Paris Style Book Review

Introduction

Paul Mason has proven to be a wonderful supporter of the Hair Boutique. I first met Paul when he emailed be with questions about longer hairstyles for men. Paul has made the commitment to grow his hair long. Paul sent me his photos so I could get a good idea of his hair and we chatted about the best way to deal with bangs that were growing out. I found Paul to have a tremendous amount of knowledge about hair care and he has graciously shared a lot of his ideas with me and the Hair Boutique.

Back in July Paul found a great book in France called Paris Style. He mentioned that he found the book while wandering around Aix on a Saturday. He popped into a discount book store and found this great used book. Unfortunately this book is not available on Amazon.com and they don't seem to be able to order it (I tried). The book was published in 1994 and may be out of print. I have not been able to locate it through any of my other book sources either. The book does not include an ISBN number. Paul did point out that the book contains Depot-legal No. 9405054-09 /1994.

Paul took the time to scan a few of the great photos. Hair Boutique has a specific policy against publishing any copyrighted photos without express permission. Unfortunately we were unable to contact the publisher. Therefore we are cautiously publishing just a few of the photos from Paul. We want to make sure and point out that all credits for the photos attached to Paul's book review are given to Era Communication Paris for the National French Hairdressing Federation, Claude Gueniche and Ego Ellenberg.

Paul has done a great job of sharing this book with us. Thank you Paul for taking the time to make this possible.

Review

'Paris Style (The reference book of hairstyling)' was prepared by Era Communication Paris for the National French Hairdressing Federation and published in 1994 by Claude Gueniche and Ego Ellenberg.

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The book is a tribute to the artistry of French hairdressing - "Paris Style with its 45 designers with very different backgrounds and talents fully represents the expression of.." the Paris School. Firstly here are some stats about the book - this is a beavy hair book - it weighs ~2.5 kg (well it is European) which translates to around 5.5lbs and comprises 464 glossy pages which are 9.5" x 12".

Inside the book there are about 550 good quality pictures showing an enormous spectrum of styles from shaved painted scalps to beautiful long hair, and there are also examples of afro-caribean hairstyles and styles for both men and women. There is a reasonable represenation of most hair lengths and around 100 of the pictures have ladies with shoulder length hair or longer. However, very few of the photographs showed really long, i.e. wasit length hair.

Karen, in her review of '388 Hair Styles' by Margit Rudiger and Renate von Samson, made the comment that the book could be enjoyed by both women and men who have an interest in hair. I think the same would be very true here. From the practical perspective, the ladies I am sure will find some styles that they will be just itching to try - maybe even the guys too.

If I hadn't decided to start growing my hair longer I would have tried one or two of the men's styles. From the aesthetic viewpoint, some of the pictures of the models just blew me away with their sheer beauty and femininity. The quality of the photographs and their artistic nature is a real treat for art book fans and 70 of the photographs are full page spreads.

However, the book is not just about photographs of models with great hair (as if that wasn't enough!). The book is actually sub-divided by the various stylists represented in the book and there is a brief introduction to them as well as showing their pictures and those of their creations.

The text is written in French, English and Japanese - great if you're trying to learn one of these languages as well!!! The stylists includes in the book are listed at the end of this review. Lots of snippets of information can be found, such as that about Patrick Ales who invented the blow dryer and patented it in 1968 - no one was interested until it was bought by L'Oreal 6 years later.

Now he is strongly interested in phtotheratry - the care of hair through plants - and is working in this area of study. The book also pays homage to historical figures such as Antoine, Guillaume, Marie and Rosy Carita and Alexandre de Paris and the final sections describes the relationships between the stars and their hairdressers and the role of the stylist in fashion shows etc.

I was fortunate enough to buy this book in a discount book store, but I think it is a real find! If you are interested in the history of hair fashions or just looking at some great pics and you can get hold of a copy of this book I think you will find it a real treat as well.

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Footnote:

Stylists included in the book are Patrick Ales, Franck Avogardi, Georges Bacon, Guillaume Berard, Christian Capdeveile, Christian Caplot, Jacky Carp, Jean Pierre Cazaux, Celianthe, Cesare, Suzanne Chadwick (USA), Andrew Collinge UK), Aldo Coppola (Italy), Frederic Deniel, Alain Divert, Maurice Franck, Daniel Frenna, Jean Claude Gallon, Michel Gardais, Marianne Gray, Daniel Harlow, Jack Holt, Miyuki Horibe (Japan), Yohei Inoue (Japan), Kyang, Michelle Laplace, Luis Llongueras (Spain), Marcel (Spain), Jean-Luc Minetti, Jacques Moisant, Marlies Moller (Garmany), Klaus Peter Ochs (Germany), Jean-Phillipe Pages, Bruno Pittini, Framck Provost, Jean Saberny, Vidal Sassoon (UK), Alain Scarfanto, Guillaume Senechal, Don Shaw (USA), Valente (Italy), Udo Walz (Germany), Alexandre Zourai, Maurice Gam, Any d'Avray and finally Mario du Lavandou.