Nars Celebrates With 15x15

This year marks the 15th anniversary of Nars. To celebrate such a fête, François Nars, the classic makeup company’s founder and creative director, plans to rejoice by commemorating some of the people which made his vision of cosmetic domination possible.

15x15 is his photographical salute to the fashionably abstruse. Nars was both the makeup artist and photographer for the book which features 15 of his nearest and dearest, including but not limited to: Marc Jacobs, Isabella Rossellini, Amber Valletta, Dayle Haddon, Naomi Campbell, Amanda Lepore, Daphne Guinness, Olivier Theyskens, Shalom Harlow and Jennifer Jason Leigh.
The idea is simple: there are two inspirations for each shot: an iconic image, person or emotion and a classic Nars product. The result: the portraits are intended to transform their subjects into new personas. Marc Jacobs, for example, channels a Richard Avedon photograph of the iconic 1960s-model China Machado.
Interestingly, after Nars finished photographing his subjects he gave each of them a Leica camera and had them capture an inspirational shot of their own, which will also be included in the book. 15x15 is available beginning November 13 at 15x15project.com. Ladies, there are only 1,500 of these books available, each of which holds an $80 price tag. Did I mention that all money made will be divided among the pet-charity of each of the subject’s choice?

So other than the fact that this is a coveted collector’s item for a good cause, why else should you want this? In the words of François Nars: “There’s something very different on every page, you don’t get bored.”