Ref: article by Salomé Mathieu, Milk Decoration, June 2022
Éditions Norma has devoted a beautiful volume to Slavik, the leading designer notably known for having conceived the Publicis drugstores.
With his modernist creations blending Art Deco and Art Nouveau, he helped forge the Parisian soul of the second half of the 20th century. He is Wiatscheslav Vassiliev, better known by the pseudonym Slavik. Eight years after the death of the iconic designer, Éditions Norma presents Slavik: The Drugstore Years, a beautiful book retracing the path of the aesthetic creator. Here, archival photos and anecdotes interweave to reveal the scope of this renowned decorator’s talent.
A student at Arts-Déco, Slavik was first recognized for his paintings with surrealist accents before signing several theater sets. He established himself by revolutionizing the windows of Galeries Lafayette, which he staged in a thoroughly modern and innovative way, creating a true narrative discourse within them. In 1954, heading the industrial aesthetics department at Publicis, he conceived the atmospheres of the Parisian drugstores, most particularly the one on the Champs-Élysées that would bring him glory. There, in the lineage of the Bauhaus, Slavik imagined objects and furniture whose form served function. From then on, he set the tone in matters of design and decoration in the French capital, right up to the beginning of the 2000s. We owe him the décor of numerous mythical Parisian restaurants, such as Le Dôme, the Lutetia brasserie, and the Jules Verne in the Eiffel Tower. A vast and multifaceted career honored in this exhaustive volume.
