1950s Fashion Print – Marnie Fogg

Description:
An essential sourcebook of prints from a key fashion decade.
The 1950s was the decade when an analytical approach to design, with a lightness and freshness, combined with whimsical imagery and idiosyncratic subject matter. Showcasing hundreds of print designs, this book celebrates the heyday of postwar fashion design.

From Lucienne Day and Robert Stewart to Maija Isola of Marimekko, the designs and influences of the print icons of the time are all covered. In addition to finished prints, the book contains exclusive illustrations and original artworks.
The major themes of the period are explored, including: narrative and novelty; abstraction, exploring the distorted and attenuated forms used in print; artistic licence and the influence of contemporary art on fashion print; and finally kinetic prints that capture the influence of the era’s ‘mobiles, doodles and spasms’. Each short chapter introduction is followed by a range of illustrations with captions to give provenance and relevance, making this a unique sourcebook for contemporary designers and students.

Review
This is a glorious book! Rich in illustration, photographs and images, from the stunning cover to the end of the book, every page sings with examples of patterns, colours and advertisements which encapsulate the 1950’s so perfectly.

There are key chapters on the following:

Abstraction
Narrative, Novelty & The Jive
Artistic Licence
Kinetic
Domestic

Each chapter has an introduction, and is followed by detailed examples of the designs created in the period and the provenance of each example.
As a reference guide to the period, with a beautiful collection of illustrations, some of which have never been published before,  this is a delightful book to transport you back to the post-war generation.  Highly Recommended

1950s Fashion Prints by Marnie Fogg is published by Batsford.
 
While you are there, take time to explore some of the other beautiful books published by Batsford, now an independent publishing house, they have created many other delightful and innovative books.