On the cliffs of the French Riviera, le Palais Bulles (the Bubble Palace) is a futuristic yet timeless living sculpture.Innovative French couturier Pierre Cardin acquired this conceptual home as a showplace for his collections. This book explores the incredible architectural achievement and celebrates the adventurous decorative spirit that the legendary fashion designer has brought to life within its walls.

The retro-futuristic epoch is one of the most visually spectacular in architecture's history. The utopian buildings of the 1960s and 1970s never go out of style. This book compiles radical ideas and visionary structures. The notion of utopia proves as diverse as it does universal. From exuberant master plans to singular architectural expressions, the rise of the utopian architectural movement in the 1960s and 1970s represents a critical shift in ideology away from mid-century traditionalism. This period shakes off the conformity and conventions of the 1950s in favor of a more experimental post-war agenda. Marked by groundbreaking reinterpretations of both the single family house as well as more large scale developments, the embrace of utopian and generally progressive thinking mirrored the cultural revolution of the times. These daring, charming, futuristic, and hopeful designs were not isolated to a particular part of the world. Visionary voices longing for a fresh approach to architecture began appearing across France, Japan, the United States, and beyond. The Tale of Tomorrow documents this prolific era in architecture--a time when anything felt possible as architects began to think further and further outside the box. The Tale of Tomorrow focuses exclusively on built manifestations of utopian ideas. Rather than mixing together abstract theorists with practitioners, this book focuses on the tangible embodiments of such forward thinking. Highlighting well-known projects as well as the more obscure and offbeat, the collection of utopian approaches compiled here maintain their visual power and infectious optimism nearly half a century later. These experimental structures, both large and small, appear in everyday places in stark contrast to their far-from-utopian contexts. In addition to featuring a range of whimsical architectural gestures, The Tale of Tomorrow also explores more brutalist styles of utopian thinking. This bold and iconic class of projects not only inspires a sense of awe and reverence towards one's surroundings but also demonstrates the broad spectrum of deeply personal solutions at play as each architect began to craft their ideal world. Whether an organically shaped residence or a towering sculptural complex, the projects in this book stand as poignant suggestions of what might have been and, perhaps what could still be.

Radical. Visionary. Poetic. Inside Utopia shows the future of living that architects and designers have envisioned. Spectacular and reflective, unpretentious and efficient: the breathtaking Elrod House by John Lautner; the Lagerfeld Apartment near Cannes that seems like a set from a science fiction film; Palais Bulles in France with its organic and unique architecture. These interiors welcome habitation and spark curiosity while embodying the foundations of minimalism and bygone visions of the future. Inside Utopia delves into the rhyme and reason behind past designs that we still interact with today. The architects, the owners, and the craftsmen like Gio Ponti or Bruce Goff who work behind the scenes created amorphous interiors that invite the mind to wander. At the time they were futuristic, confident, utopian, idealistic-- we may not realize it, but they have shaped our current living concepts, and even now, they inspire us anew. Previously it has been difficult to attain access to these preserved interiors, but Inside Utopia unearths what was before unseen.

Filled with fascinating images from the 1950s to today, this comprehensive anthology is the first to showcase the complete vision of Pierre Cardin from fashion to interior design, at a time when his creations are experiencing a resurgence. More than simply an album of compelling images, this impressive volume encapsulates Cardin’s entire oeuvre and portrays his daily life as a still-constant quest for new creative expression. -- Publisher's website.

"The Iconic House features one hundred of the most important and influential architect-designed houses in the world."--Inside cover.

A winner of the European Publishers Award for Photography, Ambroise wanders through Beijing find a city caught between two worlds - an ancient past and a frenzied present.

Venice and its environment are perceived to be in peril due to rising sea levels, tourism, and modern development. Are these threats myths or reality? This book explores Venice's environmental risks based on interviews with Venetian environmental campaigners and draws on the mythology of the Venetian Republic. Campaigners' opinions about the mobile dams nearing completion to protect the city reveal that Venice now represents an environmentally-threatened retreat from modernity. This reputation has been established as sustainable development and climate change policies have risen to the top of political agendas in many cities and countries. The book investigates how environmentalism has been transformed from a theory underpinning counter-cultural movements to part of a dominant holistic culture in Western societies. Rather than constraining Venice in search of a mythical harmony with nature, this book offers a ten-point proposal to modernize the city while preserving its ancient heritage.

A timely and important search for architecture's missing women For a century and a half, women have been proving their passion and talent for building and, in recent decades, their enrollment in architecture schools has soared. Yet the number of women working as architects remains stubbornly low, and the higher one looks in the profession, the scarcer women become. Law and medicine, two equally demanding and traditionally male professions, have been much more successful in retaining and integrating women. So why do women still struggle to keep a toehold in architecture? Where Are the Women Architects? tells the story of women's stagnating numbers in a profession that remains a male citadel, and explores how a new generation of activists is fighting back, grabbing headlines, and building coalitions that promise to bring about change. Despina Stratigakos's provocative examination of the past, current, and potential future roles of women in the profession begins with the backstory, revealing how the field has dodged the question of women's absence since the nineteenth century. It then turns to the status of women in architecture today, and the serious, entrenched hurdles they face. But the story isn't without hope, and the book documents the rise of new advocates who are challenging the profession's boys' club, from its male-dominated elite prizes to the erasure of women architects from Wikipedia. These advocates include Stratigakos herself and here she also tells the story of her involvement in the controversial creation of Architect Barbie. Accessible, frank, and lively, Where Are the Women Architects? will be a revelation for readers far beyond the world of architecture.

Home is where the glam is. A sexy interior design book with glamorous, cinematic houses from the seventies, eighties, nineties and nillies. Houses with an erotic tension that make you fantasise. Houses that could just as well be a movie set. Houses that make you dream of a wild party rather than a cosy family breakfast. Houses where the shade of Hamilton still wanders around. All of them characteristic and iconic, and top of their architectural class, selected by Thijs Demeulemeester. AUTHOR: Thijs Demeulemeester is a Belgian lifestyle journalist, specialising in interiors, contemporary art and architecture. Athos Burez creates storytelling images with a mix of portraits, still lives and landscapes. He works with staged settings and suggests with huge imagination. Burez balances on the thin line between kitsch and classic. A combination of blurred photography and sharp images results in a perfect composition. Louise Mertens runs her own design studio in Antwerp. She focuses on visual concepts, creative & art direction, brand communication, artwork and design. Her attention to detail and the use of different materials and her interest in the mysterious are some of her trademarks. SELLING POINTS: * Delve into a sensual world of villainous style with these intriguing, sleek houses * This book, designed by Louise Mertens who is the sensation of the moment because of her work with theKardashians, offers a unique look inside glamorous and never before photographed houses. In cooperation with style photographer Athos Burez 260 colour illustrations

Founded in 2009, Paris-based PARC Architectes has risen to prominence, winning awards and accolades in its native France and beyond. Just as important as its design work is PARC Architectes's research on contemporary architecture and urbanism, laid out in the essay Le Parc Planetaire (The Planetary Park), published in the firm's own journal, PRAGMA, and on its blog, CRAPZINE. This first book to focus on PARC Architectes, Architecture as Environment features fifteen foundational designs by the firm, chosen to reflect the firm's credo that the environment has to become a matter of architecture. At the interface of art and science, PARC Architectes's designs are installations rather than mere structures, enabling adequate responses to contextual and conceptual issues in the construction of contemporary human environments. In addition to brief essays, the book also includes one hundred illustrations, including many in full color.