BELLAS ARTES

In pursuit of both knowledge and delight, the craft of botanical illustration has always required not only meticulous draftsmanship but also a rigorous scientific understanding. This new edition of a TASCHEN classic celebrates the botanical tradition and talents with a selection of outstanding works from the National Library of Vienna, including many new images.

Celebrated photographer and author Ricardo Labougle takes us on an odyssey through the most superbly decorated homes in Paris. Labougle’s striking photography highlights the rich variety of Paris interiors—from classical and rococo styling to more modern interpretations of decor. However inspiration strikes, a Paris interior will rise magnificently to the occasion, as demonstrated by internationally-acclaimed Jacques Grange’s contemporary apartment situated in a Regency palace, the innovative rustic modernism of Studio KO, Vincent Darré’s breathtaking painted wall designs, which combine XVIII-century and 1920s styles, and Jacopo Etro’s architecturally exquisite space, enhanced by mid-century décor and filled with objets d’art.

An exuberant celebration of the color green—in nature, art, interiors, and design. Green is like water: it is everywhere, and we can’t live without it. Green is the color of nature and the environment. Green is life. Interior designer and style guru Carlos Mota has such a passion for green that he has now devoted an entire book to it. G: Forever Green celebrates the color in all its manifold manifestations: in nature, food, fashion, jewelry, art, interiors, and architecture. From the brilliant markings on a butterfly’s wings to the feathers of a tropical bird’s breast, from Magritte’s oversized apple to the brocade drapery in the background of a Holbein portrait, from a leafy arbor to a leafy wallpaper, from celadon to forest to emerald to acid to lime to Kelly, the variety is astounding. Illustrated with Mota’s own photographs, taken as he has traveled the world, as well as images by prominent photographers, G: Forever Green features rooms by notable designers, among them Kelly Wearstler, Alessandra Branca, Mark D. Sikes, Robert Couturier, Gert Voorjans, and Nicky Haslam. This stunning volume, superbly produced with a green metallic edge stain, is a testament to the power of green to soothe, inspire, and excite.

En vida, la fama de Johannes Vermeer (1632-1675) apenas sobrepasó las fronteras de su ciudad natal, Delft, y el reducido círculo de sus mecenas. Despues de su muerte, su nombre cayó largo tiempo en el olvido y fuera de Holanda sus pinturas llegaron a atribuirse erróneamente a otros artistas. No fue hasta mediados del siglo XIX cuando Vermeer llamó la atención del mundo del arte internacional que, de pronto, supo admirar su precisión narrativa, la meticulosidad de los detalles de sus texturas y los majestuosos planos lumínicos. Habían descubierto a un genio.

Designing private residences has its own very special challenges and nuances for the architect. The scale may be more modest than public projects, the technical fittings less complex than an industrial site, but the preferences, requirements, and vision of particular personalities becomes priority. The delicate task is to translate all the emotive associations and practical requirements of “home” into a workable, constructed reality. This publication rounds up 100 of the world’s most interesting and pioneering homes designed in the past two decades, featuring a host of talents both new and established, including John Pawson,Shigeru Ban, Tadao Ando, Zaha Hadid, Herzog & de Meuron, Daniel Libeskind, Alvaro Siza, and Peter Zumthor. Accommodating daily routines of eating, sleeping, and shelter, as well as offering the space for personal experience and relationships, this is architecture at its most elementary and its most intimate.