commerce that has raged within fashion for the last two decades. In the mid-1990s, Galliano and McQueen arrived on the fashion scene when the business was in an artistic and economic rut. They shook the establishment out of its bourgeois, minimalist stupor with daring, sexy designs and theatrical fashion shows. They had similar backgrounds: sensitive, shy gay men raised in tough London neighborhoods, their love of fashion nurtured by their doting mothers. By 1997, each had landed a job as creative director for couture houses owned by French tycoon Bernard Arnault, chairman of LVMH. Galliano's and McQueen's work not only influenced fashion; their distinct styles were reflected across the media landscape. With their help, luxury fashion evolved from a clutch of small, family-owned businesses into a $280 billion-a-year global corporate industry. Executives pushed the designers to meet increasingly rapid deadlines. For both Galliano and McQueen, the pace was unsustainable. The same week that Galliano was fired, Forbes named Arnault the fourth richest man in the world. Two months later, in the wake of McQueen's death, Kate Middleton wore a McQueen wedding gown, instantly making the house the world's most famous fashion brand, and the Metropolitan Museum of Art opened a wildly successful McQueen retrospective, cosponsored by the corporate owners of the McQueen brand. The corporations had won and the artists had lost. In her groundbreaking work, Gods and Kings, acclaimed journalist Dana Thomas tells the true story of McQueen and Galliano. In so doing, she reveals the relentless world of couture-and the price it demanded of the very ones who saved it.

Gods and Kings: The Rise and Fall of Alexander McQueen and John Galliano

RECORDED BOOKS^

This is the story of Galliano and McQueen, the two working-class British boys who shook fashion to its core. With their complicated and deeply seductive designs, they moved from the raucous art and club scene of London to the old-school heart of French couture. The author highlights the similarities and differences in their temperament, charisma and style, she explores both their individual talent and the changing nature of fashion over the 80's, 90's and noughties. The result is a deeply engrossing, fast-paced and original read.

Arts & Photography

Graphic Design

Looking Through the Prism: Navigating Life with a Visual Disability

Biographies & Memoirs

Community & Culture

Independently published

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Books by Dana Thomas