Leïla Menchari, the Queen of Enchantment is a new biography and homage to the Tunisian-born designer (1927 – 2020) and star decorator for Hermès International. Michèle Glazier's extensively illustrated, sumptuous publication focuses on 137 Hermès storefronts created by Menchari between 1978 and 2013.
For more than 30 years Leïla Menchari was responsible for designing the traffic-stopping window displays at Hermès’ prestigious flagship store at 24 rue du Faubourg-Saint-Honoré in Paris. Menchari’s aesthetic vision and her sense of colour and texture created magnificent installations that brought the best out of silk and leather. A Tunisian who considered herself a citizen of the world, Menchari was inspired by her journeys in the Middle Ear and Asia, her encounters with extraordinary figures of the art world and her Beaux-Arts training. For Hermès she created Egyptian archaeological sites with sand and crumbling statues and iconic scenes of Paris with monuments crafted out of organza, among many other fantasies.
With a preface by Hermès CEO Axel Dumas.
Actes Sud, 408pp, 15cm x 23cm, illustrated hardcover, 2023
