Mention Art Deco and you evoke the glamour of Hollywood between the wars, of luxury ocean liners and the Orient Express. Taking its name from the Exposition Internationale des Arts Décoratifs et Industriels Modernes held in Paris in 1925, Art Deco was a new style celebrating a new era. As the industrialization of the twentieth century gathered pace, the sensuous flowing lines of Art Nouveau gave way to the jagged rhythms of Art Deco. Rejecting the crafts ethic of the previous generation, the new style confidently celebrated the machine age with empathetic geometrical lines and shapes, vibrant color schemes and the use of modern man-made materials such as plastic. Skyscraper deco, steamline style - its forms revelled in a headlong rush towards the future. Illustrated with over 300 color and black and white photographs, Art Deco provides a splendid visual record of the style of the interwar years. Art, architecture, interior design, film sets, photography, furniture, in detail. Many of Art Deco's greatest practitioners worked in several media, to produce exuberant buildings with seductive Art Deco interiors. Frank Lloyd Wright, Ely Jacques Kahn and Sir Giles Gilbert Scott were just a few of the architects who produced new and bold Art Deco designs. Art Deco shows the influence of the Bauhaus, neoclassicism, Cubism, Futurism and other artistic movements, and its influence on the International Style that supplanted it after World War II is also explained. After nearly half a century of neglect, this sumptuous and subtle style is enjoying a substantial revival of interest. The boook illustrates the dazzling variety of work, from Clarice Cliff's bold ceramics to Paul Manship's elegantly sculpted interpretations of classical mythology, from the brittle brilliance of Erte's designs to the jazz-age glitter of William Van Alen's Chrysler Building, produced in the heyday of Art Deco. -- from dust jacket.