Paperblanks Urban Glam Hardback Guest Book – Plain, 144 Pages

Gather wishes, memories and signatures from weddings, celebrations and special occasions in this Urban Glam hardback guest book from Paperblanks, with 144 plain pages.

Taking their slightly sullen cues from previous artistic movements, the New Romantics of the 1980s brought their hairstyles and attitudes to new prominence. Our Urban Glam guest book celebrates the drama that made the New Romantic movement some of the most ironic good times popular culture has ever had.

The Story Behind the Design

Every genre of modern music that has succeeded in putting a stamp on its time has also made its mark with a distinct visual style. In the United Kingdom during the late 1970s and early 1980s, the impression-making group on the scene was the New Romantics. Members of the movement celebrated unbridled creativity and excessive individuality, contrasting the monotonous, dull look of their urban surroundings. Fashionable club nights became a testing ground where people went to flaunt their provocative new ideas.

The New Romantics were in large part inspired by classic English Romanticism, evolving some of the era’s more indulgent hallmarks to suit the modern music hall and nightclub scenes. Looking to our own history, we decided to do likewise and revamp our own Romantic Sensibility design, which was originally inspired by an 1843 leather binding featuring poetry by the Romantic poet Henry Kirke White. We have replaced the tender colours and traditional look of that earlier series with edgier hues and metallic finishes, echoing the New Romantics’ modernisation of past eras.

The New Romantic movement, whose influence could be seen throughout fashion, design and music, traces its origins to the 1970s nightclub scene of London and Birmingham in the United Kingdom. The popular punk rock of the time had an “against-everything” attitude, but after years of economic recession and a pervasive sense of defeat and hopelessness, that desire for confrontation was replaced with a need to instead escape the drab reality. Organisers of Roxy Music, Duran Duran and David Bowie club nights tapped into this yearning and the New Romantics scene grew from there.

Dressing up in striking outfits and using makeup to muddle gender distinctions, nightclub revellers embraced the flamboyant, the glamorous and the outrageous. Futurism, fetish and fantasy were combined with frilly period fashions of English Romantics, Puritans and French “Incroyables.” These ostentatious displays of sartorial glamour drew the attention of the media, who rushed to come up with names for the image-conscious crowd. “New Romantics” was the moniker that ultimately took hold. And so, it made sense as our series title, as it connected to both our reimagining of our “old” Romantic Sensibilities series and the bold new direction the actual New Romantic movement took. In the way that nature spurred on classical romantic ideas, this indirect descendant of Romanticism was influenced by the human-built environment of cities. The title and colour of the Urban Glam cover are a nod to its older cousin, the Pastoral Impulses design, which is a part of the original Romantic Sensibility series. With this cover we hail the New Romantics, taste-makers of the Eighties.

• Original artwork: “The Poetical Remains of Henry Kirke White of Nottingham” volume cover
• Era: 1843
• Region: England

Product Details

• Size: Guest Book – 225 × 180 × 15 mm
• Interior: Plain
• Pages: 144 (72 sheets)
• Paper: 120 gsm acid-free cream laid paper
• Cover: Hardback
• Binding: Smyth sewn – lies flat and stays durable
• Corners: Rounded
• Design: Urban Glam
• Series: The New Romantics
• Satin ribbon marker
• 100% recycled binder boards
• Decorative printed cover paper
• Threaded stitching and glue, as needed
• Cloth headbands
• Acid-free paper
• Weight: 523 g
• Product code: PB4628-8 | ISBN: 9781439746288

About Paperblanks

Paperblanks works with museums, libraries, galleries and artists around the world to faithfully reproduce remarkable artwork, historic bindings and treasured manuscripts. Every book is made to last, with binder boards crafted from 100% recycled materials, and the back endpaper tells the fascinating story behind the cover design and credits its creators.