Description
Book SynopsisVienna may not be synonymous with fashion like its metropolitan counterparts Paris and Milan, but it is a fashionable city, one that historically has been structured by changing fashions and fashionable appearances. Like the Litfaßsäule in Orson Welles’s 1949 urban noir masterpiece The Third Man, into which Harry Lime escapes in order to avoid capture and which hapless visitors today presume are merely surfaces for advertising, there are many overlooked aspects of Vienna’s distinct style and attitude. By focusing on fashion, Wiener Chic narrates Vienna’s history through an interpretation of the material dimensions of Viennese cultural life – from architecture to arts festivals to the urban fabric of street chic. The first book that connects Vienna and fashion with urban theory, Wiener Chic draws on material that is virtually unknown in an English-language context to give readers an insider’s vantage point on an under-appreciated European fashion capital.
Trade Review'A masterpiece which isn’t afraid to own up to its scholarly rigor. Equally satisfying to the coffee table book skimmer as it will be to the serious student of fashion and history'
-- Amie Zimmer, Parson’s School of Design magazine
'I really did enjoy this book! It was a truly engaging and well-written look at various aesthetic aspects of Viennese life, and laid a foundation for a very interesting future discussion on fashion and the spaces it inhabits, fills, or is lacking.'
-- Worn Through, Arianna Funk
Table of ContentsIntroduction: Vienna’s Culture of Appearance
Part I: Chic Formations: The Cinematically Historical Underpinnings of Vienna’s Urban Imaginary
Chapter 1: Baroque Chic: Fashioning Courtly Spaces
Chapter 2: Ringstrasse Chic: Vienna Moderns
Chapter 3: Prolo Chic
Chapter 4: Ausländer Chic
Part II: Staging Fashion in Vienna
Chapter 5: Museum Chic
Chapter 6: Designer Chic
Conclusion: Vienna Now, Not Never
