With its streamlined shapes and forward-looking approach, the Art Deco style still looks modern today. In the 1920s and 30s, designers and craftsmen made innovative use of both natural and man-made materials to produce elegant pieces that broke with tradition and celebrated the future. In this magnificent heavyweight compendium, antiques expert Judith Miller explores the key makers and pieces of the movement, explaining what to look for as a collector. The key areas of collecting she covers are furniture, glass, ceramics, sculpture, metalwork, silver and plastics, prints and posters, rugs and textiles, all with their clean lines, bright colours and bold motifs. Art Deco cocktail paraphernalia, streamlined radios and travel posters advertising exotic destinations catered for new leisure pursuits and designers such as Emile-Jacques Ruhlmann and René Lalique produced beautiful furniture and glassware for the luxury market. See bronze and ivory, a graphic gallery, animal sculptures, often in bronze depicting sleek panthers on wedge-shaped marble bases or and Erté cold-painted bronze of a woman in theatrical costume, French gilded bronze and enamel clocks, a rare table clock by Cartier in rose quartz and shaped like an egg, wrought-iron items with strong vertical lines and bowls and candlesticks and cocktail stands which are utilitarian and extraordinarily beautiful in their aesthetic design. One of the most renowned silversmiths was Denmark's Georg Jensen (1866-1935) whose silverware in geometric and aesthetically elegant curves and designs remain beautiful to this day. There is an enamelled glass gallery, Italian colourful glass and collectable figures whether in the Egyptian or the Wiener Werkstätte mould. 241pp, 25 x 28cm, hundreds of colour photos.
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