Noel Coward

The Classicist: Paradise Lost - 40 Years of Cafe Society

Filed under: Art, Books, The Classicist, Wealth

In the 1920s, '30s, '40s and '50s the so-called Café Society in Europe drew together aristocrats, millionaires, artists, authors, couturiers, choreographers and musicians in a "glittering world of fashion and frivolity, opulence and ostentation", notes Thierry Coudert in his ultra-stylish new book, Café Society: Socialites, Patrons and Artists 1920 to 1960 from Flammarion. Those decades were the "apotheosis of an era that was to have a profound influence on the history of taste" Coudert writes, with the likes of the Duke and Duchess of Windsor, Lady Diana Cooper, Diana Vreeland, Cole Porter, Noel Coward and Cecil Beaton setting the tone and deciding which artists, designers, and musicians were in vogue. The cover of the book (above) depicts heiress Barbara Hutton, then the Countess von Reventlow, at a tennis match in 1940, while Yves Saint Laurent, Orson Welles, Salvador Dali, Jean Cocteau and many more make cameos in the impressive volume.

Gallery: Cafe Society