This volume examines hotels, inns, restaurants, and travelling on luxurious trains and ships. The volume also explores social rituals, consumer culture, and issues of class and gender as well as the institutions of travelling for health, education, or any other purpose.

This two-volume collection of British primary sources examines institutions such as hotels, inns, arcades, bazaars, co-operatives, shops and department stores in the long nineteenth century, which were often coded as ‘luxurious’. This period was marked not only by an increase of individual consumerism but also by the institutionalisation of opulent, often purpose-built spaces such as the much-admired new grand hotels, supposedly an American invention, and department stores, modelled on the French grands magasins. These environments were tied to leisure (no longer a prerogative of the upper classes) and thus to modernity. In addition to addressing the luxurious side of these institutions, including architectural innovation and interior decoration, we also consider the other side of luxury, examining the experience of staff and period debates over the morality of consumption. This edition seeks to explore a fascinating but hitherto often neglected side of the British nineteenth century by bringing together a collection of annotated primary texts and visual material documenting these ‘temples of luxury’ as they were seen by their contemporaries.

Utilizing a variety of ancient sources, including cuneiform texts, images and archaeological finds, Luxury and Legitimation explores how the collecting of luxury objects contributed to the formation of royal identity in one of the world's oldest civilizations, ancient Mesopotamia (modern Iraq). Allison Thomason makes a significant and timely contribution to the subjects of collecting and material culture studies by bringing a new understanding to the political, cultural and social institutions of an important pre-Classical, non-Western civilization.

The Emerald Handbook of Luxury Management for Hospitality and Tourism brings together global philosophies, principles and practices in luxury tourism management, exploring the changing paradigms of the upcoming post-pandemic global luxury travel market.

Over the past century, luxury has been increasingly celebrated in the sense that it is no longer a privilege (or attitude) of the European elite or America’s leisure class. It has become more ubiquitous and now, practically everyone can experience luxury, even luxury in architecture. Focusing on various contexts within Western Europe, Latin America and the United States, this book traces the myths and application of luxury within architecture, interiors and designed landscapes. Spanning from antiquity to the modern era, it sets out six historical categories of luxury - Sybaritic, Lucullan, architectural excess, rustic, neoEuropean and modern - and relates these to the built and unbuilt environment, taking different cultural contexts and historical periods into consideration. It studies some of the ethical questions raised by the nature of luxury in architecture and discusses whether architectural luxury is an unqualified benefit or something which should only be present within strict limits. The author argues how the ideas of permissible and impermissible luxury have informed architecture and how these notions of ethical approval have changed from one context to another. Providing voluptuous settings for the nobles and the leisure class, luxury took the form of not only grand palaces, but also follies, country and suburban houses, private or public entertainment venues and ornate skyscrapers with fast lifts. The Architecture of Luxury proposes that in Western societies the growth of the leisure classes and their desire for various settings for pleasure resulted in a constantly increasing level of ’luxury’ sought within everyday architecture.

How a pioneering merchant blended religion and business to create a unique American shopping experience On Christmas Eve, 1911, John Wanamaker stood in the middle of his elaborately decorated department store building in Philadelphia as shoppers milled around him picking up last minute Christmas presents. On that night, as for years to come, the store was filled with the sound of Christmas carols sung by thousands of shoppers, accompanied by the store’s Great Organ. Wanamaker recalled that moment in his diary, “I said to myself that I was in a temple,” a sentiment quite possibly shared by the thousands who thronged the store that night. Remembered for his store’s extravagant holiday decorations and displays, Wanamaker built one of the largest retailing businesses in the world and helped to define the American retail shopping experience. From the freedom to browse without purchase and the institution of one price for all customers to generous return policies, he helped to implement retailing conventions that continue to define American retail to this day. Wanamaker was also a leading Christian leader, participating in the major Protestant moral reform movements from his youth until his death in 1922. But most notably, he found ways to bring his religious commitments into the life of his store. He focused on the religious and moral development of his employees, developing training programs and summer camps to build their character, while among his clientele he sought to cultivate a Christian morality through decorum and taste. Wanamaker’s Temple examines how and why Wanamaker blended business and religion in his Philadelphia store, offering a historical exploration of the relationships between religion, commerce, and urban life in the late nineteenth and early twentieth century and illuminating how they merged in unexpected and public ways. Wanamaker's marriage of religion and retail had a pivotal role in the way American Protestantism was expressed and shaped in American life, and opened a new door for the intertwining of personal values with public commerce.