Flair Annual 1953

[Fleur Cowles]

Fleur Cowles' inventive and influential Flair magazine was sadly short-lived. Only twelve issues were released and this Annual was published by Cowles a year after its closure. The Annual's aim was to continue the artistic creativity of the magazine but to create something more permanent, 'bound between enduring boards'. The volume is divided into sections, listed as 'Flair for… Communication, Sentiment, Travel, Americana, Art and Winter'. Subjects include 'Insulting Valentines', 'The Artist's Wife', 'The Decline of the English Coutnry House', 'Walker Evans at Santa Monica', 'They Said it with Fireworks', 'A Degas Sketchbook' and 'Rudolf Bing and the Met'. The book was designed by Federico Pallavicini. Cowles writes in her editor's note that 'It will be a source of tremendous pride to me to see the FLAIR Annual so well received and welcomed that I may make it a yearly publishing effort.' Sadly this was not to be, making this Annual and the twelve magazine issues the sole Flair output.



Fleur Cowles. Cowles Magazines. [New York]. 1952. Sole impression. Hardback, quarto; red cloth-bound boards with gilt and white decoration and titles, with rectangle cut-out to front board. 230 pages. Illustrated throughout and with numerous cut-outs, fold-outs and occassional inserts. English. 340 x 250mm. 1.6kg. . Very good; light shelf wear and rubbing to boards; small abrasion to first leaf seen through cut-out, slight browning to page edges, contents clean and fresh.