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Writings

Gay Men's Magazines - From Under Wraps To Out In The Open

With a number of new additions to the archive recently, we thought we would take a look at some of the classic, soon-to-be classic, and lesser known gay men's publications we have at Elegantly Papered. We were really excited to get our hands on a few more issues of TIMM this week. For those not in know, TIMM (The International Male Magazine) was one of the first gay men's magazines...

A Closer Look at OZ Magazine

Was there ever a publication that better defined the spirit of a decade than Oz? Across 48 issues and six years, the iconic counter culture publication tackled just about every pressing social, political, and cultural subject of its time, ranging from gay rights to racism, the environment, feminism, sex, drugs, rock music and the Vietnam War. Originally published in Sydney in 1963, a parallel British edition of the magazine was...

EXPORTING FASHION & ART THROUGH THE PRINTED PAGE

We were blown away by the reaction to Poland magazine at the Room&Book Art Book Fair in May. Considering it was the very first time we'd shown it, it was a huge success - one of the top talking points and top sellers of the whole weekend! To to be honest, it's no surprise people responded so positively, just look at the covers below...psychedelia at its best! Amazing graphics and incredibly precise layouts...

We supplied magazines for... SWINGING SIXTIES LONDON 2015

2015 saw the Swinging Sixties London exhibition open at the Fotografiemuseum Amsterdam (aka FOAM museum). We worked closely with the curatorial team on this project suggesting much material they had not seen and we supplied a number of magazines that were displayed as part of the show complementing the prints on the wall. Twiggy, 1966, Photograph Terence Donovan © Courtesy Terence Donovan Archive  

On this day in 1942 one of the most important men in fashion came into this world...

Ossie Clark became one of the most influential British fashion designers in Britain, ever. Today we remember the great work of this talented dressmaker with three pieces from our archive. Happy Birthday Ossie! 1) This is the catalogue from the Ossie Clark Retrospective curated by Celia Birtwell and Cherry Gray in 1999 at the Warrington Museum and Art Gallery where he was born. 2) A collection of fashion drawings to colour in...

Ginzburg and Lubalin’s Avant Garde

Loving Avant Garde - great editorial design, great editorial content -  a match made in heaven! Avant Garde was founded in the late 1960s by Ralph Ginzburg and art directed by Herb Lubalin. It was as much about its typography and design as its editorial content. Lubalin created a typeface of the same name for the launch of the mag. As can be seen from the covers, he was a genius in arranging overlapping letterforms. Avant Garde was...

Room & Book Art Book Fair 2015

We’re thrilled to announce that we’ll be back at the Room&Book: ICA Art Book Fair this year. Curated by Claire De Rouen Books and now in its second year, it is a round up of some of the best independent book dealers from all over the world. And we are thrilled to say we are the only vintage magazine specialists attending. Last year’s was overwhelming, the quality of the exhibitors made it very...

One of the richest men in the world started out with a magazine...

Richard Branson (Net Worth: $4.9 billion*) started his successful career at the tender age of 16 with a magazine he aptly named; STUDENT. His school teacher had told him he would either end up in prison, or a millionaire. Branson went on to prove his teacher right! What we love about his story is that it all started with a magazine launched in January 1968...     Wow, wow, wow! David Hamilton cover photography (top left) and...

Uschi Obermaier

A little while ago we sparked up an interesting conversation on instagram over photos of these photos of Uschi Obermaier from a vintage Sunday Times Magazine. Forever fans of a strong female character, a quick google search of the Munich born rebel makes for a fun read. Having absent mindedly traced her story over the years, we were pleasantly surprised to find these shots of her by Willie Christie in...

Sunday Mag Couture

Step through the doors of EP and you'll understand why our heads are often swimming with references. We like to think our eye is always working and in a bid to share more exciting content with everyone, we are launching a a series of special blog posts featuring some of our favourite content. Watch this space. First up lets transport ourselves to the 1960s and take a look at designs from Pierre Cardin and...

Barbara for Biba

We love all things BIBA and the triumphant return of Barbara Hulanicki in partnership with House of Fraser certainly seems like something to celebrate. After almost 40 years, can you believe it?! Barbara for BIBA once again! It's safe to say we are mightily relieved to hear of the designers return to the helm. She set a course to revitalise British fashion in the sixties and seventies and her uncharted foray in to...

Where did that magazine come from?

It's great to hear stories behind the magazines we discover - this one is the perfect example. We received this sweet note in a package a few weeks ago: "Thanks for your purchase of Queen. I bought this either in Charing Cross Road or Trafalgar Square kiosks as I was on my travels to live in the West Indies for a while and this cover picture caught my eye with its article on...

Eye Catching Comme des Garcons

Have a look at what caught our eye today, literally...! Filip Pagowski's fabulous artwork for Comme des Garçons It was a pull-out at the back of an early issue of Purple magazine, now known as Purple Fashion More early Purple reminiscing coming soon!

New wave iconoclasts in Vogue

Jean-Luc Godard (right) by William Klein   Last week on Celebrity Tuesdays we mentioned that one of the biggest joys of working in an archive full of vintage magazines is the huge variety of content to pick through and (re)discover. We're all big film fans around here, so when flipping through a couple issues of French Vogue from the late 1950s and early 1960s this afternoon, we were really excited...

L'Uomo Vogue just in at Elegantly Papered

We've been preparing a fresh batch of L'Uomo Vogue issues for listing today on our EBay shop Vintage.Magazines. L'Uomo Vogue is the men's Italian version of Vogue which launched in 1968. They had a habit of putting iconic men of the moment on the cover, a simple headshot with no frills.     There are some great editorials inside this issue with American actor Paul Newman on the cover including...

Alfredo Bouret - A life in illustration

Looking through our substantial collection of fashion illustration material recently we rediscovered the work of Mexican-born Alfredo Bouret - one of fashion’s most acclaimed illustrators. Bouret began his formal studies at the Mexican School of Art in the 1940s whilst holding down jobs as both a freelance illustrator and a costume designer for the Mexican film industry. From 1946 until 1948, his fashion illustrations appeared in La Familia, one of...

A Beady Eye on Harri Peccinotti's Nova magazine cover

  What a tribute to London born photographer Harri Peccinotti! Beady eye - the 2009 founded band of Liam Gallagher - has decided to use one of Harri's photographs as cover image of their recently released album ‘BE’. We recognised it straight away from our Nova magazine collection. The image, with eyes open, was originally published as a cover in the late 60s. Peccinotti was a regular contributor to Nova;...

From the EP Archive: Juergen Teller

Here at Elegantly Papered, it would be fair to say that we are slightly obsessed with Juergen Teller's work. The German fine art and fashion photographer is perhaps best known for the (in)famous cast of individuals who have featured in his work over the last thirty plus years: Kate Moss, Kurt Cobain and Bjork are just three of the high profile celebrities Teller has shot, often in various states of...

"I find fashion photographs to be the least interesting of all" - Grace Coddington

We found an article written by American Vogue's current creative director and former model Grace Coddington in The Image magazine, 1973. Edited by David Litchfield and David Bailey as photography consultant. Coddington speaks of her experience of photography with a Canon Dial camera, thoughts on photography in general, recording of memories, and the ironic statement - "fashion photography the least interesting of all".  The collage of images on the double...

Tim Walker and his Earth Girls

After meeting Tim Walker at the Vogue Festival last month, we thought it would be appropriate to take a look back at that very first shoot he took with former fashion editor Kate Phelan 14 years ago. Twelve pages of muddy fields and cloudy skies with touches of bold colour. Walker somehow managed to create a magical shoot out of a bad situation. Of course, it wasn´t all that bad...

Counterculture Magazines

Amidst endless magazines on the market today, it´s difficult to pin point a specific title that could be classed as a counterculture publication. Looking back to the 1960s and 70s, there was a handful of underground and left-wing magazines published. Catering to those who challenged social conformity in the western world, some of these publications included German magazine Twen, as well as America´s Avant Garde. Where has the individual personality...

Art Kane again

We found another image taken by photographer and visionaire Art Kane for Queen magazine. The photo displaying garments from Mary Quant´s legendary underwear collection was published in the illustrated version of her autobiography, Quant by Quant in 1966. Much like the angled aesthetic we came across in the 1968 Daily Telegraph shoot recently. Here, Kane captures Quant´s staple flower logo.    

Pretty Wet Suits

We just found an Olympic fashion cover and editorial photographed by Art Kane back in 1968. Kane, who was born in 1925 became one of the most innovative photographers of the twentieth century, and worked for publications such as Esquire magazine as an Art Director in his early 20s.  The images below were shot in Dorset - and the clothes selected alongside Great Britain´s Olympic Yachting Team Manager following the Yachting...

Mary Quant by Mary Quant

Here at Elegantly Papered we are huge fans of British designer and all round fashion innovator, Mary Quant. Renowned for her invention of the mini skirt, Quant was a revolutionary designer in many other ways too. It all began with her desire to buy men´s fabrics from Harrods, to then make clothes for women. Disappointed by the range of make up colours and shades available when she was a student...

“The best fashion show is on the street - always has been, always will be” Bill Cunningham

The first Sartorialists were snapping straight ups on the streets a lot earlier than we might at first imagine. Pioneer Bill Cunningham was capturing fashion in New York long before documentary was even considered a style of photography. At the beginning of the 1980s, early issues of ID featured page after page of inspiration taken from the street entitled ´Straight Up´. In the third issue, a collective of six photographers...

Getting into the Olympic spirit

  A very special front cover of Vogue. The clean and graphic pink background makes it appealing from the outset - but the date of the issue makes it even more impressive. Anton Bruehl photographs a model wearing a black matelassé Simpson bathing suit in June 1937. The image provides the perfect insight into how outdoor leisure activities had suddenly become popular amongst the elite at that time.  Vogue introduces the...

Paolo and his ID covers

Paolo Roversi is on our mind with the opening of his exhibition at The Wapping Project - Bankside. His photography has made the front covers of Harper´s Bazaar, Vogue and the likes, but we especially like his ID cover of Lisa Ratliffe from June 1999. A fine example of his delicate aesthetic. Inside the same issue, the editorial ´The Last Soldier´; quite apt following the end of the Gulf War...

Nova article features We'll Take Manhattan editor

Flipping through some Nova magazines from the archive, we came across an article based on various fashion editors published in1966. And there she was, the real Claire Rendlesham who was played by actress Helen McCrory in We’ll Take Manhattan. The film, directed by John McKay, and broadcast on BBC4 last week presented Rendlesham just how we might imagine a fashion editor: with that stereotypical ‘Prima-donna-esque’ personality. The Nova article by...

Supplying The Design Museums new exhibition

 We are supplying magazines for the brilliant new exhibition at the Design Museum 'Drawing Fashion'. Its curated by the lovely Colin McDowell and runs until March 2011 but we'd encourage you to go now as you will want to visit twice. The show features vintage fashion illustrations going right back the the beginning of the last century. We have supplied some beautiful Vogues from the archive showing how the illustrations actually appeared at...