Built at the beginning of the 20th century by the Bauhaus-inspired architect Rob Mallet-Stevens in Hyères in Southern France, the Villa de Noailles is a place of timeless modernity. Despite its incredible charm, the building was abandoned and fell into oblivion, but was rediscovered in the early 1990s as the embodiment of what was regarded “modern” toward the end of the last century. Artists such as Man Ray, Luis Buñuel, Salvador Dalí and Jean Cocteau lived and worked here, inspiring and taking inspiration from their hosts. The dream of modernity slowly succumbed to the passage of time, the wear and tear of war leaving little more than shadows of an architecture behind. In this volume, Karl Lagerfeld explores its secrets with his camera.