Shop America. Midcentury Storefront Design 1938-1950
Window shopping
In postwar America, everything pointed to a bright, shiny future. Sheer optimism and opulence informed everything from automobile design to architecture, infusing design with larger-than-life planes and curves. Storefront design of the era is particularly indicative of this phenomenon, incarnated here in an extensive collection of hand-illustrated shop window designs from 1938 to 1950. These spectacular, often grandiose plans for grocery stores, shoe shops, beauty salons, bakeries, and more are reminders of a time when stores were sacred shrines for the congregation of American shoppers—impressive and even slightly intimidating, just like the future itself. Collected for this unique book, the designs viewed in retrospect reveal the mindset of a unique period in history. In addition to an extensive selection of drawings are historical black and white photographs of actual shops built in a similar style. Shop America offers a rare look at mid-century commercial America as it pictured itself.
About the editor:
Cultural anthropologist and graphic design historian Jim Heimann is Executive Editor for TASCHEN America in Los Angeles. He is the author of numerous books on architecture, popular culture, and the history of the West Coast, in particular, Los Angeles and the Hollywood dream factory. For over 30 years he has built an unrivaled private collection of ephemera, which has been featured museum exhibitions around the world and in dozens of his books.
About the author:
Steven Heller, a senior art director of the New York Times and co-chair of the School of Visual Arts MFA Design program, is the author of over one hundred books on design, popular culture, and satiric art. In addition to writing for over a dozen TASCHEN titles, his recent books include Design Literacy Second Edition, Stylepedia, and The Education of a Graphic Designer.
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Shop America. Midcentury Storefront Design 1938-1950
Heimann, Jim (ED)
Heller, Steven Hardcover 10.4 x 13.4 in., 246 pages, $ 59.99 |
- Reviews (38 items)
"Un vent d'opulence et d'optimisme a soufflé en Amérique entre 1938 et 1950. A cette époque, les marques s'affichent à tous les coins de rue de façon démesurée. Des projets spectaculaires sortent alors de terre, des magasins de chaussures, des salons de beauté ou des boutiques de prêt-à-porter prolifèrent à volonté, reflets d'une période florissante. Shop America porte un regard sur cette Amérique marchande via une importante collection de dessins de vitrine réalisés à la main et des photographies d'époque, le tout accompagné d'un texte explicatif en anglais."
Chausser Magazine, Paris, France
Chausser Magazine, Paris, France
- Clippings (24 items)
Fashion Forward
Vanity Fair, United States, March 01, 2007
Vanity Fair, United States, March 01, 2007
- Related (1 items)
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- See also (7 items)
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All-American Ads 1900-1919 The dawn of consumerism: when ads were works of art |
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All-American Ads of the 20s Advertising for the Jazz Age |