Writers Read: Caroline Tiger

Tuesday, January 29, 2008

Caroline Tiger

Caroline Tiger is a Philadelphia-based freelance magazine writer and author of a few books, including a new and improved edition of The Long-Distance Relationship Guide: Advice for the Geographically Challenged and How To Behave: Dating and Sex.

She also writes the Philadelphia design blog , design-phan.

Earlier this month I asked Tiger what she was reading. Her reply:

I'm having a Francophile moment right now having recently read Antonia Fraser's biography of Marie Antoinette followed by Caroline Weber's Queen of Fashion: What Marie Antoinette Wore to the Revolution. I didn't think I needed to read Weber's book after finishing Fraser's very thorough tome, but then I saw Weber speak at a local Alliance Francaise event, and the first thing I did when I got home was order her book. It was very much worth it -- she goes into fascinating detail about how the queen's clothing choices influenced her fate. The book reads like a novel written by a fashion junkie.

Now I'm reading The Essence of Style: How the French Invented High Fashion, Fine Food, Chic Cafes, Style, Sophistication and Glamour by U. of Penn prof, Joan DeJean. I'm actually working on an article about the Paris flea markets, and this topic led me to DeJean's book. The professor traces the genesis of the very current appetite for luxury products to a single moment in French history under Louis XIV.

Tiger's mini-autobiography from design-phan:

I'm a Philadelphia-based freelance magazine writer and author who's written for lots of different magazines, including Philadelphia, Philadelphia Home & Garden, Boston Home & Garden, Town & Country, Real Simple, Fortune Small Business, Marie Claire, Budget Living (R.I.P.), and New Jersey Life. I've always been a generalist with a strong interest in architecture and design. In my scouting, research and reporting of design-related stories, I often come across objects, ideas, news, links, people and places that don't necessarily fit into assigned magazine articles but which I'd still like to write about and record. There's so much going on right now in design in Philadelphia, it's hard not to spread the news.