English
Tempest in a D-Cup
Memo from Vegas. By Dian Hanson
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I know you all believe we live the glamorous life here at Taschen. Our Los Angeles office is a nationally-listed architectural landmark and dead cool to boot, as in Das Boot, being it's in the shape of a boat, but most days here it's just long hours in front of a computer with occasional breaks to critique sexy pictures, chat on the phone with Vanessa del Rio, and research the history of pubic hair. Okay, so maybe it's not the salt mine, but days like last Friday are still reasonably rare, when customer service rep Valerie Davis and I drove to Las Vegas to interview striptease legend Tempest Storm. The interview will appear in The Big Book of Breasts, due out in 2006, along with ten others including Candy Barr, Annie Sprinkle, Uschi Digard, Kitten Natividad and Christie Canyon. Yes, I know it's hard to wait, but we just couldn't move on to design without Tempest, The Fabulous 4D Girl.
Valerie was a natural companion for this 275-mile road trip, since when not helping Taschen customers she's photographing classic and contemporary burlesque queens. Plus, she was willing to drive. Living in New York for twenty-five years I didn't have much reason to drive and didn't learn until I was 39 years old. Yes, just last year... After two years in Los Angeles I still haven't made friends with the California freeway system.
It was a great day for the five-hour trip. In LA we were suffering June Gloom, a phenomenon of moist ocean air that blankets the city in fog for most of the month. As we passed from California's so-called Inland Empire, the basin between the coastal mountains and the San Bernardino range, into the high desert around Victorville we burst out of the gloom into dazzling sunlight. There's no air as clear as desert air, its low humidity allowing hundred-mile visibility. Many hate or even fear California's desert wasteland, but as one who grew up in the year-round gloom of Seattle, Washington the desert is my idea of paradise, as intriguingly alien as Mars. Spirits lifted, we pressed on through the desert towns of Barstow (think Fear and Loathing), Baker (home of the World's Biggest Thermometer) and Jean (the poor man's Las Vegas), arriving in Sin City by early afternoon.
I originally met Tempest in 1995 when I was editor of Leg Show magazine. She was a sort of an idol of mine, dating from when my father showed me her photo in what was probably Playboy back when I was eleven (see last column for more on my dad and his men's magazines).
Page [1] [2] [3]
Page [1] [2] [3]
I know you all believe we live the glamorous life here at Taschen. Our Los Angeles office is a nationally-listed architectural landmark and dead cool to boot, as in Das Boot, being it's in the shape of a boat, but most days here it's just long hours in front of a computer with occasional breaks to critique sexy pictures, chat on the phone with Vanessa del Rio, and research the history of pubic hair. Okay, so maybe it's not the salt mine, but days like last Friday are still reasonably rare, when customer service rep Valerie Davis and I drove to Las Vegas to interview striptease legend Tempest Storm. The interview will appear in The Big Book of Breasts, due out in 2006, along with ten others including Candy Barr, Annie Sprinkle, Uschi Digard, Kitten Natividad and Christie Canyon. Yes, I know it's hard to wait, but we just couldn't move on to design without Tempest, The Fabulous 4D Girl.
Valerie was a natural companion for this 275-mile road trip, since when not helping Taschen customers she's photographing classic and contemporary burlesque queens. Plus, she was willing to drive. Living in New York for twenty-five years I didn't have much reason to drive and didn't learn until I was 39 years old. Yes, just last year... After two years in Los Angeles I still haven't made friends with the California freeway system.
It was a great day for the five-hour trip. In LA we were suffering June Gloom, a phenomenon of moist ocean air that blankets the city in fog for most of the month. As we passed from California's so-called Inland Empire, the basin between the coastal mountains and the San Bernardino range, into the high desert around Victorville we burst out of the gloom into dazzling sunlight. There's no air as clear as desert air, its low humidity allowing hundred-mile visibility. Many hate or even fear California's desert wasteland, but as one who grew up in the year-round gloom of Seattle, Washington the desert is my idea of paradise, as intriguingly alien as Mars. Spirits lifted, we pressed on through the desert towns of Barstow (think Fear and Loathing), Baker (home of the World's Biggest Thermometer) and Jean (the poor man's Las Vegas), arriving in Sin City by early afternoon.
I originally met Tempest in 1995 when I was editor of Leg Show magazine. She was a sort of an idol of mine, dating from when my father showed me her photo in what was probably Playboy back when I was eleven (see last column for more on my dad and his men's magazines).
Page [1] [2] [3]
Tempest Storm in white fox