Customer Reviews

David Hicks: A Life of Design

5 star:		(4)
4 star:		(0)
3 star:		(2)
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This book is more about Hick's life than about his work or style. I am glad I bought it, but expected more: better glossier pictures, bigger pictures instead of so many small ones....I guess it's a book a son would write about the father he admires, but as a reader, I am not interested in his marriage, his private life, etc. For that I could buy a biography. I expected more about his work, better pictures, less about his life.

many thanks to his wonderful son for writing this book. so much information. just about the best book in a long time

This a beautiful book on several levels. Ashley Hicks has provided an unsentimental and insightful overview of his father's career and masterfully edited a lifetime of designing and jetsetting into one gloriously rich weighty tome.
The book is layered with personal fragments of Hick's life...family phtographs, cherished heirlooms and notes from his sketchbooks. It really is an intensely readable combination of biography/design history.
Predictably, there are several previously published examples of his work (notably, from "Living with Design"), but this in no way diminishes the relevance of what is on offer here. For anyone interested in this great designer, this book is a must.

I found this book interesting, however, one would need to know a little about
this famous english decorator before purchasing.
I would have liked more photographs of his work but apart from that I did enjoyed reading about this man.

David Hicks (1929 - 1998) may be one of the most celebrated British designers of the last century. Indeed at the time of his death the press described his 'relentlessly organized, color-clashing home interiors as the acme of jet-set chic in the 1960's, known for his love of graphic color combinations as well as for a temperament that veered between disarming charm and apoplectic rage. Mr. Hicks was the most famous decorator of his day. Late in life he became celebrated for designing geometrically precise gardens.' All of this is documented in this rather hefty book written by his son Ashley Hicks and the history of Hicks' life and career are supplemented with countless full color photographs of his best rooms and homes and gardens.

What is immediately appealing about the design of David Hicks is his intensely creative placement of objets d'art in perfect alignment with the chosen colors of his walls and the configuration of his rooms. There is a wild assortment of bits of stone statues, geometric forms of all types, works of art in the form of paintings or drawings, and substantial reliquaries for the placement of either bits of found work or branches or flowers. He juxtaposed colors form all the wrong portions of the color wheel to an effect that is at first jarring and then with repeated viewing perfectly balanced with the space he designed. His eye discovered art in a new way and he elected to share art by focusing his interiors (and exterior gardens) with contrasting elements that made each work seem even more important. David Hicks managed to walk that tightrope between art and design and did so with aplomb. Another fascinating book from Rizzoli. Grady Harp, April 10

This is a BIG beautifully illustrated book, with lots of text making a good read. The story is amazing. Although I was very familiar with the main points of David Hicks life (interested in both design and the Mountbattens) it was like reading a good analytical biography. The hubris, humiliation, triumph and trial are all here- and unvarnished, give or take some romantic escapades.
It also has LOTS of pictures and descriptions of interiors, gardens, designs. When compared to the recent Mark Hampton book, which is very good, this one had just as many pictures, and just as much analysis of design, but with a much fuller story.
There are some small illustrations right through, but in every one of the eight sections there are several glossy mag full pages of illustration.
I was going to give it four stars, because the type font makes the text a bit difficult to read, and the captions even more so. When I was griping about this, my non-design spouse pointed out that the choice might have been between size of picture and the size and quantity of text. So five stars.
(Slight warning: if you have several of Hicks design books, you'll find some replication of photographs.)