Posts Tagged ‘Autho’
Frederic Fekkai is a famous French hairdresser who is widely recognized as one of the best hairstylists in the world. He charges $750 for a haircut. He is based in New York, where he has owned a salon on Fifth Avenue since 1989. Fekkai also owns a salon in Los Angeles where he has created celebrity hairstyles for leading Hollywood actresses.
“The only real elegance is in the mind,” Vogue editor Diana Vreeland famously said. “If you’ve got that, the rest really comes from it.” Fekkai thinks like Vreeland. “Natural. Effortless. Chic. These words are music to my ears,” he writes. “They evoke the very essence of a style that’s both simple and elegant.” The former art student has an artistic and elegant mind, and so he is able to think elegantly about all aspects of beauty from hairstyles and makeup to clothes and shoes.
A Year of Style, his literary debut, is divided into 12 sections; there is one chapter for each month. Fekkai himself describes his book as “a month-by-month guide to simplicity.” For every day of the year there are beauty tips; lifestyle suggestions; or inspirational quotes. These appear in a left-hand column on most pages and supplement the main text. The chapter content usually corresponds with the month. For instance, June has a section on summer hair, and October has a guide on formal evening attire.
The hairdresser’s book has an emphasis on hair, but it is also about makeup, skin care, nails, clothes, jewelry, shoes, and entertaining. While there is no dispute about Fekkai’s qualifications to write about hair, since he is one of the top hairdressers in the world, he is not nearly as qualified to address other related matters such as makeup and clothes. There are experts in the beauty and fashion industry who are both hairstylists and makeup artists, but Fekkai is not well known for both talents. As readers we don’t know how much he leaned on other experts for his content. The book doesn’t list any co-authors; it only identifies the photographer who provided many beautiful editorial pictures throughout his book.
Fekkai covers many subjects but he often skims and moves too quickly onto something new when he could have dug deeper on the same topic. The main theme of his book is that simplicity is the key to style, Read the rest of this entry »