New Book Celebrates The Legacy of Cecil Beaton

Famed photographer Cecil Beaton didn't just shoot pictures for Vogue and Vanity Fair, he also mingled with the cream of 20th century society. And he kept notes. Cecil Beaton kept diaries and also amassed dozens of scrapbooks now held by Sotheby's London. A new book from Assouline reveals these scrapbooks to the public. The 400 pages contains 600 images including his own prints and clippings from magazines, newspapers, and playbills, it's an assemblage of a fabulous and well-lived life. The book was assembled by James Danziger, the Director of Photography at the London Sunday Times Magazine, features editor of Vanity Fair, and director of Magnum New York. It goes on sale next week and sells for $250.

In My Fashion by Bettina Ballard

First published in 1960 In My Fashion is the memoir of former Vogue editor Bettina Ballard. After working for the fashion bible in New York, Bettina became a Voguette in Paris during the years between the wars before returning to New York. The glamorous tale includes anecdotes about a cast of characters including Chanel, Schiaparelli, Christian Berard, Babe Paley. Used editions of In My Fashion are available from Amazon.com!

Latitude

The World Will Cost You $5,800. In Atlas Form...

Homesick at The New Yorker

Maeve Brennen was an Irish-born journalist and short story writer who began working as a fashion copywriter for Harper’s Bazaar in New York during the 1940s. She also wrote a Manhattan society column for a Dublin based magazine called Social and Personal and also contributed a few pieces to The New Yorker before being offered a staff position in 1949. The New Yorker began publishing her short stories in the 1950s and she worked there until the 1980s. Brennan was also admired for her beauty and style and was known for wearing all black outfits and liked large, kooky glasses. She is sometimes considered to be the inspiration for the character Holly Golightly from Breakfast at Tiffany’s as she worked alongside Truman Capote at Harper’s Bazaar. Brennan’s best known works are The Long-Winded Lady, pieces she wrote for The New Yorker observing life in the city which were compiled into a book of the same name, a volume of her short stories titled A Spring of Affection, and her novella The Visitor, which was written in the 1940s but not published until 2000. In 2004 Angela Bourke wrote a biography about Brennan called Home Sick at The New Yorker, the cover photo for which I love!! VisitAmazon.com